The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of May 13, 2025

Secluded Valley in the Cold Mountains

2008
(American, b. 1954)
America
Handscroll; ink on paper
Painting section: 60 x 347 cm (23 5/8 x 136 5/8 in.)
John L. Severance Fund 2024.69
© Arnold Chang
Location: 240A Chinese Paintings and Calligraphy

Did You Know?

This monumental handscroll by an Asian American artist expands age-old definitions of Chinese ink painting and blurs the boundaries between traditional and contemporary, East and West.

Description

Secluded Valley in the Cold Mountains highlights Arnold Chang’s mature style and accomplishment as an artist. Painted in 2008 when Chang was 54, it demonstrates his virtuosity in brushwork and mastery in composition. The monumental handscroll, more than 11 feet in length, is filled with a landscape panorama rendered with vibrant brushwork built up in layers of ink. The scroll is an artistic response to a work by the Abstract Expressionist painter Jackson Pollock. This painting marks Chang’s breakthrough as an internationally recognized contemporary ink artist inspired by both Eastern and Western art.
  • 2008–2024
    Collection of the Artist, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2024–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Silbergeld, Jerome, and Dora C. Y. Ching. ARTiculations: Undefining Chinese Contemporary Art. Princeton, NJ: P.Y. and Kinmay W. Tang Center for East Asian Art, Dept. of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University: Distributed by Princeton University Press, 2010. Mentioned and Reproduced: fig. 9, pp. 44-45
    Pollock, Barbara. “The New Landscape of Chinese Ink Painting,“ in ARTnews, September 2010, pp. 90–95.
    Sheng, Hao. “Keeping Company With the Past,” in Orientations, Vol. 41, No. 7, October 2010, pp. 38–39.
    Scheier-Dolberg, Joseph. “Arnold Chang,” in Orientations, Vol. 41, No. 7, October 2010.
    Sheng, Hao, Joseph Scheier-Dolberg, and Yan Yang. Fresh Ink: Ten Takes on Chinese Tradition. Boston, MA: MFA Publications; New York, NY: Distributed Art Publishers, 2010. Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 60–61, p. 20
    Xu, Jay, Arnold Chang, Michael Cherney, and Asian Art Museum of San Francisco. From 2 Arises 3: The Collaborative Works of Arnold Chang and Michael Cherney 2009-2014. New York: Early Spring Press, 2014.
    McCausland, Shane. The Art of the Chinese Picture-Scroll. London: Reaktion Books, 2023. pp. 234–235
    Wang, Peggy. “Constituting CONTEMPORARY and CHINESE through Exhibitions,” in Exhibiting East Asian Art in Global Context. edited by Chelsea Foxwell and Wei-Cheng Lin. Chicago, IL: Center for the Art of East Asia, University of Chicago and Art Media Resources, Inc. 2024.
  • Landscapes by Arnold Chang: A Retrospective and Recent Acquisitions 張洪山水畫回顧展. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 8-November 9, 2025).
    Spotlight on a New Generation: Contemporary Chinese Artists. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (February 6-November 1, 2020).
    Chinese Ink: Conceptual Art Exhibition. China Art Gallery, Shanghai, China (November-December 2018).
    From 2 Arises 3: The Collaborative Works of Arnold Chang and Michael Cherney. University Museum and Art Gallery, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong (March 2-May 6, 2018).
    Landscape Relativities: The Collaborative Works of Arnold Chang and Michael Cherney. Crow Collection of Asian Art, Dallas, Texas (February 25-June 25, 2017).
    Fresh Ink: Ten Takes on Chinese Tradition. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA (November 20, 2010-February 13, 2011).
  • {{cite web|title=Secluded Valley in the Cold Mountains|url=false|author=Arnold Chang|year=2008|access-date=13 May 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2024.69