The painting career of Li Liufang spanned a period of twenty-six years as shown by his earliest extant dated works of 1602 and the last dated work of 1628. His paintings testify to a stylistic evolution successively influenced by Huang Gongwang, Wang Meng, Wu Zhen, Ni Zan and Dong Qichang and ultimately evolving an individual style. Li Liufang was also accomplished in the arts of poetry, calligraphy, seal carving, bamboo carving and rock gardening. He was esteemed as one fo the "Nine Friends of Painting" as well as the "Four Gentlemen of Jiading." Li Liufang led the life of a recluse in his rustic abode of Sandalwood Garden (Tanyuan) until his death in 1629. His style was carried on by his son, Li Hangzhi, and many literatus painters who expressed admiration for his life and art. As an individualist and a non-conformist, Li Liufang was considered a literati role model. Through the practice of Li Liufang's style, these later artists aimed to emulate a literati ideal. Li Liufang, being a prolific writer has left us a collection of poems, essays and inscriptions in his book Anthology of the Sandlewood Garden (Tanyuan ji) in which he recorded his travels, his life, details of his environment, and comments and criticisms on art. Massive writing by contemporary literati associates, gazettes of Jiangnan, Suzhou, Taicang and Jiading, traditional documentations and references in painting catalogues also add to our knowledge of the life and work of Li Liufang. This study has been undertaken in order to reconstruct a chronology of Li Liufang's life and work which will lead to some interesting revelations about the late Ming/Early Qing painting. Through an understanding of Li Liufang's localized influence in the Jianding area, one can get an insight into the nature of his role in transmitting and perpetuating the literati style formulated by the orthodox theorist Dong Qichang as well as a sense of continuity that was evident in the subsequent development of the history of Chinese painting.