Mao Xiang (Chinese), Transplanting rice seedlings, dated 1588. Hanging scroll. Ink and colors on silk. H. 12 3/4 in x W. 21 1/2 in, H. 32.4 cm x W. 54.6 cm (image). The Avery Brundage Collection, B62D19 © 2016 Asian Art Museum Chong-Moon Lee Center for Asian Art and Culture

This painting presents country life along a waterway. In the right foreground is a country house with an open window through which can be seen a desk piled with books—clearly the country home of a member of the educated elite. At the left, five farmers transplant rice seedlings. Across the body of water from them a man props up an oar in a boat while on the nearby shore a boy rides a buffalo and plays his flute. Further along the waterway is a village with a woman and a boy standing outside and a man carrying a pair of barrels on a pole balanced on his shoulders. The central intention of the painting is to be found in the inscription, which reads:

Clear rainwater has risen up to the banks. Everywhere fields cry for seedlings to be planted. Green gardens attract birds to sing and rest, Their shadows like fresh lotuses appliquéd to the surface of the water. Painted and inscribed by Mao Dan from Meixi, summer of the year wuzi.

The planting and harvesting of rice was critical to China's well-being and such a scene could be interpreted as a wish for success or for prosperity in the empire, and consequently for the reign of a benevolent and just emperor. 

Artist's Biography The signature on the painting reads "Mao Dan," a name not recorded in the standard references on Chinese painters. The style and the subject indicate this work was executed sometime in the Qing dynasty. The cyclical date on the painting is most likely the equivalent of 1828.