# Conversation in Autumn

- By: Hua Yan (Chinese, 1682–c. 1765)
- Date: 1732
- Medium: Hanging scroll; ink and light color on paper
- Classification: Painting
- Dimensions: Overall: 218.5 x 71.7 cm (86 x 28 1/4 in.)
- Culture: China, Qing dynasty (1644–1911)
- Credit line: John L. Severance Fund
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/1954.263)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1954.263/1954.263_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Teens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Two figures sit conversing in a thatched cottage. This painting illustrates two poetic lines:

My guest came to sit beyond the dust, In a narrow room, we talked about the autumnal sounds of autumn.

Hua Yan presented an intimate world—simple and rustic—amid a landscape. The cool wilderness depicted in this work conveys an aloofness that may reveal the inner world of a scholar-artist who failed the civil service examination but preserved a sense of pride and endurance in his humble surroundings.