Due to an accidental opportunity, I was able to organize and gather here some scattered thoughts about the landscape paintings of the two Song Dynasties and other traditional Chinese paintings. It can be regarded as a summary.
I feel the decline of traditional Chinese painting after the Tang, Song, and Yuan Dynasties. During this period, although there was the rise of the Wu School of Painting in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the emergence of the Four Monks and the Eight Eccentrics, there were also artists like Zhang Daqian in the Republic of China. genius, but overall it has become more and more decadent. In addition, it has been fully impacted by Western culture, and culture, thought, and art are all in chaos.
The landscape paintings of the Five Dynasties and the Two Song Dynasties have achieved unprecedented achievements in the history of Chinese painting. The Northern School of Painting is represented by Jing Hao, Guan Tong, Li Cheng and Fan Kuan. Jing Hao paints the Taihang Mountains, Li Cheng paints the cold forest scenery of the Qilu Plain, and Fan Kuan paints the Guanzhong landscape. His painting style is based on the steep and majestic mountains and ridges. as the subject of the picture. The Jiangnan School of Painting is represented by Dong Yuan and Ju Ran (Dong Ju’s master and apprentice were actually the originators of simple painting and had a profound influence on later generations. Although compared with the freehand paintings of later generations, it is no longer true simple painting in today’s eyes). Jiangnan scenery is the theme, and his painting style does not seek to be dangerous, but seeks to be plain, innocent, and full of atmosphere. Although there are obvious differences in the brush and ink styles of the two major painting schools, they are all based on "seeing from a distance to gain momentum", and the contents of the paintings are all panoramic scenery, continuous. Different from the northern painting school, Dong Yuan's landscape paintings mostly depict the bright and beautiful scenery of the south of the Yangtze River with light brushwork. His mountains are not majestic and dangerous, the rocks are not as strong and exposed as those of the northern painting school, and the trees are not dry and desolate. Dong Yuan's landscapes are all composed of gentle and rolling mountains, or fishing boats in river villages, flowing water in valleys, and the pictures are filled with mist and clouds. He does not pursue grandeur and greatness. But it focuses on a soft and tranquil atmosphere, and the details are deliberately blurry, but the effect from a distance is very good (this is very similar to Western oil paintings), and the grasp of light and color is also unique (this may be why it is liked by Westerners) . During the Northern Song Dynasty, the reputation and influence of Dong Ju's Jiangnan School of Painting was far from being comparable to that of the Northern Painting School of Jingguan. It was not until the late Northern Song Dynasty that due to the praise of some literati, Hu Yi was considered to be "plain and innocent, unprecedented in the Tang Dynasty, and the style is unparalleled". Therefore, Hu Yiyue became the highest model of landscape painting. Later, after being carried forward by the "Four Schools of Yuan Dynasty", Hu Yiyi became the top model of landscape painting. Dong Qichang's vigorous promotion enabled the Jiangnan School of Painting to achieve an absolutely orthodox status. Some people even believed that "Dong Yuan and Ju Ran in the painting world are just like Confucius and Yan Hui in Confucianism." They simply compared the two to Confucianism's eternal teachers. Confucius, Yan Hui, and so on, the northern painting school gradually declined and was no longer praised. However, in the painting world of the Northern Song Dynasty, the northern painting school still dominated the scene, and there were many painters who had the greatest influence, including Li Cheng and Fan Kuan before them, and Guo Xi and Wang Xian after them. They followed the example of their predecessors, but paid more attention to following nature. Li Cheng painted the cold forest scenery of the Qilu Plain, and preferred to use light ink. The dead trees in the cold forest he painted have straight and strong trunks, while the branches and leaves are curled and drooping. However, there are few handed down works. There is only "Reading Stone Tablets". Fan Kuan painted Guanzhong landscapes, Li Cheng's paintings can make the close-up scenes appear to be thousands of miles away, and Fan Kuan's paintings can make the distant views appear as if they are in front of you. His paintings feature majestic peaks and thousands of walls. In addition, Fan Kuan is also very good at painting snow scenes. Anyone with experience in Western painting knows about the reflective processing in the picture. Westerners are also prone to the problem of light and shadow processing in Chinese paintings. However, Fan Kuan almost always left a strip of white within the outline of the mountains and rocks, which resembles the effect of reflective lines. Few ordinary landscape painters Do this (see Fan's "Traveling in Streams and Mountains", "Snowy Mountains and Xiaosi" and "Snowy Scenery and Cold Forests"). Later generations said that Dong Yuan got the spirit of the mountain, Li Cheng got the physical appearance of the mountain, and Fan Kuan got the true bones of the mountain. However, due to the difficulty in spreading paper and silk, and the fact that many so-called handed down products are actually imitations by later generations, people today can only get a glimpse of them!
If the paintings of the Tang Dynasty were dominated by "jingbian paintings" (that is, expressing the contents of Buddhist scriptures in paintings) and paintings of aristocratic life, then landscape paintings reached their peak in the Song Dynasty (actually in the Wei and Jin Dynasties His landscape paintings are also very good. It can be seen from Zhan Ziqian's "Spring Outing Picture" that the perspective processing of distance and near is already very good). The intervention of literati and officials improved the taste of painting. The themes were focused on mountains and flowing water, masters and hermits, and combined with pastoral poetry, formed a unique and pure aesthetic art.
Both poetry and painting became popular in the Song Dynasty. One uses the rhythm of words as the carrier, and the other uses lines and colors as the medium. The two influence and penetrate each other. There is painting in the poem, and there is poetry in the painting. The collision creates the essence of Chinese landscape painting. Absolutely noisy! In fact, regardless of the Southern Sect or the Northern Sect, they are all literati paintings (Jing Hao, Li Cheng, and Fan Kuan are also literati, and literati paintings are not limited to landscapes. For example, Han Bo, who served as Jiedu Shi and Right Prime Minister in the Tang Dynasty, was good at painting animals. , the famous "Five Oxen Picture" is his masterpiece, and Li Gonglin, who is outstanding in poetry and prose, is good at painting horses and figures), you can't see the religious involvement in these paintings, and you can't see the fighting of the warriors and the iron horses ( You can't find this kind of thing in traditional Chinese paintings). These paintings are the best embodiment of the traditional Chinese philosophy of heaven and unity.
About literati painting
Although Jing Hao, Li Cheng, and Fan Kuan are all literati, in a strict sense, they are both literati and professional painters. The so-called "literati landscape painting" of later generations has a specific meaning. This lineage can be traced back to Su Shi and Wen Tong, who advocated that "the spirit is higher than the form". There is no need to pay special attention to the technique, but purely to express the freehand brushwork using calligraphy. The emphasis is on writing about one's nature and feelings, and putting one's subjective mind over realism. However, in any case, strictly speaking, they are not the mainstream of painting, but only amateur paintings. However, after Dong Qichang in the Ming Dynasty, amateur painting became the mainstream of traditional Chinese painting. Following this path of amateur painters, people today no longer know about the Tang, Song, Wei, and Jin dynasties. This journey focuses on breaking away from complexity and focusing on simplicity (abandoning gongbi and starting with freehand brushwork), and the pattern is based on leftover materials (cutting out parts of landscapes, flowers and plants to make a fuss about). Compared with large-scale landscape paintings, it does have a clever layout and conception, but its jerry-making and This is also the trick), emphasizing the charm and Zen state (none of the academic painters seem to have these things). In the end, you only need to practice according to Jie Ziyuan's painting instructions for a while and you can become a painter, or you don't even need this step at all. As long as you have the brushwork and passion, you can become a painter (in fact, many children's paintings are no worse than this). The changes in art seem to be similar all over the world. Western painting has also begun a journey of hyper-realism since the Renaissance, from Impressionism to Fauvism to today's Incomprehensible School, with continuous changes in expression forms along the way. Transcendence, in the end, reaches the same destination with us, that is, we are all returning to primitive art. We are constantly being fed this kind of second-rate, third-rate or even inferior art, and now we have lost the ability to distinguish between beauty and ugliness. Don’t you see, in today’s music scene, there are kings and queens who have neither singing skills nor musical literacy? , one after another ups and downs, everyone making a lot of money, isn't it a reflection of this phenomenon.
About Chinese painting and Western painting
If the foundation of Western painting is light and shadow, apart from color, all choices are between blank space and shadow, and lines are just the dividing line between light and shadow, then , the soul of Chinese painting is lines. A first-class master of traditional Chinese painting must also be a first-class master of line drawing. First-class Chinese painting must be constructed of first-class lines, on which life flows and souls dance! (This is the reason why many paintings today, despite their skill, look dead.) The freehand brushwork of literati breaks away from the traditional cliché of wealth and blooming flowers, breaks away from the constraints of brushwork and techniques, and integrates calligraphy into painting. In the book, he wrote straight from his heart, free and easy, and indeed created a different kind of wonder. However, if we want to appreciate the exquisite lines of first-class Chinese paintings, we still have to go back and look at Tang paintings, Song paintings and even Yuan paintings. Especially figure paintings, animal paintings, and landscape paintings. Try to compare the Hundred Horses Painting painted by an unknown person from the Tang Dynasty in the Forbidden City in Beijing (it is said to be painted by Wei Yan, which is true) with Lang Shining's Hundred Horses Painting (you can search online for the Tang Dynasty Paintings collected by the Forbidden City). The Hundred Horses Picture, Lang's Hundred Horses Picture is almost well-known to every household, but not many people know about this Hundred Horses Picture of the Tang Dynasty. This is also a strange thing! Some people may say that Lang's paintings also absorbed many traditional Chinese painting techniques. It’s true at all, but the overall thinking of his paintings is Western-style), encounters spanning thousands of years, the lines of the East versus the light and shadow of the West, everyone can judge for themselves who is higher and who is lower. In any case, the greatness of Chinese painting art and its ability to compete with the first-class art of any other nation are established by these first-class lines.
Most traditional Chinese painters, whether professional or amateur, have a literati background, or are simply literati. Today's literati and painters are walking on two different lines, rarely crossing each other, and occasionally there are a few, which is really rare.
This is a chaotic era. The impact of Western culture has made us overwhelmed. Culture, thought, and art are all in chaos, but no matter what, we cannot go back to the past. Just like today's painting students (mainly those who are professional in art), whether they study Chinese painting or Western painting, sketching is the first basic skill required. This means that we have moved from the two-dimensional thinking to the three-dimensional thinking. method (the lines and points of Chinese painting are two-dimensional space, and the light and shadow of Western painting are three-dimensional space), this should be a new starting point. After getting out of the chaos, we should have a broader future.