Shitao

Timeline

1. 1642–1679Xuancheng · AnhuiZhu Ruoji was a descendant of the Ming Prince of Jingjiang; as a child he witnessed the fall of the dynasty, his father's generation was killed in Southern Ming factional strife, and he fled into monastic life, taking the names Yuanji and Daoji. In the 1660s he moved from Wuchang to Anhui, studying painting on his own in temples at Xuancheng and Huangshan. His 1667 handscroll 'Sixteen Arhats' already shows figure observation and assimilation of late Ming stylized painting.
2. 1680–1692Jiangning · JiangsuIn the 1680s he moved to Jiangning, built Yizhi Pavilion, and befriended Ming loyalists and officials. When the Kangxi Emperor toured the south in the 23rd and 28th years of his reign, Shitao received him twice at Nanjing and Yangzhou, presenting poems and paintings. In 1690 he went north to the capital seeking patronage and monastic rank; he mingled with the powerful but secured no stable support, and returned south around 1692.
3. 1692–1707Yangzhou · JiangsuAfter returning south he made Yangzhou his final home, building Datie Thatched Hall east of the city around 1697, living by selling paintings and also arranging rocks. Late in life he compiled his painting theory into the eighteen chapters of 'Monk Bitter Gourd's Record of Painting', proposing 'one brushstroke' as the root of all methods, opposing rigid adherence to antiquity, and stressing 'sketching from all marvelous peaks'. He died of illness around 1707 and was buried in Yangzhou.