Construction Of The Concept Of Wang Wei Image In The History Of Painting

This thesis discusses how "Wang Wei" as an image had been constructed in the history of painting. As a distinguished pastoral poet of the Tang Dynasty, Wang Wei established his unique position in the literally world with his "refreshing state of ease", "intangible nature of beauty" and "profoundness" in poetry. Though equally professional in painting, Wang Wei had not received significant recognition from art critics in Tang Dynasty. It was not until the late Ming that he got a distinctive status as a painter. At that time he was regarded as father of "South-School of Landscape" and father of "Literati Painting". The change in Wang Wei's status is intriguing. One might find an important reason for such a change from people's opinions of Wang Wei in the Northern Song Dynasty ("N. Song" for short). By looking into the appreciation of Wang Wei given by people in N. Song Dynasty, this thesis suggests that, with words, arts and imagination, people in N. Song had constructed a "Wang Wei" which did not exist in the reality of the Tang Dynasty but lived in particular context of N. Song culture. Later, the new "Wang Wei" interpreted by the N. Song people had been cited, retold and reconstructed. In this way, the image of "Wang Wei" deepened as the literary texts about Wang Wei historicized.During the late Ming Dynasty there had been a group of critics who created an orthodox of landscape painting and whose concern was some theoretical issues of painting. They admired Wang Wei and considered him to be the father of "literary painting", which was further developed thanks to the Ming intellectuals' preference for it. Such a preference was based on N Song people's construction of "Wang Wei". After the late Ming intellectuals had built "Wang Wei" as the father of "Literati Painting", "Wang Wei" became a highly abstract concept, and as the theory of "Literati Painting" were further developed and became more influential, all these construction become preconception of the future generation when they made a historical narrative of the painter Wang Wei.