The Series of Ancient Chinese Paintings

A Comprehensive Collection of Ancient Chinese Paintings incorporates over 12,250 pieces (sets) of Chinese paintings on paper, silk, and linen, etc., from 267 museums and cultural institutions at home and abroad, including more than 9,000 pieces (sets) of domestic collections and 3,250 pieces (sets) of foreign collections. Over 22,000 ultra-large format negatives have been used to photograph most of the national treasures. It is by far the largest visual documents on ancient Chinese paintings, with the largest publication scale, the most comprehensive collections, the most vivid image representation, and the finest printing quality.

Catalog

A Collection of Pre-Qin, Han and Tang Dynasties Paintings

Classic Works (2 volumes)
National Palace Museum (1 volume)
Archaeological Discoveries: Secular & Religions (3 volumes)
Archaeological Discoveries: the Paintings Recovered from Hidden Library Cave of Dunhuang in Russia (2 volumes)
Archaeological Discoveries: the Paintings Recovered from Hidden Library Cave of Dunhuang in England (3 volumes)
Archaeological Discoveries: the Paintings Recovered from Hidden Library Cave of Dunhuang in France (2 volumes)

A Collection of Song Dynasty

Palace Museum (8 volumes)

Shanghai Museum (2 volumes)

Liaoning Provincial Museum (2 volumes)

National Palace Museum (6 volumes)

Works from Museums and Cultural Institutions in China (2 volumes)

Works from Museums and Cultural Institutions in Europe and America (6 volumes)

Works from Museums and Cultural Institutions in Japan (3 volumes)

Continuation of Chinese works (2 volumes)

Dunhuang (2 volumes)

Archaeological Discoveries: Heishui City cultural heritage collected in Russia (4 volumes)

A Collection of Yuan Dynasty Paintings

Palace Museum (3 volumes)

Shanghai Museum (3 volumes)

Liaoning Provincial Museum (3 volume)

Works from Museums and Cultural Institutions in Japan (2 volumes)

Works from Museums and Cultural Institutions in Europe and America (2 volumes)

A Collection of Ming Dynasty Paintings

76 volumes

A Collection of Qing Dynasty Paintings

100 volumes

Download Full Catalog

The Series of Paintings of Chinese Dynasties, published by Zhejiang University Press, are of important cultural missions and dis- tinct significance of times.

—— Du Weiming
(Research Profs)

Quality Standards

Edition

All the collected works have been formally authorized by relevant collection institutions. In order to protect the legitimate rights of domestic and overseas collection institutions, Zhejiang University conducts different protection measures in different stages, and strictly manages all the image resources according to the agreements signed with museums and cultural institutions to
prevent any form of tort.

Shooting

80% of the collected works are re-shot according to our latest technical standards either by the collection institutions or by us with certain authorization. Most of the works are shot by 8*10 inch reversal film, which enables the paintings to be preserved in the highest precision, the best quality and the realest state due to the world’s broadest breadth. Many of the works are shot and published for the first time across the world.

Scanning

Special studio and the world’s best Heidelberg S3900 electronic color scanner are provided and Lab color pattern, which has the largest color space, are adopted to ensure broad color space and vivid color reproduction.

Color Correction

GMG color management system is adopted to customize color management curves and provide required color management ICC curves (curves collected from inside pages) for plate making. Most of the pictures have been adjusted for 11 tens or even hundreds of steps to separate ink and color, so as to embody the true spirits of the original works.

It begins with the entity works on art history, which is a great symbolic project on rebuilding a Chinese Culture theory with the comparison of Chinese and Western cultures.

—— Fang Wen
(Emeritus Professor, Art and Archaeology at Princeton University, USA.)

Layout Design

A Full View for Hand Scroll

Segmental View for Hand Scroll

Original or Enlarged Size for Paingtings inside Album

Original or Shrinked Size for the Vertical Axis

I would like to suggest that the stunningly beautiful Song Series of volume now available can be understood to represent the open- ing of a bring new stage in the understanding and appreciation of the art of Song paintings. Never before has such intimate, de- tailed and accurate access to the great monuments of Song art has been possible.

—— Richard Bamhart
(Professor, Yale University, US)

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About us

ZUP & CNPIEC

A Comprehensive Collection of Ancient Chinese Paintings is a publication project compiled and published by Zhejiang University and Zhejiang Provincial Cultural Heritage Administration. Approved by President Xi Jinping in 2005, this large-scale, major national cultural project collects global ancient Chinese paintings covering all history timelines, which has been attached great importance and continuing attention throughout years.

Established in 1984, Zhejiang University Press (ZUP) is one of the leading academic and art publishers in China. ZUP consistently works towards being an internationally-recognized publishing company, specializing in high-quality books, teaching materials, journals, audio and video publications and electronic publications.

CNPIEC is committed to becoming a world-class digital agent and wholesaler in order to realize its transformation from product trader to information service provider. We have established the CNPeReading international digital resources trading platform over more than 5 years of development efforts, integrating a variety of overseas online digital resources, including millions of e-books, more than 10, 000 electronic journals, over 5 million articles, 105 thousand audio book chapters and 7 large local databases. CNPeReading’s localization of the gathering of ideas, and professional international service have received wide recognition among both domestic and foreign institutional users and cooperation channels.