Biography

Gu Kaizhi was born in Wuxi (in modern Jiangsu) where his father served in the imperial secretariat as an assistant. At about nineteen he was employed as aide to the Grand Marshal Huan Wen. He held a succession of minor official posts under various leaders of the Eastern Jin court.

One emperor under whom Gu Kaizhi served was Huan Xuan. An enthusiastic art collector, ahead of his accession Huan Xuan ordered a big boat to store paintings and other treasures so that they could be easily transported to safety in case of war. Gu Kaizhi entrusted to the emperor a sealed chest with his most precious works. The emperor broke open the box, stole the paintings, then repaired and returned it to the artist with the seals intact. Upon discovering his loss, Gu Kaizhi said that, "the marvelous works partook of divine power, transformed themselves and vanished, like men ascending to join the immortals."

Works

The Admonitions of the Instructress to the Court Ladies (女史箴圖)

This painting, dated between the 6th and 8th century AD - probably an early Tang Dynasty copy - illustrates nine stories from a political satire about Empress Jia Nanfeng written by Zhang Hua (ca. 232-302). Beginning in the eighth century, many collectors and emperors left seals, poems, and comments on the scroll. The Admonitions scroll was stored in the emperor's treasure until it was looted by the British army in the Boxer Uprising in 1900. Now it is in the British Museum collection, missing the first three scenes. There is another surviving copy of this painting, made during the Song Dynasty and is now held in the Palace Museum in Beijing. The Song version is complete in twelve scenes.

The painting is on silk and is a polychrome. "The figures, whose countenances are at once solemn and tranquil, are described with a thin, unmodulated brush-line.... The brush-mode...has been described as 'spring silkworms spitting silk'".

Nymph of the Luo River (洛神賦)

Nymph of the Luo River is a painting by Gu which illustrates a poem written by Cao Zhi (192-232). It survives in three copies dating to the Song Dynasty. One copy is now held in the Palace Museum in Beijing, and another one is now at the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C. The third was brought to Manchuria by the last emperor Pu Yi (1906–1967) while he was the puppet emperor of Manchukuo under Japanese rule. When the Japanese surrendered in 1945 the painting disappeared. After ten years the Liaoning Province Museum recovered it.

Wise and Benevolent Women (列女仁智圖)

Wise and Benevolent Women survives in a 13th-century copy dating to the Song Dynasty, and is today located in the Palace Museum in Beijing. It illustrates a subset of the women described in the Han dynasty work Biographies of Exemplary Women. The 5 meter long scroll is divided into 10 sections, with each section containing a short description.

生平

出生年份沒有記載。約364年在南京為瓦官寺畫維摩詰像，引起轟動。366年當上大司馬參軍，392年為殷仲堪參軍，405年升為散騎常侍。

顧愷之多才，工詩賦，善書法，被時人稱為「才絕、畫絕、癡絕」，他的畫線條連綿流暢，如「春蠶吐絲」。著有《論畫》、《魏晉勝流畫贊 (摹搨妙法)》和《畫雲台山記》(唐張彥遠歷代名畫記抄錄以傳)，提出「以形寫神」、「盡在阿堵中」的傳神理論。其陸探微、張僧繇合稱「六朝三大家」。

繪畫

顧愷之畫跡甚多，有《司馬宣王像》《謝安像》《劉牢之像》《王安期像》《阮脩像》《阮咸像》《晉帝相列像》《司馬宣王並魏二太子像》《桂陽王美人圖》《蕩舟圖》《虎豹雜鷙鳥圖》《鳧雁水鳥圖》《廬山會圖》《水府圖》《行三龍圖》《夏禹治水圖》等。傳世作品有《女史箴圖》、《列女仁智圖》卷、《洛神賦圖》卷。

女史箴圖

《女史箴圖》長卷，傳顧愷之的作品，現剩唐(8世紀)絹臨本藏於大英博物館，原為清宮藏畫，在英法聯軍火燒圓明園時被搶劫到英國。另宋代白描紙臨本（一說為李公麟筆）於北京故宮博物院藏。

晉惠帝時，賈后專權善妒，當時大文學家張華作《女史箴》一文來諷刺她，並藉此教育宮廷婦女。顧愷之根據張華原作的主要內容作畫內容是所謂婦女應遵守的清規戒律。一共12段(現剩9段)，每段包含一個古代宮廷女人的「模範」故事，並在每段前面自己抄錄張華的一段賦。唐人摹本上面蓋滿了從8世紀起，歷代收藏家和皇帝的印章，後面有金章宗和清朝乾隆皇帝的以及其他人的題跋和乾隆皇帝親自畫的一束蘭花。畫後有顧愷之自己的簽字，這幅畫可能是世界上最早的有畫家簽字的畫（簽字是否後人所加有爭議）。人物線條圓轉，後人稱之為「春蠶吐絲」，又叫「高古游絲描」，技法上受篆書影響。氣味古樸，其用筆的功力，線條的質量，都是後人很難達到的。

女史箴圖于1900年八國聯軍進攻北京時被一名不知情的印度英兵（一說是英軍大尉基勇松）為了玉畫扣從某貴婦廉價買下，1903年僅以二十五英鎊賣給大英博物館。前兩段已經流失。大英博物館曾經請日本專家進行修複，為了不使畫作在捲動的過程當中受損，修復後只供攤平展覽。

洛神賦圖

現剩兩幅宋朝人臨摹的《洛神賦圖》，是根據曹植的洛神賦畫的，畫中曹植和隨從在岸上遙望水上飄逸窈窕的洛神和各種神仙怪物。其中一幅現藏北京故宮博物院，另一幅被末代皇帝溥儀捲逃到東北，日本投降後散落民間，後被遼寧博物館收藏。

列女仁智圖

《列女傳》是漢代的名儒家學者劉向所寫。顧愷之以繪畫的方式傳達了書中列女的故事。《列女仁智圖》是宋人摹本。但仔細端詳，保留了顧愷之過人的畫技。現存《列女仁智圖》僅餘二十八個人物。在顧愷之的筆下，畫卷中人物的神態、氣質、身份被描繪得生動有趣，恰如其分。顧愷之對生活觀察十分細緻。這樣才可以將每一個人物的神態、氣質描繪得如此傳神。《列女仁智圖》省掉背景平列人像的畫法，是漢代同類題材大多採用的畫法，稱作"平列構圖布局法"，。顧愷之的畫技，通過人物的姿態表情，使平擺浮擱的人物之間有了內在聯繫。現藏北京故宮博物院。

斫琴圖/斲琴圖

《斫琴圖/斲琴圖》傳為顧愷之之宋摹絹本。此圖描繪古代文人學士制琴的場景。畫中有14人，或斷板、或制弦、或試琴、或旁觀指揮，還有幾位侍者（或學徒）執扇或捧場，但從畫面的空間布局上看，工藝流程的先後次序不明顯，而且人物之間的關係也缺乏確定性與連續性。由于沒有具體的歷史故事背景，也沒有相關的文字說明，因此很可能是脫離文字的故事性而強調人物的各自特徵。在古代的長卷人物畫中，通常都注重故事的敷演，表達一定的倫理道德觀念。此畫恰在這一點上忽略不計。此圖雖不及《洛神賦圖》有名，及具代表性，但在風格特徵上仍凸現出顧愷之的千古一絕。現藏北京故宮博物院。