Writers › Writer / Poet
Wang Wei (Liu Song)
Liu Song scholar of the Langye Wang clan, courtesy name Jingxuan, versed in calligraphy, painting, music and medicine, who repeatedly declined office; his Xu Hua is an early treatise on painting.
In a study at night, a desk holds a brush pot, a porcelain vase with a plum branch, a lit red lantern, a folded fan and an unrolled blank scroll, with no one seated there, while through a round window the moon rises over a lake with a sailboat.
Also known as Courtesy name Jingxuan · Wang Hui (variant in Gu Shi Yuan)
Wang Wei, courtesy name Jingxuan, came from Linyi in Langye (modern Linyi, Shandong). He was broadly talented, skilled in calligraphy, painting, prose, music, medicine and divination, and often declined office; he served as libationer to the Grand Commandant, aide to Liu Jun, Prince of Shixing, and Palace Gentleman of the Crown Prince, and was posthumously made Director of the Palace Library. His Xu Hua is an early essay on painting; the Jade Terrace anthology keeps his Miscellaneous Poem, which the Gu Shi Yuan credits to 'Wang Hui'.
Life and times
Dates 415 CE–453 CE