Divine Steeds: Horse Art Exhibition Opens at Palace Museum

Divine Steeds: Horse Art Exhibition Opens at Palace Museum

From April 22 to June 21, 2026, the Palace Museum in Beijing presents “Divine Steeds: The World of Horses in Palace Calligraphy and Painting” (神骏：故宫书画艺术中的马世界) at the Calligraphy and Painting Gallery of Wenhua Hall. The exhibition brings together 55 horse-related masterworks from the museum’s collection, celebrating the horse’s spirited beauty and the depth of traditional Chinese culture.

Opening Ceremony

At the opening on April 21, Palace Museum Director Wang Xudong (王旭东) and Huang Jiachun (黄嘉纯), chairman of the Charity Research Institute, delivered remarks. Executive Deputy Director Lou Wei (娄玮) presided. The institute is the exhibition’s sole donor.

Wang noted that the horse’s spirit — steady and far-reaching — echoes the museum’s ethos of “reverent guardianship and masterful inheritance.” The exhibition, he said, carries forward an upright, rising spirit and invites audiences to appreciate ancient masterpieces while exploring the social history and humanistic values of different eras. Huang observed that with 2026 marking the bingwu (丙午) Horse Year of the Chinese zodiac, the show offers a timely occasion to consider the horse’s many meanings in history and art.

Four Sections, Fifty-Five Treasures

The exhibition unfolds in four sections — “Journeys,” “Grazing,” “Martial Glory,” and “Divine Steeds” — spanning paintings and calligraphy from the Tang dynasty through the Qing. Of the 55 works, 20 are first-class national cultural relics and 28 are exhibited for the first time.

Highlights include:

• Hundred Horses, attributed to the Tang dynasty
• Li Gonglin’s (李公麟, 1049–1106) copy of Wei Yan’s Herding Horses, from the Northern Song dynasty
• Zhao Lin’s (赵霖, Jin dynasty) Six Steeds of the Zhao Mausoleum, depicting the warhorses of Emperor Taizong
• Zhao Mengfu’s (赵孟頫, 1254–1322) Man on Horseback, from the Yuan dynasty
• Ren Renfa’s (任仁发, 1254–1327) Horses Leaving the Stables, Yuan dynasty
• Giuseppe Castiglione’s (Lang Shining, 郎世宁, 1688–1766) Kanhuliu, an imperial horse portrait from the Qing court

Together, the works trace more than a thousand years of equine imagery — from court hunting scenes and grazing herds to the six warhorses carved in stone for Emperor Taizong’s mausoleum — revealing how the horse carried power, poetry, and companionship through Chinese art.

Source: https://www.cntizi.com/25416.html