Shih-t'ao

Related Category: Asian and Middle Eastern Art: Biographies

(shûr-tou), 1641–c.1670, Chinese painter of the late Ming–early Ch'ing period, one of the major figures in 17th-century painting. A descendant of the imperial Ming family, he escaped persecution from the invading Manchus by becoming a Buddhist monk with the name Tao-chi. Settling in Yangzhou, he severed his ties to the Buddhist church and became a professional painter and a landscape architect. In his treatise, Hua Yu Lu, he emphasized the importance of the concept of “i hua,” or one line, which is variously translatable as line, unity, or a sense of oneness with nature.