Title: Chinese painting - Wikipedia
Headings: Chinese painting
Chinese painting
Contents
Specifics and study
Early periods
Six principles
Sui, Tang and Five dynasties (581–979)
Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan dynasties (907–1368)
Late imperial China (1368–1895)
Modern painting
Since 1978
Iconography in Chinese painting
Water Mill
Image as Word: Rebus
The Donkey Rider
Realm of the Immortals
Images of women
Landscape Painting
Paradigm Shift in Chinese Landscape Representation
Buddhist and Taoist influences on Chinese Landscape painting
Early landscape painting
Dyads
Art as cartography
See also
Notes
References
Further reading
External links

Content: Early periods
Painting from the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 CE), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Animalistic guardian spirits of midnight and morning wearing Chinese robes, Han dynasty (202 BCE – 220 CE) on ceramic tile
The earliest paintings were not representational but ornamental; they consisted of patterns or designs rather than pictures. Early pottery was painted with spirals, zigzags, dots, or animals. It was only during the Eastern Zhou (770–256 BC) that artists began to represent the world around them. In imperial times (beginning with the Eastern Jin dynasty ), painting and calligraphy in China were among the most highly appreciated arts in the court and they were often practiced by amateurs—aristocrats and scholar-officials—who had the leisure time necessary to perfect the technique and sensibility necessary for great brushwork. Calligraphy and painting were thought to be the purest forms of art. The implements were the brush pen made of animal hair, and black inks made from pine soot and animal glue. In ancient times, writing, as well as painting, was done on silk. However, after the invention of paper in the 1st century AD, silk was gradually replaced by the new and cheaper material. Original writings by famous calligraphers have been greatly valued throughout China's history and are mounted on scrolls and hung on walls in the same way that paintings are.