CHEN CHUNYU (ACTIVE 19TH CENTURY) Orchid Pavilion, cyclically dated Wushen year (1848) Handscroll, ink and colours on silk depicting scholars amidst a mountainous landscape, cups flowing down a stream, colophon and seals of Hu Tong'en (active mid 19th Century) cyclically dated to the Jiayin year (1854) and seals. The calligraphy 95cm (37 1/2in) long x 21.5cm (8 1/2in) high; The landscape 131cm (51 1/2in) high x 21.5cm (8 1/2in) high 注脚 Provenance: An English private collection Hu Tong'en 胡彤恩 (late Qing dynasty), studio name Wu'an (勿庵), was from Sanshui in Guangdong Province. Little is known of his life except that he became a jinshi degree holder during the Guangxu reign, and was an official in the Department of Criminal Justice. The literati gathering in Orchid Pavilion near Shanyin (present day Shaoxing) in 353 CE, became a symbolic event in literati cultural history, immortalised by the writings of the sage of calligraphy Wang Xizhi (303-361). Wang Xizhi wrote the canonical work of calligraphy 'Preface to Orchid Pavilion', for the poetry written by 42 literati engaged in a drinking contest. As the present lot shows, wine cups were floated down a small winding creak as the men sat along its banks; whenever a cup stopped, the man closest to the cup was required to empty it and write a poem. Apart from the calligraphy of Wang Xizhi, the event itself encapsulated an elegant and poetic lifestyle that generations of scholars forever after strove to emulate and represent in paintings such as the present lot. For an ink rubbing of a related scene of the Orchid Pavilion Gathering, see G.Tsang and H.Moss, Arts from the Scholar's Studio, Hong Kong, 1986, no.28.