Ink on the move

Artist maps memory onto landscapes, where brushstrokes reshape how distant worlds feel, Lin Qi reports.

With Qingming Festival just past, the calendar quickly turns toward the Labor Day holiday, followed by Duanwu Festival in mid-June. A sequence of closely spaced holidays like this excites some people, while leaving others hesitating over their plans — whether to set out and embrace the gentle allure of spring, or remain at home, seeking moments of quiet, both physical and mental.

It is hard to say whether people in ancient times shared this same dilemma, but they coined a term that offers a different answer: woyou (wandering while lying down). Rooted in Taoist thinking, it describes a journey undertaken entirely in the mind, through the contemplation of landscape paintings. Gazing at mountains and rivers brought to life through expressive brushwork — often idealized yet vivid — was believed to nourish both spirit and body, especially when travel itself was constrained by distance or cost.