Shan shui (Chinese: 山水 lit. "mountain-water") refers to a style
of Chinese painting that involves or depicts scenery or natural
landscapes, using a brush and ink rather than more conventional
paints. Mountains, rivers and often waterfalls are prominent in
this art form. Shan shui painting first arose to prominence
during the 5th century, in the reign of the Liu Song Dynasty. It
was later characterized by a group of landscape painters such as
Zhang Zeduan, most of them already famous, who produced large-
scale landscape paintings. These landscape paintings usually
centered on mountains. Mountains had long been seen as sacred
places in China, which were viewed as the homes of immortals and
thus, close to the heavens. Philosophical interest in nature, or
in mystical connotations of naturalism, could also have
contributed to the rise of landscape painting. The art of shan
shui, like many other styles of Chinese painting has a strong
reference to Taoist (Daoist) imagery and motifs, as symbolisms
of Taoism strongly