Sung and Yuan Paintings

The acquisition by the Metropolitan Museum of Art of twenty-five paintings of the Sung and Yüan dynasties from the collection of Mr. C. C. Wang must be considered one of the finer moments in the collecting history of the institution. The quality of each handscroll, album leaf, and hanging scroll is satisfyingly high. In its totality the collection is of the utmost importance because the group fills what has up to now been a serious gap in the Museum’s oriental holdings. Although the Museum is strong in Chinese sculpture, porcelain, decorative arts, and monumental painting, its examples of the early classic” period of Chinese landscape and figure style have been inadequate. The Bahr collection of Sung and Yüan paintings gained by the Metropolitan in 1947, although containing some works of art of considerable quality, must be viewed upon reflection more as a valuable study collection than as a series of masterworks. Thus the acquisition of these major holdings of the C. C. Wang collection is felicitous indeed. [This book was originally published in 1973 and has gone out of print. This edition is a print-on-demand version of the original book.]