Artists › Painters and Calligraphers
Wang Lu
Kunshan physician and painter of the late Yuan and early Ming who climbed Mount Hua in 1383 and painted it in a forty-leaf album
A desk holds an unrolled sheet bearing three bold black ink strokes, with a rack of many brushes above it, a stone ink slab and ink stick, a porcelain bowl, a red lacquer box, a dish of red seal paste and a paperweight; a small seated figure shows through a round window onto bamboo.
Also known as Zi Andao · Hao Jisou
Wang Lu, courtesy name Andao, came from Kunshan in Jiangsu. A physician trained under Zhu Zhenheng, he wrote the medical treatise Yijing suhui ji, and he was also a poet and painter. In 1383, while in Shaanxi, he climbed Mount Hua and on his return painted the forty-leaf Album of Mount Hua from what he had seen, adding a preface that declared 'I take my mind as teacher, my mind takes my eyes, and my eyes take Mount Hua', a plea for painting from real mountains rather than models. The album, his only surviving painting, is now divided between the Palace Museum, Beijing, and the Shanghai Museum.
Yuan
Ming