The pine trees river theme arrives on silk in this landscape scroll painting, calm and fully resolved. The overall effect is serene rather than showy, suited to a room meant for lingering. Among pieces of chinese landscape wall art, this is the quiet kind: balanced, calm, and easy to live with.
The painter uses mist as a veil, revealing the mountains in stages. The wash work is confident, pooling and thinning exactly where it should. Falling water provides the one note of motion in an otherwise still world. In the middle distance, the pine trees anchors the painting's sense of place. The river is a band of pale wash, calm and unbroken. Blue-green mountains give the scene its distinctive mineral glow.
It keeps good company with the finest serene chinese wall decor, the kind that rewards daily looking. It is the kind of piece guests ask about, and owners never tire of answering. Give it time; the best pictures are slow company.
