Huìshì bèikǎo 繪事備考
A Compendious Reference for Painting Matters by 王毓賢 (Wáng Yùxián, fl. 1691, 清, zhuàn 撰)
About the work
An 8-juàn (in fact 10, since juàn 5 is divided into three sub-volumes for the abundant Northern Sòng material) chronological dictionary of Chinese painters, by Wáng Yùxián 王毓賢 (zì Xīngjù 星聚), Hànjūn 漢軍 Xiānghóngqí 鑲紅旗, who rose to Húguǎng ànchá shǐ 湖廣按察使. The book was compiled in Kāngxī xīnwèi 康熙辛未 (1691) while Wáng was serving in the Húguǎng judicial office. Juàn 1 is zǒnglùn 總論 — a synthesis of painting methods from various sources; juàn 2–8 are the painter biographies, organized by dynasty: juàn 2 covers Xuānyuán 軒轅 (the Yellow Emperor) through Suí; juàn 3 the Táng; juàn 4 the Five Dynasties; juàn 5 (in three sub-volumes) the Northern Sòng; juàn 6 the Southern Sòng; juàn 7 the Liáo, Jīn and Yuán; juàn 8 the Míng. Each painter has a short biography followed by a list of his transmitted famous pieces. Wáng’s principal model is Zhāng Yànyuǎn’s 張彥遠 Lìdài mínghuà jì 歷代名畫記 and Xià Wényàn’s 夏文彥 Túhuì bǎojiàn 圖繪寶鑑 KR3h0040, extending their lists and adding much. He fills the late-Míng gap by drawing on Hán Áng’s 韓昂 Túhuì bǎojiàn xùbiān 圖繪寶鑑續編, which however only reaches Zhèngdé (1505–1521) — so for the Jiājìng and later Wáng has no source and leaves the entry incomplete. The Sìkù critics flag a particular evidential error inherited from Zhāng Yànyuǎn: the Mùtiānzǐzhuàn phrase “Fēng Mò huà yú Héshuǐ zhī yáng” (Fēng Mò drew on the north shore of the Yellow River) — where 畫 means “drew” — is mistakenly understood by Zhāng (and by Wáng following him) as 畫 (paint), making “Fēng Mò” the Father of Painting; the Sìkù critics note that Guō Pú’s commentary makes clear that 膜畫 is in fact a personal name, with no painting involved at all.
Tiyao
We have respectfully examined: Huìshì bèikǎo in eight juàn, by Wáng Yùxián of the present dynasty. Yùxián, zì Xīngjù, of the Hànjūn Xiānghóngqí, finally Provincial Judicial Commissioner of Húguǎng. Chén Dǐng’s 陳鼎 Liúxī wàizhuàn 留溪外傳 records the prison-officer Wāng Jīnzhāng’s affair, saying that Yùxián was diligent in administrative work, leaving no documents pending — so his strengths were originally as a lìcái 吏才 (administrative talent). Yet this compilation was made in Kāngxī xīnwèi (1691) while he was serving as Provincial Judicial Commissioner — showing he could also give attention to connoisseurial scholarship. Juàn 1 is zǒnglùn — extracts from the various authors’ painting-method writings. Juàn 2–8 take the names, biographies and incidents of past painters and arrange them by dynasty: from Xuānyuán to Suí makes one juàn; LiáoJīnYuán together one juàn; Táng, Five Dynasties, Southern Sòng and Míng each their own juàn. Only the Northern Sòng houses are abundant — so this is split into three sub-volumes. Total: nominally eight juàn, in fact ten. The entries each give a short biography followed by the named transmitted pieces. The work takes Zhāng Yànyuǎn’s Lìdài mínghuà jì and Xià Wényàn’s Túhuì bǎojiàn as base, broadening into areas they did not cover; the gathering is quite full. However: as for the Mùtiānzǐzhuàn “Fēng Mò huà yú Héshuǐ zhī yáng” — Guō Pú’s commentary clearly states “膜畫 is a personal name”; Zhāng Yànyuǎn erroneously took 晝 as 畫 and accordingly called Fēng Mò the ancestor of painters, and forged a Pú-commentary to vouch for it; Yùxián followed the error without correcting it — a failure of textual checking. Further, Cháng Sīyán 常思言 of the Liáo, with high human and painterly grades, is mentioned in Guō Ruòxū’s 郭若虛 Túhuà jiànwén zhì 圖畫見聞志, but the other books lose his name; Yùxián too omits him. As for the Míng painters, he relies only on Hán Áng’s Túhuì bǎojiàn xùbiān, which reaches only Zhèngdé (1505–1521); from Jiājìng onwards there is no continuation — also incomplete. Yet earlier writers such as Lǐ Sīzhēn, Shì Yàncóng, Liú Dàochún — these often distinguish grades by criteria mixing time-periods, hard to navigate. This book follows the Zhāng and Xià examples and arranges by period and category, simply browsable; it also trims redundancy, easy to retrieve. Although it uses much old language, it does not fall into the dìxiāng zǔjì zhī bìng (the fault of unbroken family inheritance of stale text). Respectfully collated, Qiánlóng 43 (1778), sixth month.
Abstract
The Huìshì bèikǎo, completed in 1691, is one of the principal Qīng painter-dictionaries before the imperial KR3h0061 Yùdìng Pèiwénzhāi shūhuà pǔ (1708) superseded it. Wáng’s strengths and weaknesses are exactly those identified by the Sìkù: a clear chronological structure and convenient retrieval but inadequate evidential checking and an incomplete late-Míng / early-Qīng cutoff. The work is the principal source for tracing painter biographies in the gap between Xià Wényàn’s Túhuì bǎojiàn (mid-Yuán) and the Pèiwénzhāi compilations (early eighteenth century). Wáng’s biographical preface (the yuánxù dated Kāngxī 30 / 7 = autumn 1691, signed “SānHán Wáng Yùxián” — SānHán identifying him as a Yongning bannerman) and the preface’s enumeration of nearly thirty earlier painting-record traditions consulted is itself one of the principal bibliographies of pre-Qīng painting literature.
Translations and research
- Cahill, James. The Distant Mountains. New York: Weatherhill, 1982.
- Bush, Susan, and Hsio-yen Shih (eds). Early Chinese Texts on Painting. Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1985.
- Yú Jiànhuá 俞劍華 (ed.). Zhōngguó měishùjiā rénmíng cídiǎn 中國美術家人名辭典. Shanghai: Shanghai Rénmín měishù chū-bǎn-shè, 1981. [Uses the Huì-shì bèi-kǎo as one of its principal sources.]
- No standalone Western-language monograph on the Huì-shì bèi-kǎo.