Linyi
— — the city the great calligrapher came from.
Not only on a wall.
“A prefecture city of eleven million in southern Shandong, on the Yi River below the Yimeng Mountains. Birthplace of Wang Xizhi, the fourth-century calligrapher whose work is held as the finest brush writing ever made in Chinese tradition. The modern city is one of China's largest wholesale commodity markets; the old town still keeps the calligraphy academies that draw students from across the country. — from the studio
Linyi, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Linyi is a prefecture-level city in southern Shandong Province, on the Yi River where it leaves the Yimeng Mountains for the North China Plain. The prefecture covers about 17,200 square kilometres and holds a population of around 11 million, which makes it the largest prefecture in Shandong by both area and population. The urban core sits about 200 kilometres south of the provincial capital, Jinan. The city is the seat of the Linyi Commercial Capital, a wholesale-market complex that handles over 400 billion yuan of goods a year.
The city honours Wang Xizhi, born here in 303 AD, as its calligraphic founder. His Lantingji Xu, the 'Preface to the Orchid Pavilion Collection,' is held in Chinese tradition as the single greatest work of brush writing. Every September the city stages the Wang Xizhi Calligraphy Festival, with competitions, exhibitions, and the gathering of brush-makers from across China. The Wang Xizhi Memorial Hall on Hongqi Road keeps copies of his work and the family well preserved from the original courtyard.
The old city sits on the right bank of the Yi River, with the Wang Xizhi memorial, the Han-era tomb at Jinqueshan, and the Mengshan scenic area about an hour to the north. The Jinqueshan dig recovered bamboo-strip manuscripts of Sun Tzu's Art of War in 1972, the earliest known copies. High-speed rail reaches the city from Beijing in about three and a half hours and from Shanghai in about four. The wholesale market complex on the southern edge is open daily and forms a separate destination of its own.