A beautiful gift to the College finds a great and prominent home.
This scroll was a gift from the family of Wheaton student Kertes Heng '17 in 2015 and was given in recognition of the work of Wheaton College. It is displayed prominently in a frame on the wall just outside the senior administrative offices of the College on the second floor of Blanchard Hall.
The Chinese written language is not an alphabet of letters with which to spell, but rather symbols with meaning. Because of this, foreign words and names are written ('spelled') with characters, which by their pronunciation come as close as is possible within the language to the sound of the foreign word.
On this scroll, with the characters written from left to right, the first character is pronounced "Hui" with a fourth tone, meaning "benefit, kindness, or favor". The second character is pronounced as "Dun" also with a fourth tone, meaning "meal, stop, suddenly, pause or arrange". Both of the first two characters are non-independent characters (which means they carry a meaning but don't function unless used together with other characters), but when they are put together, they sound like "Wheaton". The last two characters together mean "university or college", pronounced as "Da Xue" (Da with a fourth tone and Xue with a second tone).
The red marks on the right margin are stamp marks which are the 'signature' of the artist for this work.
The artist, Pang Jia Yong, was born in the town of Yanting, Sichuan province of China. He is a member of the Chinese Modern Calligraphy Research Association, a council member of Sichuan Provincial Calligraphy Association, and Xi’an Painting and Calligraphy Fellowship Association. He is the deputy general manager of Chengdu National Heritage and Culture Media Company. His works have been collected by the Vice-Chairman of the Russian State Artur Chillingarov as well as by his fans and many art lovers in China. He also has his works auctioned in Hong Kong.
庞嘉勇，中国四川盐亭人，中国现代书法研究会会员，四川省书法协会理事，中国西安书画联谊会理事，中国成都国秀文化传播公司副总经理，有作品曾被俄罗斯国家副主席奇林加诺夫，阿尔图尔收藏，也有作品在香港拍卖及国内爱好者收藏。
