Inspired by the centuries-old Chinese tradition of private scholars’ gardens, the Garden of Flowing Fragrance 流芳園 with its many pavilions linked by courtyards and walkways surrounds the centerpiece of the garden, the Lake of Reflected Fragrance.
Above is the Star Gazing Tower 望星樓, which is the highest point in the garden and affords sweeping views of Mt. Wilson and the domes.
Works of Calligraphy are integrated so beautifully in the garden! You feel like you are walking through poetry!!!
You approach the garden by walking along a dragon wall and there above the archway is the calligraphy of
Wan-go H.C. Weng 翁萬戈 (born 1918, Shanghai; active United States)
Garden of Flowing Fragrance 流芳園 (Liú Fāng Yuán)
Garden of Flowing Fragrance 流芳園 (Liú Fāng Yuán)
Wan-go H.C. Weng 翁萬戈 (born 1918, Shanghai; active United States)
Pavilions connected by corridors and walkways surround the shimmering Lake of Reflected Fragrance 映芳湖
The first pavilion is the Love for the Lotus Pavilion 愛蓮榭
Wang Shixiang 王世襄 (1914–2009, born Beijing; active China)
2007
Running-regular script 行楷書 This bold inscription, with its resolute verticals and slight variations in character size and structure, was brushed by Wang Shixiang at the age of ninety-three, only two years before his death. To a greater degree than other script types, each stroke in regular script begins and ends with clearly articulated motions. For example, note that the right-hand vertical of the leftmost character (xie 榭, “pavilion”) emerges from a triangular head formed through individual motions of the brush. Holding his brush upright, the calligrapher then traced the unwavering vertical, ending in a slight leftward hook. The left-facing point was added by pushing the brush in a final display of calligraphic force.
The gorgeous views of the lake from the Lotus Pavilion are my favorite!
Just after leaving the pavilion of lotus love, if you look carefully, you will see
Listening to the Pines 聽松
Lo Ch’ing 羅青［羅青哲］ (born 1948, Qingdao, Shandong Province, China; active Taiwan)
2007
Seal script 篆書
Textually invoking the sound of wind blowing through pine needles, Lo Ch’ing’s characters visually evoke the trees’ moss-covered limbs. The artist has chosen to write on thin paper composed of long, loosely aggregated fibers that quickly absorb and disperse ink. Further, he has diluted the liquid to encourage it to spread even more chaotically. Consequently, the simple brushstrokes of his characters are partially obscured, creating the impression of trunks and branches covered in organic accretions. Ultimately, the characters partially lose their status as linguistic signs, appearing instead as images produced through the almost miraculous interaction of ink, paper, and water.
I love the seal script above--so playful! Wind in the Pines and Listening to Pines is a very important idea from Japanese tea ceremony.
Court of Assembled Worthies 集賢院 (Jí Xián Yuàn)
Fu Shen 傅申 (born 1937, Shanghai; active Taiwan, United States, and China)
2018
Running script 行書
On a sunny August afternoon in 2018, the eighty-one-year-old Fu Shen visited The Huntington to execute this inscription in a spontaneous display of calligraphic bravura. Despite—or perhaps to spite—his failing constitution and tremulous limbs, Fu held his brush with unshaking confidence and manipulated it with absolute precision. Thanks to his incorporation of the dramatic, scratchy brushstrokes known as “flying white” strokes, his characters palpably pulse with internal energy. Fu draws inspiration for the structure of his characters and the drama of their strokes from the works of Huang Tingjian (1045–1105), a renowned poet and calligrapher who was the subject of Fu’s doctoral dissertation.
This corner of the garden is very moving for me. Embodying the perfect harmony of friends: beautiful Chinese garden pavilions and towering California oaks.
Love!!!
Idly strolling in springtime, we leave the painted halls; among the plums and willows, I cannot bear the fragrance! 春望逍遙出畫堂 間梅遮柳不勝芳
Terry Yuan [Yuan Zhizhong] 袁志鍾 (born 1954, Shanghai; active United States)
2013
Running script 行書
The visual form of Terry Yuan’s couplet perfectly embodies its content: his characters seem to float lightly on the paper, as though they are “idly strolling in springtime.” Yuan achieves this effect by carefully choreographing multiple forms of visual variation. For example, in the next-to-last character of the right-hand scroll (hua 畫, “painted”), none of the nine horizontal strokes is written in exactly the same manner—or even at the same angle. Further, he introduces a subtle bend to the vertical axis of the character, creating the impression that it is twirling in midair. Ultimately, he weaves a wavy line among all of the characters in the scroll, reinforcing the overall impression of carefree leisure
Inside the Flowery Brush Library-- a Scholar's studio筆花書房
Rocks and poetry, beautiful calligraphy and the buildings are so harmoniously arranged
More covered walkways leading to the northern corner of the garden, where we find the Studio for Lodging the Mind 寓意齋
Studio for Lodging the Mind 寓意齋 (Yù Yì Zhāi)
Bai Qianshen 白謙慎 (born 1955, Tianjin, China; active China and United States)
2018
Running-regular script 行楷書
Brushed on paper flecked with gold and silver foil, Bai Qianshen’s characters seem to lilt through space. Bai writes with a saturated brush whose wet ink bleeds slightly into the paper, obscuring harsh lines while still conveying a sense of dance-like motion. Further, Bai rounds the heads and tails of his strokes to imbue his characters with a sense of pleasing softness. Within the aesthetic unity of his brushwork, however, Bai pursues subtle variation, filling the inscription with liveliness. For example, each of the inscription’s seventeen dots has a unique form—and each one seems to be endowed with its own personality.
This corner of the garden is filled with the art of Wang Mansheng 王滿晟
(born 1962, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, China; active United States)
On either side of the entrance of the Studio, are two carvings by Wang Mansheng.
And his calligraphy --incised on a beautiful rock, is nestled just to the west of the studio (seen best in above picture of the studio)
Garden of the Arts 藝苑 (Yì Yuàn)
Wang Mansheng 王滿晟 (born 1962, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, China; active United States)
Running 行
A native of Shanxi Province, Wang Mansheng graduated in 1985 from the Chinese Department of Shanghai’s Fudan University, where he majored in classical literature. He subsequently worked for over a decade as an editor, director, and producer at China Central Television in Beijing. Since moving to the United States in 1996, he has devoted himself to reinterpreting classical Chinese painting and calligraphy. His work has been shown and collected worldwide, including in China, Hong Kong, Japan, Europe, and the United States. He resides with his family in the Hudson River Valley outside of New York City.
Additional Inscriptions
L: "Written by Bansheng [Wang's art name]" 半升書
Seals
L: "Seal of Wang Mansheng" 王滿晟印 (white text 白文)
Delicately paved and partially shrouded by rockeries and planters, this courtyard derives its name from a term that can refer both to the art world in general and to a specific space for artists to meet. This garden-with-the-garden celebrates the many arts—from penjing to painting—that are brought together within Liu Fang Yuan.
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This part of the garden also has a work of calligraphy-- incised on a garden rock--by Michael Cherney (More on him below!)
And speaking of the mysterious and amazing Michael Cherney
Myriad View Pavilion (萬景亭).
Try to contemplate the clouds and mists beyond the three peaks; all are in the palm of a numinous immortal 試觀烟雲三峰外 都在靈仙一掌間
Michael Cherney 秋麥 (born 1969, New York; active China)
By playing with the saturation of his ink and the abstraction of his characters, Michael Cherney has created an inscription that visually evokes the dreamlike content of its text. Each line of his couplet begins with a character written with a brush heavily laden with ink; the liquid has so saturated the paper that an aqueous halo appears around each character.
Moving downward, Cherney’s brush began to dry, and the hairs of its tip began to fray. Despite lightly re-inking midline, his brush ultimately exhausted its ink, devolving into near abstraction. This movement from saturation to exsiccation, from legibility to graphic play, creates a visual drama evocative of the imaginative transformations suggested in the couplet.
As we walked away, Chris grabbed my hand and said, "I REALLY like Michael's work! It is so pleasant!"
High praise from an astrophysicist!
The Verdant Microcosm 翠玲瓏
This 17,900-sq.-ft. area on the western slope of the garden is designed for the study, creation, and display of penjing 盆景 (miniature potted landscapes, similar to Japanese bonsai). A complex of walled courtyards showcases dozens of examples of the penjing art form, as well as distinctive scholar’s rocks.
Verdant Microcosm 翠玲瓏 (Cuì Líng Lóng)
Tang Qingnian 唐慶年 (born 1956, Beijing; active United States)
2018
Bird-and-worm script 鳥蟲書
The sinuous forms of Tang Qingnian’s characters writhe with life. Their smooth, even lines are produced with an upright brush whose tip is “hidden,” remaining perfectly centered in every stroke. Tang draws inspiration for these baroque characters from “bird-and-worm script,” a 2,500-year-old form of writing that was occasionally employed on later seals. The script was named for its resemblance to the tracks left by birds and worms; some calligraphers even adorned their characters with schematic drawings of birds’ heads and feathers. Tang, however, is not content with merely revitalizing a past model. Instead, in his characters’ playful linearity, one senses his interest in contemporary graphic design.
Seeing the Large in the Small 小中見大 (Xiăo Zhōng Jiàn Dà)
Grace Chu [Chu Chang-fang] 朱彰芳 (born 1959, Taipei, Taiwan; active United States)
2018
Seal script 篆書
Brushed in dry ink on smooth, foil-flecked paper, the unmodulated lines of Grace Chu’s characters manifest a remarkable range of visual and textural effects. Each of Chu’s brushstrokes transitions from inky saturation to chalky dryness. Certain passages—such as the right side of the second character (zhong 中, “in”), whose thin, mottled ink struggles to adhere to the paper—even suggest granitic veneers. Such effects depend on Chu’s careful control of her brush, whose tip remains perfectly centered in every stroke. Such precision is clearly visible in the rounded ends of her strokes, where she has twisted her drying brush hairs in a final flourish, creating an effect of charcoal-like granularity.
World in a Wine Pot 壺天 (Hú Tiān)
Zhu Chengjun 朱稱俊 born 1946, Zhenjiang, Jiangsu Province, China; active China and United States)
2018
Seal script 篆書
Zhu Chengjun’s "wine pot" (hu 壺) cannot help but make one smile. Zhu derives the structure of his character from early seal script, but he dramatically transforms its wiry, symmetrical form into a playful embodiment of the spirit of the vessel. His lines quiver as though inebriated of their own substance. His central circle barely meets in the middle, like a belt straining around a beer-filled belly. And, similar to a drunkard’s mismatched socks, the two halves of Zhu’s upper horizontals are rendered in contrasting sizes and degrees of saturation. His “world” (tian 天), on the other hand, stands in comparative stability, soberly anchoring its wine-soaked companion.
Rocks are an essential feature of Suzhou gardens. The stones found throughout Liu Fang Yuan are a type of limestone traditionally harvested from the bed of Lake Tai near Suzhou; today, they are quarried in various regions of China. For more than 1,200 years, these rocks have been renowned for their strange shapes and many holes. Particularly prized individual specimens, like the towering stone near the teahouse, Patching Up the Sky (Bu Tian 補天), were seen as embodying energy-like ethers, or qi.
Walking toward the newStargazing Tower 望星樓
We encounter another work of art by Wang Mansheng
Treading the Void 凌虛 (Líng Xū)
Wang Mansheng 王滿晟 (born 1962, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, China; active United States)
2018
Seal-clerical script 漢簡書
Wang Mansheng’s inscription could only have been written in the late twentieth or twenty-first century. The unadorned, archaic form of his characters derives from the styles of writing employed in documents brushed on strips of wood or bamboo (common materials used for inscriptions prior to the advent of paper) in the last centuries BCE, which have been excavated in ever-increasing numbers since the 1970s. Neither fully seal nor fully clerical, such inscriptions combine the relatively smooth, even lines of “lesser” seal script with the simplified character structure (as well as the occasional flared strokes) of clerical script. Having extensively studied such writings, Wang has internalized their forms and now introduces them as ancient calligraphic models for the future.
Stargazing Tower 望星樓 –
Situated on the highest point in the garden at the southern end of the lake, this beautiful 527-sq.-ft. pavilion provides stunning views of the landscape, the distant mountains, and (with a bit of imagination) the universe beyond. The name pays homage to the Mount Wilson Observatory—visible from the tower—and to the work of astronomer Edwin Hubble. Hubble’s papers are part of the Library’s holdings in the history of science.
Gaze through the mists within mist
stars sparkle in the heavens beyond heaven
Looks like Japanese 鯱?
Dream Journeys....
LA Times: The magical new Chinese Garden at the Huntington is the getaway you need right now
"Garden’s place names are poetry in themselves: consider the Studio for Lodging the Mind, the Terrace of Shared Delights, the Verdant Microcosm (dedicated to miniature potted landscapes known as penjing), and at the southern corner of the garden, at the bottom of the canyon, next to the stream, the Pavilion for Washing Away Thoughts. (That place should be popular these days.)"
The word “fragrance” means much more than aroma here, Bloom said. The word also evokes water, which streams into and out of the lake at its center, and the energy that flows through the site, but there is also the literature connection to a famous poem by Cao Zhi, a.k.a. Ts’ao Chih (192-232), about the Goddess of the Luo, a river in northeastern China. Basically, Bloom said, the river goddess falls for the author, and he for her, as she “scatters her fragrance” along the river bank, but their relationship ends when she sadly (and likely wisely) decides “that men and gods must follow separate ways.”And there’s yet another reference, Bloom said, because in Chinese, there’s a phrase about “passing on your fragrance to 100 generations,” meaning you establish a good name for your family and pass it down. “In this case,” Bloom said, “fragrance refers to the impression the garden leaves behind.”