Left Scroll from Calligraphy Couplet (after 1911): Art, History and Details

Left Scroll from Calligraphy Couplet (after 1911) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Liang Qichao (Chinese, 1873–1929).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The prominent politician and modern reformer Liang Qichao writes here in an angular, firm, and little modulated regular script style, inspired by inscriptions incised on ancient stone steles. Those script styles were popular among reformers of the time, as they sought to revive the ancient culture and built a new China on the country’s strong ancient foundations. Each scroll cites the verse of a historic cultural figure in Chinese history.

Object facts

• Title: Left Scroll from Calligraphy Couplet
• Date: after 1911
• Creator attribution: Liang Qichao (Chinese, 1873–1929)
• Culture: China, Republican period (1912-49)
• Type: Calligraphy
• Technique: One of a pair of hanging scrolls; ink on paper
• Dimensions: Overall: 128 x 30 cm (50 3/8 x 11 13/16 in.)
• Collection: ASIAN - Hanging scroll
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 2023.162.1

A detail from the museum

Liang Qichao aimed to reform the country and strengthen its foundations through the revival of the ancient culture of China.

Collection credit

Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.