As a foreign painter of the early Tang dynasty, Yuchi Yiseng played an important part in Chinese art history. However, without his original paintings, interpretation of the limited documents relevant to him might cause misunderstanding. This paper first sorts out documents of significance and summarizes Yuchi Yiseng’s painting style, then discusses the related painting styles of medieval Tocharian and Sogdian murals.Finally, it draws the conclusion that, compared to Khotanese paintings, Tocharian and Sogdian murals around the 7th century indicate a better impression of space, as if they were executed "outside the walls."
