The form of this handsome Ying scholar’s rock recalls, and may have been inspired by, the majestic, vertical mountains depicted in the paintings of the Four Wangs, a celebrated group of 17th- to early 18th-century landscape painters. The attractive texture of the stone is visible on both the front and back, which makes it uniquely able to be displayed and viewed in the round. One side contains an opening which suggests a passageway that easily allows the imagination to visualize a scholar traversing the mountainside.

For a discussion of related scholar’s rocks see Robert D. Mowry, Worlds Within Worlds: The Richard Rosenblum Collection of Chinese Scholar’s Rocks, Harvard University Art Museums, 1997, pp. 211-13, no. 32, pp. 222-225, no. 38.