Bamboo and Calligraphy,

1750

Jin Nong was often described by friends as an "extreme eccentric." In 1736, he traveled to Beijing to take an examination for select scholars; for unknown reasons, he evaded sitting the exam, thereby ending his chance at an official career. Jin then lived off his considerable talents as a poet, painter, and calligrapher. During the 1740s, he developed an archaistic "lacquer script," a forceful, square-ended, block-character style modeled after calligraphy from the third century. He named his script after a type of flat-edged brush used for the application of lacquer, which was perfectly suited for making square-end strokes. Jin was singularly devoted to painting bamboo and even planted a bamboo grove in front of his studio in order to study it and watch it grow. This piece combines Jin’s love of bamboo imagery with characters written in his distinctive lacquer script calligraphy.