This is a signature on a watercolor painting. I'm trying to figure out who the artist is. I don't know if it's Chinese or Japanese. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
1 Answer
The artist used two courtesy names in the piece:
- One in the calligraphy, 新羅山人;
- One in the seal, 秌(秋)𡵽(岳).
The artist's real name is 「華嵒」 (Mandarin Pinyin: Huà Yán), a Qīng Dynasty painter.
Notes on seal character identification
In the seal,
「秋」 uses the variation 「秌」, where 「��」 and 「火」 are switched around;
「岳」 is written with a shape like
where the middle peak of 「山」 (picture of a mountain with multiple peaks) is exaggerated, and 「丘」 appears in its historical form (picture of hills with multiple peaks) (glyph evolution below):