Dong Yuan - Works

Works

The Xiao and Xiang Rivers or Scenes along the Xiao and Xiang Rivers, a painting on silk (49.80 cm by 141.30 cm), is one of his best-known masterpieces. It demonstrates his exquisite techniques, and his sense of composition. The clouds break the background mountains into a central pyramid composition and a secondary pyramid, by softening the mountain line, he makes the immobile effect more pronounced.

The inlet by breaking the landscape into groups makes the serenity of the foreground more pronounced, instead of simply being a border to the composition, it is a space of its own, into which the boat on the far right intrudes, even though it is tiny compared to the mountains. Left of center, he uses his unusual brush stroke techniques, later copied in countless paintings, to give a strong sense of foliage to the trees, which contrasts with the rounded waves of stone that make up the mountains themselves. This gives the painting a more distinct middle ground, and makes the mountains have an aura and distance which gives them greater grandeur and personality. He also used "face like" patterns in the mountain on the right. Another of Dong Yuan's painting The Riverbank is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and was a gift from New York financier Oscar Tang.