About Shi Tao (1642 - 1707)
Shi Tao was a Chinese artist born in Quanzhou County in Guangxi province. He was a member of the Ming royal house. He narrowly avoided catastrophe in 1644 when the Ming dynasty fell to invading Manchurians and civil rebellion. He became a Buddhist monk in 1651. Shi Tao moved to Beijing In 1690 to find patronage for his promotion within the monastic system. Frustrated by his failure to find a patron, Shi Tao converted to Daoism in 1693 and returned to Yangzhou where he remained until his death in 1707.

Shi Tao is one of the most famous individualist painters of the early Qing dynasty. The art he created was revolutionary in its transgressions of the rigidly codified techniques and styles that dictated what was considered beautiful. Imitation was valued over innovation, and although Shi Tao was clearly influenced by his predecessors, his art breaks with theirs in several new and fascinating ways.

His formal innovations in depiction include drawing attention to the act of painting itself through his use of washes and bold, impressionistic brushstrokes, as well as an interest in subjective perspective and the use of negative or white space to suggest distance.Shi Tao's stylistic innovations are difficult to place in the context of the period. The poetry and calligraphy that accompany his landscapes are just as beautiful, irreverent, and vivid as the paintings they compliment. His paintings exemplify the internal contradictions and tensions of the literati or scholar-amateur artist, and they have been interpreted as an invective against art-historical canonization.