Chuseongbudo (Theme of Chuseongbu, Sounds of Autumn)

Chuseongbudo, painted by Kim Hong-do, is a siuido (a painting illustrating the meaning of a poem) in which Danwon Kim Hong-do (1745–1806?) depicted "Chuseongbu" (Ode to the Sounds of Autumn), a rhapsody by the Chinese Song-dynasty writer Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072). On the left of the painting is an oval intaglio seal reading "Giu Yuja" (Wandering Traveller Riding an Ox), and the full text of Chuseongbu is written in Kim Hong-do's own hand; as the closing inscription reads "Painted at Dangu, three days after the winter solstice of the eulchuk year," the painting can be dated to 1805, when Danwon was 61 years old. As this year is presumed to be the one immediately before Danwon's death, the work is believed to be his last dated painting, made shortly before he died. On the right of the composition is a withered autumn mountain, its ridge rendered with horizontal dry-brush strokes creating light and shade that suggest it is nighttime. At the centre stands a Chinese-style thatched cottage, within whose round window Ouyang Xiu can be seen. The painting depicts the very scene in which Ouyang Xiu, hearing a sound while reading, told a boy servant to go out and see what it was, and the boy, having gone outside, replied: "The stars and moon shine bright and clear, there is no one to be seen in any direction, and the sound comes from among the trees." The boy raises his hand to point toward the direction of the wind's sound, while two cranes kept at the house are depicted with necks outstretched and beaks open, as if answering the sound of the wind. The deciduous trees in the yard sway in the wind blowing from the left, and fallen leaves are scattered sparsely across the ground. On the hill to the left of the composition stand two trees, beside which a thatched house surrounded by bamboo can be seen, with a full moon rising above. The painting is coloured darkly overall, and the use of dry-brush technique conveys well the bleak atmosphere of an autumn night. The compositional arrangement, which places mountains or hills on either side to enclose the cottage and yard as though viewed from above, thereby emphasising the theme, is a clear demonstration of Danwon's outstanding sense of composition, while the slender yet irregularly bent trees with forking tips are also typical of his characteristic technique. The dry brushstrokes, applied with a slight rubbing motion from left to right, effectively convey the sound of a keen wind blowing through the rough, desolate branches under the cold moonlight. This must represent both the sorrow of old age that Ouyang Xiu sought to convey, and, at the same time, an expression of Danwon's own feelings as he faced approaching death. The phrase "a hundred cares weigh upon my heart", in which Ouyang Xiu, facing the autumn when all things wither, laments the vanity of life, is the very phrase that Danwon also quoted in a letter he sent to a certain Scholar Kim in 1805, vividly reflecting his state of mind at the time. With his ailing body compounded by worries over the future of his still-young only son, Kim Yang-ik, and concern for his married-off daughter, Danwon too could not help but lament the vanity of life.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Yongsan-gu, Seoul

Designation

Treasure · 보물