Spring of War Book, Baling Ancient City, midnight. Meet oil painter Mo Hongxun, China painter Dai Jian, poet and calligrapher Cui in a teahouse. Mo Hongxun doesn't know many people, but they are connected. Dai Jian's Chinese painting has been concerned for a long time and he likes it very much. The new Cai Shiping is a sincere person. Cui Sheng has a square face, and there is quite a heroic momentum between his eyebrows.
This is the second meeting with Cui. The first time we met was in Yueyang Nanhu Hotel. It was February 2004, and I participated in the "Dongting Lake Pen Club" of the Provincial Federation of Literary and Art Circles. On that occasion, he sent "a diary of a flower family composed of pictures and videos". Read it carefully at once. These days. It is not easy for people to read a book carefully. Diary of Huajiadi is a wonderful artistic essay. Cui recorded his days of studying in the calligraphy graduate class of Wang Yong Studio of the Central Academy of Fine Arts in the form of a graphic diary. It is not only a record of art learning process, but also a kind of thinking learning. This process is art in itself. After reading the diary, I also feel that Cui's sense of language and ability to control words are very good. I didn't make a fuss about the record of the artistic process, which made me feel that I had entered the calligraphy graduate class of the Central Academy of Fine Arts and integrated into their study life. Diary seems to be written casually, and it is really not easy to attract readers. After reading it, I feel that I have gained much more than the fun of reading, broadened my horizons, smelled the ink of the graduate class, and indirectly gained knowledge of calligraphy appreciation. After reading this book, I learned something about Cui and felt his persistent pursuit of art.
Q Cui: Why are you interested in calligraphy?
Cui grew up on Chishan Island, an isolated island in Dongting Lake. His parents both work in Chishan prison. His contact with the outside world is very limited. The limited crowd outside the high wall, except his parents' colleagues, are all employed on the spot after serving their sentences.
When he was in primary school, he hardly saw real calligraphy works. /kloc-when he was 0/2 years old, he passed the window of a small house and saw a poem written by Chairman Mao in seal script through the glass window. He was very surprised. He was frightened by the formal beauty of these words. A child doesn't know that there are such beautiful brushstrokes in the world. Seal script is a shock and an opportunity for a child who has never seen calligraphy works. This is why Cui became attached to calligraphy and reached the peak in seal script.
1979 One day in summer, there was a hand of God pushing in the dark. Cui, a middle school student who is interested in calligraphy, went to the post office on the island and ordered a calligraphy magazine for himself. At this time, an old man who also ordered magazines at the post office noticed the child and noticed that he wanted to order a calligraphy magazine. The old man took the initiative to talk to Cui. He is a prison worker named Wang Xianxuan. It was 1975 that was pardoned by the Kuomintang Major General and civil servants. After being pardoned, he did not go back to his hometown and worked as a boiler burner in prison. This meeting is an opportunity for both Wang Xianxuan and Cui. Wang Xianxuan has considerable attainments in calligraphy. For some reason, he failed to return to his hometown after being imprisoned for 26 years. He is a lonely old man who cares about a young man who loves calligraphy and gives him guidance. From then on, Cui became a student of Wang Xianxuan. Only then did he know that the author of Chairman Mao's poems that shocked him a few years ago was Mr. Wang Xianxuan, and the suspense for many years finally settled! In the days that followed, Cui sent his calligraphy homework to Mr. Wang Xianxuan's home two or three nights a week to comment, and the teachers and students talked for four or five hours. The old man is well-read and has a profound knowledge of Chinese studies. Cui was not only influenced by calligraphy, but also established his aesthetic taste.
On an isolated island, Cui had his first calligraphy teacher. In an era of neglecting culture and art, it is really hard to have a mentor who teaches him wholeheartedly and a learning environment! At that time, books could not be bought on the isolated island, and almost all of Cui's calligraphy tablets and art books were mailed. Cui began to take the first step in calligraphy.
Like Wang Xianxuan, tutoring young Cui's calligraphy study has become a very meaningful thing in his life. I think: If Wang Xianxuan is still alive and knows Cui's calligraphy achievements today, he will be pleased.
Cui later came to Changde to study and work. Changde is also a lakeside city of Dongting Lake, where calligraphy talents gather. Cui, who is good at learning, has been guided by Mr. Yang Wei, Mr. Zhang Gong and Mr. Zhang Gong, laying a solid foundation. Later, I studied at Hunan University of Arts and Crafts for three years. Under the guidance of the famous painter Mr. Dewey, the style of pen and ink has been further improved. In the autumn of 2002, he entered the Central Academy of Fine Arts for further study, and his calligraphy artistic creation gradually improved.
I saw Cui's calligraphy exhibition at Hunan Art Museum today. That was the third time I saw Cui, and it was also the first time I saw his exhibition. Scanning the huge exhibition hall, there is a feeling of clouds flying and surging, and the shore is cracked, which has a great visual impact. Some words are suspected to have been written with a broom. How dare you! Large works occupy the four walls of the exhibition hall. Among them, the couplet of seal script is praised by peers.
Cui's calligraphy is magnificent, with outstanding personality and far-reaching artistic conception. A couplet that seems to be a masterpiece hangs in the middle of the east wall of the exhibition hall. The red rice paper reads: "Yunlin Mountain is far away, and the article is self-innovative." In particular, the word "how flat and how far" is round, peaceful and casual, which is very eye-catching, as if suddenly entering the cool and spacious hall of ancient buildings after being exposed to the sun, with a refreshing feeling.
I like this painting very much. When I looked carefully, it turned out that someone had ordered it. No sooner had the exhibition opened than someone took a fancy to it. Too soon! It's really a pity. Think: such a good combination is unrepeatable, and it requires a mentality and accidental creativity, which can never be obtained again. In all kinds of helplessness, I had to "eat" this beautiful couplet with my eyes, and I felt that I was in line with the deep Zen world of Cui's calligraphy works. Good works make people reluctant to give up. The so-called collision between art and mind is at this moment.
I don't know much about calligraphy, and I haven't learned real cursive script. Reading calligraphy depends on a true spirit of life, a force of life, a free spirit of getting rid of anger and practicing both rigidity and softness. Calligraphy is an abstract art, it is the most convenient to express a person's spiritual strength, but it is also difficult to cover up a person's spiritual weakness. I don't appreciate the way to seek scriptures in China's calligraphy art treasure house to whitewash my pale soul. What looks beautiful on the surface does not necessarily belong to the calligrapher himself. Calligraphy is the most difficult thing to hide a person's mood and spirit. I am afraid that I will lose myself by cooperating with famous artists, thus falling into tradition and having a great sense of inferiority. This may depend on my strong spiritual strength to refuse to get lost.
Cui's calligraphy, like a rural child, streaks in the wasteland in the summer sunshine and swims happily in the water, which is a kind of impudence that is not bound by statutes! Let people realize the free spirit of calligraphers.
Cui's calligraphy reminds me of the reed of Zeguo in Dongting Lake, a tenacious growth and a wanton expression. Plants grow wildly in fertile land.
According to an old-timer in Hunan calligraphy circle, Cui is an accomplished young calligrapher, who is in his early forties this year and has a profound traditional foundation. However, what Cui sees in his calligraphy works is not the complete inheritance of tradition, but the full absorption of rich nutrition in tradition and the untraceable enhancement of artistic physique. There is a fresh vitality in his works, that is, the power of the original ecology, or the state that cannot be imitated. This work shows traces of his wandering in Wan Ren.
A child who grew up on an isolated island in Dongting Lake studied, worked and lived in the cities around Dongting Lake, and later chose Cui, a calligraphy artist who lived in Yueyang Ancient City near Dongting Lake. His field is a vast atmosphere with the essence of Huxiang culture. Dongting Lake and Yueyang, which are close to the Yangtze River, are irreplaceable places of geomantic omen in terms of human geography.
Cui has never left Dongting Lake, which is the background of his calligraphy works. The title of this paper is to change a couplet in his collection: "Clouds in the chest, lakes and mountains below" into "Clouds in the chest, lakes and mountains at the bottom of the pen".