The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of March 19, 2025

Man, Buffalo, and Calf

1145
(Chinese, active c. 1145)
China, Southern Song dynasty (1127-1279)
album leaf; ink and color on silk
Image: 25 x 26.7 cm (9 13/16 x 10 1/2 in.); with mat: 33.3 x 40.5 cm (13 1/8 x 15 15/16 in.)
Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 1960.41
Location: not on view

Did You Know?

Li You included such tiny details as circular patterns of hair on the buffalo’s hindquarters.

Description

Here, a herdboy tending a cow with a calf is sitting beneath a tree with his pet myna bird. The painting can be read as a pastoral scene. As the water buffalo helped plow the fields, it was perceived as an animal that endures hard work without gain for itself, often interpreted as a metaphor for the official.

Ox-herding pictures, presented as gifts in court circles, were used for their moral and political rhetoric. The Yijing (Book of Changes) states, The Receptive is the earth, the mother . . . it is a cow with a calf . . . the multitude [in relation to the ruler].
  • ?–1960
    (J.T. Tai sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)
    1960–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Cleveland Museum of Art, “Recent Acquisitions Press Release,” October 4, 1960, Cleveland Museum of Art Archives. archive.org
    Cahill, James. The Art of Southern Sung China. New York: Asia House, 1962. cat. no. 26
    Lee, Sherman E. and Wai-Kam Ho. "Scattered Pearls beyond the Ocean." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Feb., 1964), pp. 23-39. Reproduced: pp. 23-39, cat. no. 9 www.jstor.org
    Wang, Chi-chʻien. Album Leaves from the Sung and Yuan Dynasties: [Exhibition], March 26 Through May 30, 1970. New York: The [China House] Gallery, 1970. Reproduced: cat. no. 26
    Ho, Wai-kam, Sherman E. Lee, Laurence Sickman, and Marc F. Wilson. Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting: The Collections of the Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1980. Reproduced: cat. no. 41, pp. 56-57
    Tōyō kaiga no seika: tokubetsuten: Kurīvurando Bijutsukan no korekushon kara [東洋絵画の精華 : 特别展 : クリーヴラント美術館のコレクションから = Highlights of Asian painting from the Cleveland Museum of Art]. Nara, Japan: Nara National Museum, 1998. Reproduced: p. 44, cat. no. 21
    "Art of Japan: Paintings, Prints and Screens: Selected articles from Orientations 1984-2002." Orientations Magazine (2002). Reproduced: fig. 9, p. 136
    Chou, Ju-hsi and Anita Chung. Silent poetry: Chinese paintings from the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2015. Reproduced: p. 99, fig. 1
  • China’s Southern Paradise: Treasures from the Lower Yangzi Delta. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 10, 2023-January 7, 2024).
    Main Asian Rotation (Gallery 120). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (March 11-July 13, 2004).
    Highlights of Asian Paintings from The Cleveland Museum of Art. Nara National Museum (organizer) (February 21-March 29, 1998); Suntory Museum of Art (April 28-June 21, 1998).
    Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (November 7, 1980-January 4, 1981); The Cleveland Museum of Art (February 11-March 29, 1981); Tokyo National Museum (October 4-November 17, 1982).
    Album Leaves from the Sung and Yuan Dynasties. China House Gallery, New York, NY (March 26-May 30, 1970).
    The Art of Southern Sung China. The Asia Society Museum, New York, NY (organizer) (February 15-April 15, 1962).
    Year in Review - Nineteen Hundred Sixty. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 30, 1960-January 1, 1961).
  • {{cite web|title=Man, Buffalo, and Calf|url=false|author=Li You|year=1145|access-date=19 March 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1960.41