Mention the name Wang Ximeng, I believe many people are not familiar with it, but if you want to talk about "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", everyone must be familiar with it. It is one of the most famous masterpieces of calligraphy and painting in the Northern Song Dynasty, and together with Zhang Zeduan's "Map of the Upper River of the Qing Dynasty", it is called "the masterpiece of the Northern Song Dynasty".
"A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" is 12 meters long, and such a divine work is from the hand of an eighteen-year-old genius teenager, Wang Ximeng, and what is even more surprising is that Wang Ximeng depicted it in only half a year.
Since its birth, "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" has been talked about by people with its beautiful artistic conception and exquisite brushstrokes, and has always been collected by many celebrities. The Qianlong Emperor of the Qing Dynasty was even more fond of it, and at the front of the scroll there was a poem: "Those who do not think of themselves as people, then adjust ding to be who they are."
The two poems of the Qianlong Emperor hint at the ruler of Wang Ximeng's time, Song Huizong, in which the Qianlong Emperor raised a very intriguing question: How could Emperor Huizong of Song, who had cultivated such a talented teenager as Wang Ximeng, appoint traitors to govern the country and eventually lead to the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty?
"Emperor of Calligraphy and Painting"
The Northern Song Dynasty has been walking downhill since Wang Anshi failed to change the law. The fainting of the rulers and the decay of the officials constantly accelerated the decaying feudal dynasty, of which the emperor's fainting was the direct cause of the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty.
In 1100, the ambitious Song Zhezong died of illness in the middle of the dynasty at the age of 25. Empress Xiang used her family power to disregard the advice of the chancellor Zhang Huan and insisted on establishing Emperor Zhezong's younger brother Zhao Yi as the king. But no one knows that this wrong decision will hasten the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty.
"Frivolity cannot rule the world" This is the evaluation of the new emperor by The Prime Minister Zhang Huan, and sure enough, Zhao Yao, who was on the throne, did not show the demeanor that a king should have, did not care about power at all, and paid no attention to politics. The most asked question every day is – where can I get pleasure in recent days?
At first, in order to cope with the imperial government, the reigning Emperor Huizong of Song co-managed the state affairs with the empress dowager in the name of "the right to dispose of military and state affairs". However, the good times did not last long, and after only one year, the empress dowager died of illness, and Zhao Tuo, who was officially pro-government, began to let go and find his own happiness.
Zhao Yao's personality was quite similar to that of Li Yu, the lord of the Southern Tang Dynasty, who regarded poetry and painting as his main business every day, and constantly suppressed the prime ministers Zhang Huan, Cai Bian and others. Gao Li, who was flattered by the aggrandizement, was regarded as the pillar of the country by the opportunistic Cai Jing and others.
When Cai Jing, Tong Guan, Gao Li, and other traitors presided over the administration of the dynasty, they tried their best to meet the demands of Emperor Huizong of Song for all kinds of poverty and extravagance, which made the people of the world miserable, and during the period, peasant movements such as the SongJiang Uprising in Shandong and the Fangla Uprising in Anhui broke out, which plunged the Northern Song Dynasty into internal and external difficulties.
Traitors are in charge, and the road to loyalty is blocked. In the eyes of Emperor Huizong of Song, the Northern Song Dynasty is still a peaceful and prosperous world, he is addicted to pen and ink Danqing all day long, studying calligraphy and painting, that is, under this coincidence, a teenager and an emperor have created a miracle in the history of Chinese culture...
Genius teenager Wang Ximeng
In 1113 AD, on a whim, Emperor Huizong of Song was inspired to summon all the painters of the Great Song Dynasty and ordered them to paint the splendid mountains and rivers of the Great Song by hand within half a year, and the best ones were rewarded. While the painters were busy with the paintings, one of the unique teenagers caught the attention of Emperor Huizong of Song.
As an emperor of calligraphy and painting, Song Huizong's realm in the field of art was very comparable, and he could be said to be the leader of the art field of the Northern Song Dynasty at that time. Not only is it unique in painting, but it even invented a set of fonts called "thin gold body", which is extremely difficult to write and has a high artistic appreciation value, which has been used for thousands of years.
The young man who attracted the attention of such an emperor was named Wang Ximeng, and when Emperor Huizong of Song saw this person painting, he was skilled in his pen and unique in his eyes, and people and paintings were integrated.
Emperor Huizong of Song was so mesmerized that he put down the emperor's shelf and personally taught Wang Ximeng his method and taught him pen and ink techniques. Even in order to make this painting pass on for hundreds of generations, Emperor Huizong of Song changed the paper to a silk painting and let Wang Ximeng paint on the silk surface.
Under the careful carving of Wang Ximeng and the dedicated guidance of Emperor Huizong of Song, a masterpiece of the gods of the world, "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", came out. The total length of the painting is 12 meters, a mountain and a tree are meticulous, a river and a river are vast, serious and lively. The combination of dynamic and static makes the rivers and mountains of the Great Song Dynasty unfold in front of people's eyes, and becomes a masterpiece of landscape painting in the Northern Song Dynasty.
Wang Ximeng also became the most famous painting saint of the Great Song Dynasty besides the emperor with a "Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", when he was only 18 years old, and the ruler of the Great Song Dynasty, Song Huizong, was just 30 years old. The whole country seems to be as vibrant and majestic as depicted in the painting, but history has not left much time for the Northern Song Dynasty...
"It is difficult to stay in the country"
After the "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" was completed, Emperor Huizong of Song was full of appreciation and rewarded it to his favorite minister Cai Jing. After Cai Jing won it, it was regarded as a national treasure. Shi Shuyun: "In the eighteenth year of Xi Meng, painting was a disciple... Not more than half a year old, but in this way. Shangjiazhi, because of the gift of The King. ”
With the favor of Cai Jing, Tong Guan, Gao Li and other traitors, the Northern Song Dynasty became increasingly corrupt and on the verge of decline, and the "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" also became a portrayal of the sunset of the Northern Song Dynasty.
In 1120, Jin and the Northern Song Reached an "Alliance on the Sea", and the Northern Song Dynasty decided to "unite jin and destroy the Liao". Under the victory of the Northern Jin Army against the Liao Festival, at this time, the Northern Song Dynasty in the south was constrained everywhere, forming a situation in which the Jin Dynasty attacked the Liao and the Liao robbed the Song, and the weakness and corruption of the Northern Song Dynasty made the Jin State deeply remembered.
In 1126, the second year after the jin dynasty destroyed the Liao, it marched south. In the face of the menacing Jin army, Song Huizong did not think about how to resist, but wanted to emulate the Eastern Jin Dynasty. In the second year of Jing Kang, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, Tokyo, was besieged, and the incompetent Emperor Huizong of Song had no choice but to give the throne to his son Zhao Huan, that is, Song Qinzong.
Soon, the city of Tokyo was destroyed, and more than 3,000 people of the Song Huizong, Song Qinzong father and son, the Zhao royal family, harem concubines, and courtiers were captured by the Jin army and escorted north, the treasury of Tokyo City was also looted, countless rare treasures were robbed by the Jin people, and the antique calligraphy and paintings were burned, known in history as the "Change of Jingkang", and the Northern Song Dynasty was destroyed from then on.
Fortunately, the painting "Map of a Thousand Li Rivers and Mountains", which is revered as a national treasure, and the "Map of the Upper River of the Qingming Dynasty" that has been handed down to later generations have been preserved intact in this crisis, but no matter how well the "Map of the Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" and the "Map of the Upper River of the Qingming Dynasty" are painted, they are doomed to not be able to retain the eight hundred miles of rivers and mountains of the Great Song Dynasty.
Dynasties have changed, passers-by have been hurried, and "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" has been collected and sought after by countless emperors, nobles, and literati and inkers in the past dynasties. After the founding of new China, "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" was collected by the Palace Museum.
"In the old days, Wang Xie Tang Qianyan flew into the homes of ordinary people" The "Map of a Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" that only the emperor could play in the past can now be displayed intact in front of the eyes of the world. However, because this painting is made on silk paper, the picture is extremely easy to break.
Therefore, the Palace Museum tried its best to keep its physical objects on public display. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains" has only been publicly exhibited in the 1950s, 1980s and 2017.
However, with the continuous progress of science and technology, people can still use Internet communication equipment to "zero-distance contact" with ancient masterpieces to feel the shocking beauty it brings.
As a dynasty of long-scrolled poetry books, the Northern Song Dynasty had the heroism of "going to the east of the great river to exhaust the waves", and it also had the sadness of "miserable and miserable relatives"; it contained all-encompassing culture and the theory of imprisoning thought; it had the most artistic emperors and genius teenagers who became famous in one fell swoop; and there were also traitors who had been left behind for thousands of years, and they could not look back.
Wang Ximeng, a talented teenager, although the history books record him only a few lines, is enough to become a name for scholars to look back at the last years of the Northern Song Dynasty and talk about comfort, outlining a romantic time. He left a reputation as a "genius teenager" in the history of Chinese painting, but unfortunately this genius left only one work.
People can't help but guess that perhaps, this teenager with a paintbrush in his hand turned into a crane and jumped into the painting after painting.
He toured the undulating mountains in it, crossed the vast rivers, drunkenly collapsed in the countryside fields, woke up next to the soft collapse of the bamboo mat, and witnessed countless people coming and going in the millennium, but he was still the teenager, as young as this painting, forever young, always alive...