Self-Titled Sixteen Views On Living In Seclusion

Sixteen Views in Seclusion, self-titled, paper, 21.4X29.8cm, collected by the National Palace Museum, Taipei

　　Chen Hongshou wrote this calligraphy when he was fifty-four years old (1651). He drank drunkenly at the West Lake one night, with a beautiful lady waiting on him with his pen and inkstone. In front of sixteen paintings depicting the elegance of seclusion, he wrote a poem to express his sad mood at the end of his life. . These thin and elegant strokes, like orchid leaves, exude a delicate and elegant temperament.