Yang Xi
Although no autograph copies of Yang Xi's famous calligraphy have survived, one well-documented stone rubbing version of the revealed "Huangting jing" (黃庭經, Yellow Court Scripture) has been given special attention. The Song dynasty connoisseur and critic Mi Fu (1051-1107) analyzed four manuscripts of the "Huangting jing", and said the best one was written on a silk scroll with a provenance that he traced back to the early 8th century. Mi disagreed with a former owner Tao Gu (陶穀, 903-970) who said that Wang Xizhi wrote the manuscript, and concluded it was a superb example of calligraphy from the Six Dynasties period. The Ming dynasty calligrapher and painter Dong Qichang (1555-1636) was so impressed by the Mi Fu manuscript that he made a copy, recommend it as the best model for studying "kaishu" script, and included it as the first example in his classic "Xihong tang fatie" (戲鴻堂法帖, Calligraphy Compendium of the Hall of the Playful Goose). Dong's colophon attributed the calligraphy to Yang Xi himself and described it as "the traces of a holy immortal" (Ledderose 1984: 262-263, who calls Dong's attribution to Yang "extremely optimistic").
Wang Xizhi
In addition to the esteem in which he is held in China, he has been and remains influential in Japanese calligraphy.
Born in Linyi, Shandong, Wang spent most of his life in present-day Shaoxing, Zhejiang and Wenzhou. He learned the art of calligraphy from Lady Wei Shuo. He excelled in every script but particularly in semi-cursive script. His representative works include, in chronological order, "Narration on Yue Yi " (), "The Yellow Court Classic" (), "Commentaries on the Portrait of Dongfang Shuo" (), "Admonitions to the Emperor from the Imperial Mentor" (), "Preface to the Collection of Poems Composed at the Orchid Pavilion" (, also commonly known as "Lanting Xu" ), and "The Statement of Pledge "《告誓文》. Unfortunately, none of his original works remains today.