‘Painting-like’ and ‘lifelike’: Two ideas in artificial mountain making in Ye Xie’s ‘on artificial mountains’

Abstract

One of the most important and significant elements of a Chinese garden is the man-made feature of artificial mountains. This element embodies the cultural theme of shanshui 山水(mountains and rivers) and produces a distinctive and recognisable visual effect. Scholars note that artificial mountains became a principal feature of garden design during the 17th century, a time when garden culture was especially prosperous. In the lower Yangtze river delta area of Jiangnan during the late-Ming period, the artificial mountain became almost indispensable for a garden. Crucial insights about the art of mountain making in 17th-century Jiangnan have been provided by the work of contemporary scholars who base their work on some important historical texts such as ‘Biography of Zhang Nanyuan’ (Zhang Nanyuan zhuan 張南垣傳) by Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–1672), Craft of Gardens (Yuan ye園冶, c.1630–35) by Ji Cheng 計成 (b.1582) and Casual Expressions of Idle Feeling (Xianqing ouji 閑情偶寄) by Li Yu 李漁 (1611– 1680). There is, however, another text that may provide important new insight into the art of 17th-century artificial mountain making. ‘On Artificial Mountains’ (Jiashan shuo假山說), a translation of which is appended to this article, was written by Ye Xie 葉燮 (1627–1703), a well-known literary theorist whose work The Origins of Poetry (Yuan shi 原詩) is considered the first serious attempt at a comprehensive and organised poetics since Liu Xie’s 劉勰 (c. 465–522) The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons (Wenxin diaolong 文心雕 龍). Mostly elided by contemporary scholarship until now, only two texts have afforded it some limited discussion. Jin Xuezhi notices Ye’s ideas of zhen 真 (true/natural) and jia 假 (false/artificial) in his book Chinese Garden Aesthetics (Zhongguo yuanlin meixue中國園林美學). An essay by Qiu Chunlin introduces Ye’s questioning of ‘garden imitating painting’ with a brief discussion about the historical background. Unfortunately, both of these mentions of Ye Xie and his ideas tend to be somewhat simplistic as neither enters into an accurate and penetrating understanding of the garden-making ideas of the 17th century. Ye Xie’s text is somewhat unusual in Chinese garden history because of the rare form it takes. Ye Xie uses dialogue to express his ideas and to offer a critique of the opposing view. It is precisely this form that carries a special theoretical and historical significance, and helps us to elaborate our understanding of apparently conflicting ideas about artificial mountain making. The polemic within the essay works to evoke the notion that, while some ideas had dominance over others, in fact a variety of ideas on artificial mountain making were present in the specific region and period. In this text, both the idea that Ye opposes and the idea he supports can be distinguished by the two key concepts of ‘painting-like’ (ruhua 如畫) and ‘lifelike’ (rusheng 如生), respectively. The presence of both of these concepts prompts a further study of the text’s historical context. An accurate analysis of ‘On Artificial Mountains’ by Ye Xie can lead us to a better understanding of the ideas, as well as the features, of artificial mountain making in Jiangnan gardens during the 17th century.