(b Xinghua, Jiangsu Province, 1686; d Yangzhou, 1760). Chinese painter. He was born into a wealthy family and received a sound classical education. Wei Lingchang, his first painting instructor, taught him landscape in the style of the ORTHODOX SCHOOL, and with Wang Yuan, a female relative and painter from Gaoyou, Jiangsu Province, he studied flower-and-bird painting. At the age of 22 he passed the provincial civil service examinations and two years later he was granted an audience with the Kangxi emperor (reg 1662-1723) after having presented a poem at the latter's 60th birthday. Chosen as an attendant at the Nan shufang ('Southern imperial study'; a literary advisory body to the emperor), he studied the style of Huang Quan and Xu Xi from Jiang Tingxi (1669-1732), a major scholar-painter of the court.
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