# Zhi and Xu's Pure Conversation

- By: Lan Ying (Chinese, 1585–after 1664)
- Date: 1643
- Medium: Hanging scroll; ink on paper
- Classification: Painting
- Dimensions: Painting: 141 x 56 cm (55 1/2 x 22 1/16 in.); Overall with knobs: 246 x 80 cm (96 7/8 x 31 1/2 in.)
- Culture: China, Ming dynasty (1368–1644)
- Credit line: Gift of Stephen O. K. Chen
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/1970.128)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/cma/1970.128/1970.128_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Teens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Lan Ying’s painting is a gift to his friend, the Chan monk Wuyun, in which he depicted two sages of the Six Dynasties period: the Buddhist monk Zhidun (314–366 CE), and the Daoist priest Xu Xun (265–420 CE). Meant to be understood as an analogy of the friendship between artist and monk, the painting also offered a retreat into the past, a year before the fall of the Ming dynasty.

A professional painter born in Hangzhou, Lan Ying is traditionally considered a last representative of the Zhe school. Lan wrote poetic inscriptions and interacted with the literatus Chen Jiru (1558–1639).