The Song dynasty (960–1279 AD) was a culturally rich and sophisticated age for China. It saw great advancements in the visual arts, music, literature, and philosophy. Officials of the ruling bureaucracy, who underwent a strict and extensive examination process, reached new heights of education in Chinese society, while general Chinese culture was enhanced by widespread printing, growing literacy, and various arts.
Appreciation of art among the gentry class flourished during the Song dynasty, especially in regard to paintings, which was an art practiced by many. Trends in painting styles amongst the gentry notably shifted from the Northern (960–1127) to Southern Song (1127–1279) periods, influenced in part by the gradual embrace of the Neo-Confucian political ideology at court.
People in urban areas enjoyed theatrical drama on stage, restaurants that catered to a variety of regional cooking, lavish clothing and apparel sold in the markets, while both urban and rural people engaged in seasonal festivities and religious holidays.
Visual arts
Chinese painting during the Song dynasty reached a new level of sophistication with further development of landscape painting. The shan shui style painting—"shan" meaning mountain, and "shui" meaning river—became prominent features in Chinese landscape art. The emphasis laid upon landscape painting in the Song period was grounded in Chinese philosophy; Taoism stressed that humans were but tiny specks amongst vast and greater cosmos, while Neo-Confucianist writers often pursued the discovery of patterns and principles that they believed caused all social and natural phenomena.Ebrey, Cambridge Illustrated History of China, 162. The making of glazed and translucent porcelain and celadon wares with complex use of enamels was also developed further during the Song period. Longquan celadon wares were particularly popular in the Song period. Black and red lacquerwares of the Song period featured beautifully carved artwork of miniature nature scenes, landscapes, or simple decorative motifs. However, even though intricate bronze-casting, ceramics and lacquerware, jade carving, sculpture, architecture, and the painting of portraits and closely viewed objects like birds on branches were held in high esteem by the Song Chinese, landscape painting was paramount.Morton, 104. By the beginning of the Song dynasty a distinctive landscape style had emerged.Barnhart, "Three Thousand Years of Chinese Painting", 93. Artists mastered the formula of creating intricate and realistic scenes placed in the foreground, while the background retained qualities of vast and infinite space. Distant mountain peaks rise out of high clouds and mist, while streaming rivers run from afar into the foreground.Morton, 105.
There was a significant difference in painting trends between the Northern Song period (960–1127) and Southern Song period (1127–1279). The paintings of Northern Song officials were influenced by their political ideals of bringing order to the world and tackling the largest issues affecting the whole of their society, hence their paintings often depicted huge, sweeping landscapes.Ebrey, Cambridge Illustrated History of China, 163. On the other hand, Southern Song officials were more interested in reforming society from the bottom up and on a much smaller scale, a method they believed had a better chance for eventual success. Hence, their paintings often focused on smaller, visually closer, and more intimate scenes, while the background was often depicted as bereft of detail as a realm without substance or concern for the artist or viewer. This change in attitude from one era to the next stemmed largely from the rising influence of Neo-Confucian philosophy. Adherents to Neo-Confucianism focused on reforming society from the bottom up, not the top down, which can be seen in their efforts to promote small private academies during the Southern Song instead of the large state-controlled academies seen in the Northern Song era.Walton, 199.
Ever since the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420–589), painting had become an art of high sophistication that was associated with the gentry class as one of their main artistic pastimes, the others being calligraphy and poetry.Ebrey, 81–83. During the Song dynasty there were avid art collectors that would often meet in groups to discuss their own paintings, as well as rate those of their colleagues and friends. The poet and statesman Su Shi (1037–1101) and his accomplice Mi Fu (1051–1107) often partook in these affairs, borrowing art pieces to study and copy, or if they really admired a piece then an exchange was often proposed.Ebrey, 163. The small round paintings popular in the Southern Song were often collected into albums as poets would write poems along the side to match the theme and mood of the painting.
Although they were avid art collectors, some Song scholars did not readily appreciate artworks commissioned by those painters found at shops or common marketplaces, and some of the scholars even criticized artists from renowned schools and academies. Anthony J. Barbieri-Low, a Professor of Early Chinese History at the University of California, Santa Barbara, points out that Song scholars' appreciation of art created by their peers was not extended to those who made a living simply as professional artists:Barbieri-Low (2007), 39–40.
During the Northern Song (960–1126 CE), a new class of scholar-artists emerged who did not possess the trompe-l'oeil skills of the academy painters nor even the proficiency of common marketplace painters. The literati's painting was simpler and at times quite unschooled, yet they would criticize these other two groups as mere professionals, since they relied on paid commissions for their livelihood and did not paint merely for enjoyment or self-expression. The scholar-artists considered that painters who concentrated on realistic depictions, who employed a colorful palette, or, worst of all, who accepted monetary payment for their work were no better than butchers or tinkers in the marketplace. They were not to be considered real artists.
However, during the Song period, there were many acclaimed court painters and they were highly esteemed by emperors and the royal family. One of the greatest landscape painters given patronage by the Song court was Zhang Zeduan (1085–1145), who painted the original Along the River During Qingming Festival scroll, one of the most well-known masterpieces of Chinese visual art. Emperor Gaozong of Song (1127–1162) once commissioned an art project of numerous paintings for the Eighteen Songs of a Nomad Flute, based on the woman poet Cai Wenji (177–250 AD) of the earlier Han dynasty. The Southern Song dynasty court painters included Zhao Mengjian (趙孟堅, c. 1199–1264), a member of the Imperial family, known for popularising the Three Friends of Winter.
During the Song period Buddhism saw a small revival since its persecution during the Tang dynasty. This could be seen in the continued construction of sculpture artwork at the Dazu Rock Carvings in Sichuan province. Similar in design to the sculptures at Dazu, the Song temple at Mingshan in Anyue, Sichuan province features a wealth of Song era Buddhist sculptures, including the Buddha and deities clad in lavish imperial and monastic robes.Sorensen, 282–283.
Paintings
Ceramics
Sculpture
Poetry and literature
Chinese literature during the Song period contained a range of many different genres and was enriched by the social complexity of the period. Although the earlier Tang dynasty is viewed as the zenith era for Chinese poetry (particularly the shi style poetry of Du Fu, Li Bai, Bai Juyi), there were important poetic developments by famous poets of the Song era, with the flourishing of the ci form being especially being associated with Song poetry. Song developments in poetry included the works of the social critic and pioneer of the "new subjective style" Mei Yaochen (1002–1060), the politically controversial yet renowned master Su Shi (1037–1101), the eccentric yet brilliant Mi Fu (1051–1107), the premier Chinese female poet Li Qingzhao (1084–1151), and many others. Although having roots in the Liang dynasty (502–557 AD), and further development during the brief existence of the Southern Tang immediate preceding the Song, the ci form of Chinese poetry found its greatest acceptance and popularity during the Song dynasty, and was used by most Song poets. The high court Chancellor Fan Zhongyan (989–1052), ardent Neo-Confucian Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072), the great calligrapher Huang Tingjian (1045–1105), and the military general Xin Qiji (1140–1207) were especially known for their ci poetry, amongst many others. The great ci poet Li Yu (who ruled the Southern Tang under the name Li Houzhu) wrote some of his most famous works during his time as a prisoner at the first Song court, following the demise of his former kingdom: Li Yu is an important transitional figure, sometimes considered to be the first major Song poet, and sometimes acclaimed as the last major Tang poet.
Historiography in literature remained prominent during the Song, as it had in previous ages and would in successive ages of China. Along with Song Qi, the essayist and historian Ouyang Xiu were responsible for compiling the New Book of Tang by 1060, covering the history of the Tang dynasty. Chancellor Sima Guang (1019–1086), the political nemesis of Wang Anshi (1021–1086), was responsible for heading a team of scholars that compiled the enormous historical work of the Zizhi Tongjian, a universal history completed in 1084 AD with a total of over 3 million written Chinese characters in 294 volumes.Pratt & Rutt, 478. It covered the major themes and intricate nuances of Chinese history from 425 BC during the Warring States all the way up to the 10th century and the fall of the Tang.Brownlee, 19. In 1189 it was compiled and condensed into fifty-nine books by Zhu Xi (1130–1200), while this project was totally complete with the efforts of his disciples around the time of his death in 1200.Partington, 238.
There were also very large encyclopedic works written in the Song period, such as the Four Great Books of Song compiled first by Li Fang in the 10th century and fully edited by the time of Cefu Yuangui in the 11th century. The largest of these was the 1013 publication of the Prime Tortoise of the Record Bureau, a massive encyclopedia consisting of 9.4 million written Chinese characters divided into 1000 volumes. There were also rhyme dictionaries written during the Song dynasty, such as the Jiyun of 1037. Although Neo-Confucianism became dominant over Buddhism in China during this period, there was still a significant amount of Buddhist literature. For example, there was the collection of Zen Buddhist kōans in the Blue Cliff Record of 1125, which was expanded by Yuanwu Keqin (1063–1135). 'Travel record literature' ('youji wenxue') was also a popular category of literature during the Song period, which was accounts of one's own travel experiences typically written in narrative or prose styles, and included authors such as Fan Chengda (1126–1193).Hargett, 67–68. A great example of Chinese travel literature in the Song period would be Su Shi's (1037–1101) Record of Stone Bell Mountain.