Xú Wèi 徐渭 (1521–1593; CBDB 30607), zì Wénchāng 文長, hào Qīngténg 青藤 (also Tiānchí Shānrén 天池山人 and Qīngténg Dàoshì 青藤道士), of Shàoxīng 紹興 (Zhèjiāng). One of the most celebrated and eccentric figures of the mid-to-late Míng period, distinguished in painting, calligraphy, drama, prose, and military strategy.
Xú passed no examination beyond the xiùcái level despite repeated attempts. In the 1550s he served as a strategist (mùyǒu 幕友) in the secretariat of the Fújiàn and Zhèjiāng military commander Hú Zōngxiàn 胡宗憲, contributing to the anti-Wōkòu 倭寇 campaigns. After Hú’s fall and execution, Xú suffered a breakdown and killed his wife in a fit of madness (1565); he was imprisoned for seven years before being released through the intercession of friends including Zhāng Tiānfù 張天復. The remainder of his life was spent in poverty, eccentricity, and prolific artistic production.
As a painter Xú Wèi pioneered the expressive ink-splash (pòmò 潑墨) style of flower-and-plant painting that became enormously influential in later Chinese art. As a calligrapher he was noted for his wild cursive script (kuángcǎo 狂草). Wilkinson (§31.0) lists him among the literary-cultural arbiters of the mid-Míng whose sensibility influenced taste in later periods.
His dramatic works include the famous Sì Shēng Yuán 四聲猿 (Four cries of the gibbon), four short zájù plays. His prose writings — essays, letters, and miscellanea — are collected in the Xú Wénchāng sānjí 徐文長三集 and similar compilations.
The Yīngliè Zhuàn 英烈傳 (KR4k0078) and its sequel Xù Yīngliè Zhuàn (KR4k0079) are attributed to Xú Wèi on their title pages, but scholarly consensus regards this attribution as uncertain and possibly a later editorial ascription.
One of Xú’s art names, Tiānshuǐyuè 天水月, is a visual pun on the character 渭 (the three components of the character wèi read separately: sky + water + moon), as noted by Wilkinson (§2.1.3).