Folk Customs

The clothing, food, housing, transportation, as well as the folk customs of the Chinese people, all reflect their inner peace, optimism, open-mindedness, and aesthetic tastes.A visitor from afar would be able to perceive all this in the hustle and bustle of the capital Bianliang of the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), as depicted in the famous painting A Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival. They could also find all this in many aspects of traditional life: the busy Tianqiao area in Beijing, the hawking of peddlers in alleys, pigeons soaring across blue skies, the leisurely life of taverns, the openness, fashion and vitality of modern Shanghai, the ambience exquisitely created in teahouses and bars, shadow boxing, and a game of go. Chinese people have long pursued soulful contentment in the midst of secular lives, trying each and every method to add meaning and joy to everyday life.

Urban Customs in A Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival
A Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival was a painting created by the court artist Zhang Zeduan(birth and death dates unknown), at the end of the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127). It is now housed in the Palace Museum in Beijing.

Over the nearly 900 years since its creation, this masterpiece has generated many reproductions. Today there are over 30 reproductions collected in famous museums around the world. One copy even passed before the critical eyes of Qing Emperor Qianlong(r.1736-1795), an art enthusiast who had believed it to be the original. That replica is now housed in the Taipei Palace Museum. In a sense, the wide range of imitations only proves the value of this precious artistic masterpiece.

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