In the middle of Ming Dynasty in China (1368- 1644), Suzhou gradually developed into a southern metropolis. The development of economy has promoted the prosperity of culture, and many famous painters have appeared. Scholars often get together for banquets, and many scholars regard painting as entertainment. They inherited and developed the painting tradition of Yuan Dynasty (A.D. 1279- A.D. 1368), among which Shen Zhou, Wen Zhiming, Tang Yin and Chou Ying are the most famous, and their novel painting styles and outstanding artistic achievements are famous in the painting world. Later generations called it "Si Wu Family".
Shen Zhou is the main representative of Wu Pai. Both of them are famous artists who are good at poetry and painting. Their painting style mainly inherits the tradition of literati painting in Song and Yuan Dynasties. They can paint several themes, but landscape painting is the best. Many of their works describe the scenery and literati life in the south of the Yangtze River, paying attention to pen and ink and the organic combination of poetry and painting. Shen Zhou's landscape painting is mainly based on rough brushwork and light color rendering, and the ink and wash flowers are very distinctive. Wen Zhiming mainly uses meticulous landscapes, and likes to cover and dye with cyan and heavy colors. Tang Yin and Wu Pai represent another type. Tang Yin changed from a scholar to a professional painter who made a living by selling paintings. Because Chou Ying is a professional painter, he is greatly influenced by literati painting in his creation, with comprehensive techniques and profound skills, and his theme and interest can meet the requirements of urbanites. Both of their teachers are Chen Zhou, who studied under Li Tang and Liu Songnian in painting, and were influenced by Shen Zhou, Wen Zhiming, the Northern Song Dynasty (960- 1 127) and the Yuan Dynasty (1279- 1368). They painted fine realism and attached importance to artistic conception. Tang Yin's figure painting is sometimes meticulous and sometimes freehand. Chou Ying was greatly influenced by ancient people's copying, and he was good at setting colors, green landscapes and meticulous figure painting.
The Ming Dynasty was an era in which the Sports School and Wu Pai coexisted, and it was also an era in which the two schools alternately rose and fell. The palace flower-and-bird paintings represented by Liang Lin and Lv Ji include two different styles: meticulous painting and freehand brushwork. Wang E's landscape paintings are called contemporary Ma Yuan. Among the people, Wei Wu, a Zhejiang painter influenced by Dai Jin, was fascinated by his painting style, which had a great influence on the painting world at that time. The influence of Zhejiang School gradually penetrated into the court in the middle of Ming Dynasty, and the painting style inside and outside the court tended to be rough ink painting. At the same time, Zhejiang School is also famous for its academic figures and landscape paintings, and is called "academic school" by modern people. Painters such as Guo Xu and Xu Duanben have their own characteristics, and their works also reveal traces of physical discharge. On the basis of learning from Shen Zhou and Wen Zhiming, Chen Chun's freehand flower-and-bird painting inherited and developed the freehand ink painting method in Yuan Dynasty, which opened up a new road for the development of freehand flower-and-bird painting in Ming and Qing Dynasties.
The late Ming Dynasty was the most prosperous period in Wu Pai. Although limited by the living scope at that time, the painting theme was narrow, monotonous and repetitive. However, they attach importance to inheriting the tradition of ancient pen and ink, regard the pursuit of style as an important purpose of art, and are also creative because of their profound cultural accomplishment and their own aesthetic pursuit. Their pen and ink skills and expression techniques had a great influence on the later painting circles.