Ten Bamboo Studio Painting and Calligraphy Handbook (Shizhuzhai shuhua pu): Birds

Color printing reached a level of perfection in the early 1600s, as seen in this Ten Bamboo Studio Collection of Calligraphy and Painting and the Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting (printed 1679 and 1701). The painterly quality, precision in registering (aligning) the woodblocks, and harmonious colors made them the most successful color print editions in Chinese history. Both editions were printed and compiled in Nanjing, spread nationwide, and had a great impact on the arts in Japan and Korea.