SONG XU (1525-1606) Treading through Snow on Wufeng，1579

SONG XU (1525-1606)
Treading through Snow on Wufeng，1579
Hanging scroll, ink and color on silk, inscribed by the artist with a title in clerical script, and dated Wanli jimao, signed Song Xu, with three artist's seals.
52 1/4 x 12 1/2in (132.8 x 31.8cm)
Footnotes:
宋旭 (1525-1606) 五峰蹋雪 設色絹本 立軸 一五七九年作

款識：五峰蹋雪。萬曆己卯春孟雨雪不止，因策杖過萬玉菴，探梅暮歸笠川草堂。是夜寒甚，相共擁爐啜茗，乘興作此。槜李宋旭初暘甫記事

鈐印：初暘、石門生、宋旭之印

Provenance:
Collection of Chang Fo-Chuan (1908-1992)

來源：
張佛泉（1908-1992）舊藏

Song Xu was a native of Jiaxing who relocated to Songjiang at the beginning of the Wanli period (1573-1619). He was skilled as both a landscape and figure painter, although most of his surviving compositions are landscapes, and of those, several depict actual locations. His famous depiction of the Five Sacred Mountains (五丘圖), dated 1588 and now in the collection of the Palace Museum, exemplifies his approach to topographical painting.

This snow landscape depicts Shandong's Wufeng Mountain, so-named for its five peaks at the summit. With soft tonal values and subtle hues of color the artist contrasts a gray-washed sky with the snow-covered hills. Punctuated in ink with whiskers of trees on the mountain's slope, and the spare winter growth gives the painting a rhythmic vitality. A red-robed figure crosses a bridge, his servant behind, and the steep climb to the temple seems daunting as the artist takes advantage of the vertical composition.

It is known from his writings that Song Xu visited many of the places he depicted in his landscapes. A devout Buddhist, the artist would often lodge at monasteries during his travels.