"The best way is to make the pictures into photo albums for more people to enjoy. But we haven't enough competencies to do it now, " Liu said.

Around the 240th anniversary of Cao Xueqin's death, the "Exhibition of Hand-Painted Pictures of A Dream of Red Mansions Painted by Sun Wen of the Qing Dynasty" was held at the Lvshun Museum on July 1-August 20, and is open at the National Museum on September 1-22; synchronously, its chromatic hardcover album will be printed and published by the Writers Publishing House. The national treasure finally discloses its mysterious veil after 45 years.

  Aesthetic and historical treasure

A Dream of Red Mansions is a masterpiece of Chinese classical literature. Therefore, from the mid-18th century, various artworks have adapted it as a theme, including various New Year pictures , prints, picture books and embroideries. The hand-painted album of Sun Wen is seldom seen among artworks with the same theme and is also an artwork that few people know.

Even experts and scholars on A Dream of Red Mansions, including Zhou Ruchang and Feng Qiyong, masters on A Dream of Red Mansions, have not had a chance to view the original hand-painted album. Some have never even heard of it before.

Feng Qiyong, who had just viewed the photos, said that from an aesthetic angle, the album boasts tremendous value because it is the aesthetics appraise on A Dream of Red Mansions.

Liu said that all original pictures have been screened into photos, some of which have been appreciated by Zhou Ruchang. A fine antique catalog will be published during the exhibition, where, for each picture, Zhou Ruchang has composed a poem featuring seven syllables per line for the first 80 chapters and five syllables per line for the remaining 40 chapters.

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