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Boats Grappling Upstream
Full of small details meant to delight the imagination, this album leaf reveals the texture of life in rural China. Using grappling hooks on long poles, men in five small transport boats negotiate the bend of a river and work their way upstream. Arriving from the opposite direction, similar boats land at a village market and unload their wares. From a pavilion perched above the swift current, two men let down a rope and bucket to draw water. Red-walled shrines or temples overlook the stream. Birds wheel over the roofs and watchtowers of a nearby city.
This leaf originally was folded in the middle; the viewer would have opened it to reveal its content, like turning the page of a book. A meticulous work by an unidentified eighteenth-century artist, the painting bears a forged signature of the Yuan dynasty painter Wang Yuan (ca. 1280–after 1349) at lower left. |