Brief Biography-Xia Chang, a bamboo painter, was born in Kunshan in 1388. He was an early Ming scholar-official painter in the Yuan tradition. The Hanlin academy admitted him in 1415, and he eventually was called to Beijing, where he held high-ranking positions until 1457. Xia Chang was one of many scholar painters regarded as literati or wenrenhua painters. They were more interested in expression than the visual impact of a painting. It was a style devised by Dong Qichang, who established the Southern and Northern Schools. Literati painting was preferable to professional works by some scholars, which concentrated mainly on aesthetic viewpoints.