Xie Shichen (1487-1567), a native of Suzhou, was a Ming Dynasty calligrapher and painter. The character 樗仙, also spelled Si Zhong, is also known as the Fan Xian Zi and the Tiger Hill Mountain Man. Noh poems, gongshu, shanli books. Good at landscape, Fa Wu Zhen, Shen Zhou, to its intention and slightly changed, self-proclaimed "private Shu Shi Weng has a year", Song and Yuan families of brushwork are all learned, next to the Zhejiang school Dai Jin, Wu Wei, painting style is between the "Wu school" and "Zhejiang school", its painting can be said to be the confluence of literati painting and painting, elegant and customary can be appreciated. The "Ming Painting Record" praised Shi Chen for "being quite a barrier, having a great deal of courage, and not without a disease of reason, which is also the dai and Wu Erjia sects."
Xie Shichen is a painter who loves to travel through landscapes, he is keen to visit famous mountains and rivers, and collects the wonders and beauty of nature in his paintings. Looking at his paintings, landscapes can be said to be his favorite expressive themes. Multi-structured as a long scroll of giant mantle, known for being good at painting water, rivers, lakes and seas, all excellent. It is also made of overlapping mountains, towering and steep, pen and ink or fine and vigorous, or strong and deep, or vertical and horizontal, rich in change. The gestures are bold, the structure is dense, the depiction is delicate, and the colors are light.
In his paintings, the characters are extremely dashing, and the rivers, lakes and seas are all wonderful. The pen is quite bold, and the long scroll is long and horizontal. Imitating Li Tang's pen and ink, the composition is majestic, and the pen and ink are strong and old, which can be described as a typical Zhejiang style. With both Shen Shitian's stout connotation and the great momentum of Dai and Wu Ergong, it was highly praised by the people at that time. But after Wen Zhengming's death, the influence of literati painting swept the painting world, the "Four Kings" landscape sounded all over the world, and Xie Shichen's paintings began to slowly disappear from the mainstream vision.
He once put forward the painting concept of "heaven and god, entertainment and Tao survival", that is, to achieve the pursuit of harmony with the spirit of heaven and earth in the leisurely tour, which is a summary of his artistic experience of traveling between mountains and rivers and feeling the magnificence of famous mountains and rivers. In his early years, Xie Shichen marched between the five lakes and three rivers, pursuing the state of freedom depicted in Zhuangzi's "Getaway": "Pengzhi migrated to the south of the muye, the water hit three thousand miles, and the one who shook the rock was ninety thousand miles".
The style presented by Xie Shichen's picture and Zhuangzi's literary style can be said to be the same, and there is a sense of arrogance and strangeness. However, Xie Shichen mainly pursues the "body tour" trend embodied in the picture, and lacks the state of "virtual room and whiteness" that Zhuangzi needs to have for the "heart tour". Therefore, although Jiang Shaoshu commented in the "History of Silent Poetry" that he was "good at painting, quite courageous, long scrolls and huge curtains, vertical and horizontal", he also turned sharply after him, pointing out that Xie Shichen's paintings were "more than imposing, and Shao Xiu was insufficient".