In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

119 Chapter  Epilogue he foregoing discussions amply demonstrate that narrative illustration continued to hold a significant place in the elite visual culture of late imperial China. Illustrated stories offered highly educated male viewers admonition and guidance, as well as inspiration and enjoyment. Much of the time such pictures can be clearly distinguished from paintings whose primary purpose was to be “artistic.” The difference involves the discursive categories of tu and hua.1 Visual depiction (tu) showed what things look like and was complementary to verbal representation (shu),2 while visual expression (hua) was the counterpart of verbal poetry (shi).3 Tu related to public concerns and furthered governance, and hua provided an outlet for the private and personal. Tu derived value from subject matter, hua from spirit consonance and brushwork. Tu was purposeful depiction, and hua was art for art’s sake. Without question, illustrations of historical events and exemplary lives were tu. With few exceptions, writers in recent centuries have focused their attentions on hua, following Dong Qichang, who emphasized calligraphic technique, dynamic composition, and visual allusion to ancient masters. Yet Dong’s contemporary, the “conservative ” critic Xie Zhaozhi, advocated realism, historical accuracy, and sound craftsmanship.4 Impatient with the kinds of expressionistic abstractions and sketchy homages to earlier painters that were increasingly in vogue, Xie lamented that contemporary artists rarely painted historical subjects, human figures, portraits of sages and Buddhas, or other such salutary themes. Unlike Dong, Xie maintained that paintings should serve didactic purposes and promote propriety. Other literati who were not renowned critics undoubtedly shared his views. Implicitly endorsing them as well, the Kangxi emperor wrote in 1707: “Pictures and painting are matters of art, but they approach the Way.”5 Such distinctions became blurred when paintings depicting moralistic narrative subjects circulated in the art market. Because the market prized works that purported to embody the unique personal qualities of ancient masters, narrative illustrations often carried false attributions to famous artists. But the subjects they depicted also contributed to their intrinsic worth, in contrast to paintings whose value depended almost entirely on the artist’s identity. When a painting ascribed to a renowned master was revealed as a forgery, it no longer enabled the owner or viewer to commune with a prestigious cultural figure from the past.6 However, a phony attribution did not invalidate the worthy content of pictures that illustrated exemplary themes. The moralistic narratives in a fake “Liu Songnian” Cultivating Rectitude scroll, for instance, retained positive meanings that highly educated collectors and viewers found significant regardless of the painter’s identity, but a forged “Ni Zan” was useless or even counterproductive for associating the owner with that lofty paragon of Yuan eremitism.7 Nonetheless, circulation in the art market also created the possibility that didactic illustrations might elicit the viewer or collector ’s superficial appreciation, rather than moral contemplation. The market transformed instructive or inspirational images into commodities. Writing in 1729, just months before the Yangzhou salt merchant Wang Qinweng bought the album depicting the life of Confucius (Plates 21, 22), Cheng Man suggested that the pictures were equivalent to a seven-foot piece of coral, a highly prized rarity.8 It is no wonder that Wei Zhizhang felt it was necessary to warn Wang not to treat the album like an extravagant bauble.9 To discourage that possibility, both writers devoted their colophons to the venerable subject of Confucius’s life, noting with approval that its visual representation was consistent with ancient texts. B 120 | m i r ror of mor a l i t y In a palace context, however, opulence was not considered a hindrance to didactic efficacy. The Ming officials who submitted beautiful albums of illustrated stories that were intended to mold young imperial pupils into ideal emperors believed that a prince would naturally absorb desirable moral lessons while enjoying the pictures. As Huo Tao and Zou Shouyi wrote in their 1539 memorial offering Pictures of Sagely Merit to the Jiajing emperor’s heir: We hope that the sage emperor [Jiajing] will glance at it and say whether our painted picture-album will have some slight usefulness as a means of making the heir apparent into a sage, and that he will order [palace] attendants who are careful and honest to take our painted picture-album in sometimes for the heir apparent to see and enjoy. There is no need to lecture and explain the meaning of the texts. Just by contemplating the pictorial images, he will get the...

Share