Asian Art website: Scroll for Zhang Datong

Although Huang's bold running-script style is one of the most original in the history of Chinese art, it was partly based on the strangely shaped characters of Eulogy on Burying a Crane, a long-forgotten inscription carved on a cliff, which he believed to be from the hand of the revered calligrapher Wang Xizhi (303—361). Huang wrote this scroll while ill, yet despite his weakened condition, an impression of his inner vitality and physical power is transmitted through each character.