陳洪綬畫作（包括繪畫及版畫）中的女性有幾點特色：1. 雖然如傳統的仕女畫般，也畫妓女，但是多為閨秀小姐與侍女，2. 畫中女性的肢體語言特別多，也比較誇張，或躺或坐或立，或執扇，或手握拂尾，或捧花等，皆非傳統習見之姿，強調畫中女性對身體細膩的感覺，3. 與前一點相關的是，陳洪綬畫中的女性傳達出女性的慾望，如百無聊賴、斜倚煙籠的富家少婦。而這種慾望的傳達，除了姿勢的特別外，還藉著畫中的各式物品來表現一種相思的氣氛及細緻的感官效果。

經由上述畫作形式的分析，我們或可探究：既然陳洪綬女性圖像的消費者多為男性，畫中女性人物形象、肢體語言及所處氛圍的轉變或許顯示出男性觀賞女性的角度或男性慾望投射的女人典型有所改變。本文的切入點為晚明江南士人盛行的物品賞玩文化；賞玩本為慾望、癖好的投射，也促使感官美學愈加精緻化。賞玩對象可為古物、奇花、奇石等，也可為有女性出現的人物畫。在此種文化氣氛中，可被欲求的「女性」為何，而女性性質及美感又是如何被建構，皆值得思考。

This paper attempts to investigate how some late-Ming figure paintings represent women and their qualities and how these qualities of womanhood represent the culture of connoisseurship of that time. The focused objects are a group of paintings and woodblock prints by Chen Hongshou, the most famous figure painters in late-Ming China. These works exhibit intriguing designs in composition and female image which seem to connote multi-leveled messages worthy of further research. In addition, Chen and his friends, some of whom were also his patrons, were members of one literati society active in the area of Jiangnan. Through studying the collected writings of Chen and his friends, we can partly reconstruct the context in which Chen's figure paintings were purchased, seen, and used. This context enables us to ask questions about how late-Ming literati of Jiangnan defined womanhood, evaluated female beauty, and consumed female image.

The female figures seen in Chen's painting demonstrate three formal characteristics which deserve our attention. First of all, traditionally, the image of courtesans dominated the genre of Chinese female-figure painting. Even though Chen paints courtesans as well, most of his figure paintings depict gentry ladies and their maids. Secondly, Chen's female figures show unusually rich gestures, some of which are dramatic and close to staged performance. These gestures convey the sense that women in his works are conscious of their own body and sensual feelings. Thirdly, related to the second point some of Chen's female figures are characterized by desire not only through their gestures, but through the display of various objects loaded with cultural significance. These sensual gestures and symbolic objects produce an ambience of love sickness and refined sensuality unseen in previous figure painting.

Since the main consumers of Chen's female figures were men, the changes describe above, including female image of gentry ladies, richly physical gestures, and the ambience of love and sensuality, perhaps suggest that late-Ming literati of Jiangnan cultivated a special taste for women and womanhood. These changes also seem to indicate that women, as the object of men's gaze and desire, could not avoid being constructed into an abstract category of "womanhood". To answer thesequestions, I start with the late-Ming culture of connoisseurship which involves collecting and evaluating objects and writing about objects. The activities of connoisseurship was the projection of literati's desire for control, distinction, and sensual refinement. The objects of their desire could be antiques, beautiful flowers,strange rocks, and women represented in figure painting as well. In this cultural ambience, it is interesting to know what literati of late-Ming Jiangnan desired from female figures in painting and women in reality. Treating women as objects for sensual refinement, these literati constructed and promulgated new qualities for the category of womanhood, especially in their production and consumption of female figures in painting.

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