Hearts and HeavenLy Journeys Who Knows (Part 2)

Shen Zhou (1427-1509), also spelled Qinan, Shi Tian, and Bai Shi Weng, was a Ming Dynasty master of painting, calligrapher, writer, and physician, a native of Changzhou (present-day Suzhou, Jiangsu).

Shen Zhou came from a wealthy family of calligraphy and painting, learning poetry from Chen Kuan when he was young, and learning painting from his uncle Shen Zhen in his youth, as well as Liu Jue, Du Qiong, Zhao Tonglu and others. Throughout his life, he studied at home, sang poetry and painting, traveled to forest springs, pursued spiritual freedom, never been recruited by the imperial examination, and always lived a pastoral and secluded life.

Shen Zhou, together with Wen Zhengming, Tang Yin, and Qiu Ying, also known as the "Ming Four Families", is the founder of the Wumen School of Painting, he studied under the Four Schools of Fayuan, and traced back to Dong Yuan and Juran, while bypassing the Southern Song Dynasty courtyard body painting and the Zhejiang School, forming a unique personal style, which has played a role in the field of literati painting since the Yuan and Ming Dynasties.

Episode 1 Review: Heart and Heaven Who Knows (Part 1) Heart and Sky Tour Who Knows (Middle)

There are bamboo houses

Shen Zhou began in middle age, less than a mile west of his ancestral home Xizhuang, located in the countryside, and close to the lake and river to build another business, named "Youzhuju" also known as "Youzhuzhuang". Sun Chengze wrote in the "Records of Gengzi Pinxia": "Shi Weng placed a bamboo village, tasted the sparse to raise bamboo, and its things were very charming. "Shu" refers to the Buddhist word for "collecting fortunes," that is, the words used to raise money and goods. When Shen Zhou built a bamboo village, he once sent a letter of favor to a friend for bamboo, which was passed down as a good story by posterity.

Hearts and HeavenLy Journeys Who Knows (Part 2)

Ming Shen Zhou's "There are bamboo neighbors". © Shanghai Museum

After the completion of the bamboo residence, it became a good place for Shen Zhou and his friends to gather and appreciate antiquities, and also witnessed the lifelong friendship between Shen Zhou and his best friend. The image of the bamboo house has become a social means here, not only to invite friends to write inscriptions on the scroll, forming an interaction between collectors and friends, but also conveying the welcome to friends to visit.

Ming Shen Zhou "Bonju Yu Appreciation Map" volume. © Liaoning Provincial Museum

Located on the outskirts of Xiangcheng, Youzhuju not only became a mansion for Shen Zhou to escape the heat of the summer, but also provided a safe place for Shen Zhou to live in peace. If there were no friends to visit, Shen Zhou would sleep with a high pillow, sweep the floor and burn incense, and still copy books and paintings every day, and practice meditation.

Ming Shen Zhou's "Nine Duan Jin" book of "Qingshan Mangrove Tree". © Kyoto National Museum, Japan

The elderly Shen Zhou "less in the city and more in the countryside" and lived in the countryside for a long time. Occasionally, after a day in the city, they will eagerly return home. The city of Suzhou is becoming more and more prosperous, but Shen Zhou, who is willing to accept new things, has little interest in it.

According to the "Gusu Zhi", there are four temples on the four sides of Gusu City: East Zen, North Zen, South Zen and Yongding. Xichan Temple was located in the west of Gusu City and was later merged into Yongding Temple. When he was a teenager, Shen Zhou stayed in Suzhou with his father Shen Heng and stayed in the Xichan Temple in the city, and since then, Shen Zhou's friendship with the monk Ming Gong has lasted for more than thirty years. Shen Zhou laughed at himself as a country man, who had never lived in the downtown area every time he entered the city for more than thirty years, and if he wanted to stay overnight, he would definitely go to the Xichan Temple to find Ming Gong. Ming Gong intimately did not come to disturb, so Shen Zhou also lived in the Zen Temple.

Ming Shen Zhou "Fourteen Nights and Moon Chart". © Museum, Boston, USA

The monks knew that Shen Zhou was good at painting, and often asked for paintings when Shen Zhou was spending the night, and Shen Zhou was also happy to show his painting skills to thank the monks for their hospitality. Shen Zhou Kesu Zen Temple is not all for meditation, but more to find a clean place to read and paint. In addition to the Xichan Temple, Shen Zhou also often traveled to and from the Dongchan Temple in Suzhou.

During the season when the famous flowers are in full bloom, watching the flowers with friends and gathering banquets is an important part of Shen Zhou's daily life and social activities.

Ming Shen Zhou "There is a bamboo village Mid-Autumn Moon Appreciation Chart". © Shanghai Museum

As he grew older, Shen Zhou reduced his going out and became more and more fond of listening to stories. Therefore, the people of Suzhou City came to youzhuju to tell him stories. Originally a secluded rural courtyard, every day became noisy, Shen Zhou felt that it was also very good, he "built a hundred guest halls, every near twilight, will open the feast four people."

Ming Shen Zhou "There is a bamboo village Mid-Autumn Moon Appreciation Chart" (partial). © Shanghai Museum

Everyone knows that Shen Zhou is good at hearing strange stories, so some people have a big brain and make up some stories to change Shen Zhou's paintings, "those who want to get their pictures, the things that are strange and strange are moved, poor, or made up, so there are many people who lose them." As a result, Shen Zhou's painting debts seem to never be finished, and he does not care, he enjoys it, writing down these true and false stories and leaving them for posterity to taste.

Ming Shen Zhou's "Zhile Pavilion" of dongzhuang atlas. © Nanjing Museum

At that time, there were many imitators of Shen Zhou's poetry and paintings, and the most dramatic thing was that some people "either made a fake work and asked for a problem to sell", and Shen Zhou "was also happy to respond", he obviously did not measure this behavior by absolute standards of right and wrong, or treated it leniently, or was happy to help it.

Once, someone came to ask for a painting and gave Shen Zhou a long silk, and Shen Zhou painfully finished painting. Later, Shen Zhou wrote to Zhu Yunming to spit bitter water, feeling that the two had been busy with one painting and one book for nearly a year, and the rewards they received were only sporadic small sums of money, "the gift of the head is a false word, and the one who sees it is the ear of the star and silver." After this sentence, the word "huh" was added.

In short, people in a variety of ways, in the end, every family got a painting of Shen Zhou, and even "every family has had it for many years", "fake works have come to the capital", although I don't know if the painting is true or false, but the above inscriptions should be mostly true.

Happy life

Shen Zhou lived through the seven dynasties of Xuande, Zhengtong, Jingtai, Tianshun, Chenghua, Hongzhi, and Zhengde, and Shen Zhou lived in seclusion in the forest for life, and although he was recruited many times, he was not a person who forgot the world. Shen Zhou was always concerned about major state affairs, and his personal happiness was closely linked to the gains and losses of political affairs: "I am a farmer and a farmer, and I am governed by others. Whoever examines the gains and losses of the government is worried about me. Shen Zhou liked the famous sentence of Suzhou xiangxian Fan Zhongyan the most, "Before the world is worried and worried, after the world is happy and happy", often advising friends to "worry first and then be happy".

Ming Shen Zhou's "Green Mountain Mangrove Tree Map". © Tianjin Art Museum

The new generation of Wu Zhongcai after Shen Zhou has made great changes in the question of whether to become a career, like his students Tang Yin and Zhu Yunming, who are full of hope for their careers. Tang Yin went to the exam with pride. Shen Zhou also went with the crowd to feed him at Tiger Hill.

Ming Shen Zhou "Tiger Hill Farewell Map" volume. © Poly 2007 Autumn Auction

A month later, he was shocked to learn that Tang Yin was imprisoned for being involved in bribery in the science field, and at the same time, the chief examiner Cheng Minzheng was also imprisoned. When Cheng Minzheng was impeached due to the rain disaster, Shen Zhou was not afraid of the wind and rain storms, and struggled to speak out: "People go from today, when is the rain sunny?" "Give Cheng Minzheng support and comfort in spirit." Cheng Minzheng died soon after this huge blow. Shen Zhou could not suppress his grief, and wrote a poem for Cheng Minzheng in his grass hall to show his innocence: "A gentleman does not know that flies are evil, and the villain An Xinyu is flawless." ”

Tang Yin's career was hopeless, and he simply sold paintings for a living, and Shen Zhou also praised him. Tang Yin's friend Zhu Yunming was also unfavorable, and he enjoyed life while persistently taking the exam. Although he had many shortcomings, Shen Zhou could always see the most shining things in him, and always loved and appreciated this uninhibited descendant, and regarded him as a lifelong confidant.

In his later years, Shen Zhou's anxiety and worry about aging were finally relieved to see through the red dust, and relieved by indifferent death. A friend sent a coffin, and Shen Zhou wrote a poem to thank him for "He is worried about the white hair, life and death have been followed day and night", and even before he died, he had repaired his own grave: "If you look at who is not a guest, believe in death to return to this is home." When he found that the white hair was getting out of the way, Shen Zhou was open-minded: the grass was more and more years old, and the white hair was less and less. The grass promotes gray hair, as if it is afraid of people and does not grow old. The hair is white, and the grass can't be green. I'm a Rakuten, combing my hair against the grass.

If you face the fact of aging with the mentality of lotte knowing your destiny, you will no longer have any worries. "Behind you should be worried, and come to brush the mural Danqiu", in the face of endless worries, Shen Zhou depicts the Danqiu inhabited by the gods on the wall.

When Shen Zhou was eighty years old, he was still "blue and fluttering, like a god, with a strong spirit and painting as usual." In the fourth year of Zhengde (1509), the eighty-three-year-old Shen Zhou, at the invitation of his friend Wu Lun, went to Yixing, visited Shanjuan Cave, and composed Ji You poems and "Small Water Cave Map"; he also wrote "Ink Spring Map" for Ming, "Wen Bird Chrysanthemum Map" for Chu Zhai, and "Wu Shan Tu" after saying goodbye to Shen Yuxuan's rain; and "Jiangcun Rain Map" and "Du Fu Riding a Donkey Map" were also composed in the same year. On August 2 of that year, Shen Zhou died of illness and was buried near Xiangcheng. The student Wen Zhengming wrote the deed, and the old friend Wang Jun wrote the epitaph.

Shen Zhou's noble character, idyllic and gentle personality, as well as the extensive talent of poetry and painting, were deeply respected by people from all walks of life, and his reputation was highly respected in Wuzhong, spreading in all directions, and naturally became the grandmaster of Wumen Art Garden. He looked at life and death, used a wide-minded attitude, used painting and poetry to dispel his sorrows, and completed his seemingly calm and troubled life.

Resources:

"Shen Saturday Chronicle" Yang Zhibo Qin Xiaolei

"Ishida Dahu - Shen Zhou of the Wumen School", Suzhou Museum

◇ Some of the information in this article comes from Suzhou Museum, Palace Museum, Wuzhong Museum, Shanghai Museum, Nanjing Museum, etc

◇ The pictures not marked in this article come from the Internet, and the copyright belongs to the original author

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