The Journey of a Legendary Landscape Painting

Are you curious about the color scheme of this dance, or why the colors of the dancers' dresses stand out from the omnipresent China red?  

It's an unmistakable tribute to a special genre of Chinese fine art, the Blue and Green Landscape paintings, which originated in the Sui and Tang period and were revived in the Song Dynasty. The unique colors of azurite blue and malachite green come from precious minerals, rendering them an extravagance for Chinese artists as ultramarine blue was for Renaissance oil painters in the West. That's why this type of landscape paintings were mostly for the royal courts or wealthy families. 

One such painting was an 11.9-meter long scroll known as "A Panorama of Mountains and Rivers", projected on screens above and behind the dancers. It was painted around 900 years ago by an 18-year old genius painter for his Northern-Song emperor patron. Take a snapshot of any section of this painting and it's your dream screensaver.

The painting "A Panorama of Mountains and Rivers" is now in the Palace Museum.

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