"Midian landscape" is also called "Mi's Yunshan". The mainstream of landscape painting in Song Dynasty is the ink landscape painting inherited from Tang and Five Dynasties, that is, the broken ink landscape painting combined with line and ink, and the application of color is limited to the light color blooming combined with color and ink. In addition, there are traditional heavy-colored turquoise landscape paintings. Due to the influence of literati's ink drama in the mid-Northern Song Dynasty, a new school of landscape painting, the so-called "Midian landscape", emerged in the micro-Sect period.
Founder Mi Fei (1051~1107) was one of the four great calligraphers in the Northern Song Dynasty. Mi Fei was originally from Taiyuan, Shanxi, and later moved to Xiangyang and Zhenjiang. He saw misty and smoky trees on Yunshan along the Yangtze River and was inspired, so he made a new creation on the basis of Dong Yuan's painting method. He painted landscapes with ink and wash, and he said, "It's enough to write with letters and hide trees and stones with smoke and clouds", which gave full play to the effect of ink and wash blending and formed a subtle and ethereal charm.
Mi Youren (1086~ 1 165), the son of Mi Fei, inherited his father's method, and a few crystals were handed down from generation to generation, such as "Mo Opera in Yunshan" and "Atlas of Xiaoxiang White Clouds", all of which were filled with clouds and were vivid and interesting.