A powerful exploration of the nationalization of domestic animation
The experience and value of "fine art film"
Zhang Qizhong
In recent years, domestic animation, regardless of the number or box office, has shown a steady growth trend. In 2019, 31 domestic animation films were released, with a total box office of 7.095 billion yuan. While the domestic animation box office is growing in a spurt, we should note that the works of major animation countries such as France, Japan, and the United States basically have their own art style. How to better establish their own style, especially how to apply Chinese art resources to domestic animation, is a problem that should not be ignored. The achievements made in the field of fine art films after the founding of New China may be able to provide a reference experience for the current animation creation.
The splendor of "fine art film" and "seventeen years"
After the founding of New China, cartoons were positioned in the education of children and young people. Therefore, from "Kitten Fishing" (1952) and "Good Friends" (1954), many domestic animations were positioned at "low" audiences, and it was not until "The Proud General" (1956) that the characters were first adopted and the direction of "nationalization of domestic animation" was proposed.
The real focus of domestic animation on "fine art" was between 1958 and 1966. During this period, the typical animation types were ink animation represented by "Little Tadpole Finds Mother" (1960) and "Mudi" (1963), as well as flower and bird painting style animations such as "Bees and Earthworms" (1959), "Shy Yellow Warbler" (1960), "Cuckoo Is Late" (1959), "Little Swallow" (1960) and so on. The field of the vista of Little Carp Jumping The Dragon Gate (1958) also adopts the landscape painting style, which has been tried in The Boasting Frog (1954). Animation focuses on "fine art", as a discussion of an art short film style, it is a historical stage necessary for the growth of domestic animation.
At that time, the mass line of animation creation and the pursuit of "nationalization" were supported and helped by many famous artists across the country, which greatly improved the level of "art film" creation. For example, the famous decorative painter Zhang Guangyu served as an art designer in the large-scale animation film "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" (Part 1), shaping the main characters of the film - Sun Wukong, the Jade Emperor, Taibai Venus, the Three Princes of Nezha, etc., and made a panoramic sketch for the film. Conceived of the design of the next episode of the film, his brother Zhang Zhengyu also gave specific guidance to the background of the film, so that the background style of the film has a strong decorative flavor of combining virtual and real, and at the same time, it is also very coordinated with the human action, which enhances the atmosphere of the film. The painter Huang Yongyu lived in Xishuangbanna and other ethnic minority areas for a long time, and he specially designed the color paper-cut pieces "Waiting for Tomorrow" and "Long Hair Sister". After Huang Yongyu, who is familiar with the life of ethnic minorities, and the director exchanged creative intentions, he adopted an artistic approach that combines virtual and real and focuses on fiction for the character modeling and background of the film. The Chinese painter Cheng Shifa collected a lot of materials in the Dai area of Yunnan and served as a character modeling and background design for "Peacock Princess". In China's second ink animation film "Shepherd Boy Piccolo", Li Keyan, a painter known for painting cows, once made 14 ink paintings for the film, mainly based on shepherd boys and cows, for the reference of the film crew. In addition, the painter Francis Participated in the specific work of filming, served as the background designer, and strived to coordinate the background with the characters.
In addition, painters Such as Ye Qianyu, He Tianjian, Chang Shuhong, Lai Chusheng, Zhang Zhengyu, and Jiang Hanting have successively lectured at the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio. When Chang Shuhong held the Dunhuang Mural Art Exhibition, he and the artists studied the characteristics of Dunhuang art and the story themes related to dunhuang murals, and considered adapting it into a script for an art film. Ye Qianyu has taught several "sketch art" lessons for art film makers, Zhang Zhengyu has long studied background styles in the studio and creators, and made character modeling modifications for the origami film "A Cabbage", and He Tianjian and others have taught Chinese painting, and they have made efforts to improve the professional level of art film creators. At the same time, Wang Chaowen, Zhang Tong, Tang Yun, and other artists from all over the world analyzed and recommended new art films, and put forward creative themes and suggestions for improving the films.
It can be seen that the animation transformation of Chinese art resources once supported the glory of Chinese animation short films. Of course, there are specific historical factors that cannot be replicated and reached by today's commercial animated films.
The reason why "fine art films" are unsustainable
Because most of the "art films" are short films and are mainly aimed at "young" audiences, the story of the play itself is extremely weak. After the reform and opening up, there were animations "Good Cat Mimi" (1979), "Ginseng Doll" (1981), which were completed according to the style of New Year painting, and "Indiscriminate Accumulation" (1981), which was created according to the image of Han Dynasty portrait bricks, and "Landscape and Water" (1988), which captured the situation of the painter splashing ink on the spot and capturing the animation. It is precisely because of the emphasis on the "artistry" of the picture that in the 1980s, there was also a debate about whether art films belonged to fine arts or films. At the same time, the American "Snow White" (1937) and "Cricket Jemmini" (1950), the Japanese animation "Astro Boy" (1963) and "Ryutaro" (1979) entered the Chinese market and were welcomed, and the 1981 domestic animation "Monkey Fishing Moon" and "Kind Xia Wudong" became a short board because of too much emphasis on artistry.
At the symposium of the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio in 1982, there was still a debate about whether art films should be "surnamed" or "surnamed Beauty". This controversy and the creation of animation in the later period of time showed the limitations and ambiguity of the understanding of the attributes of animation ontology in the domestic animation industry at that time. Art films belong to fine arts in form, and children's literature in terms of drama content, and the two are born into animation ontology, and there is no need to argue. The controversy itself stems from many animation directors with art professional backgrounds in the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio, who are good at and pay attention to the communication of modeling and images, but they are at a disadvantage in terms of film theme, drama structure, character development, etc., so that the film is hollow, repetitive and single in terms of artistic style. This decline has not been well resolved.
Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio was established on April 1, 1957, and the Literary Group was established in 1963; in 1965, the group was changed to the Ministry of Literature, which had nearly 20 professional screenwriters and editors of fine art films. After 1976, the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio re-established the Literary Editing Office. In 1984, the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio underwent institutional reform, and the Ministry of Literature merged with the Production Office to establish a new Creative Production Office. In 1987, the screenplay work on fine art films was separated from the room and the Office of Literary Creation was established. The evolution and clutching of the literary department also indirectly reflect the ups and downs of domestic animation film dramas.
The question is, why did some animation films before the establishment of Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio have a better drama structure? The reason is that animation directors such as Fang Ming (Zhi Yong Only Ren), Hua Junwu, Te Wei, Yu Zheguang, Wan Liming, Wan Gu Toad, Wan Chaochen, Qian Jiajun, Jin Xi, Xu Bingduo, Yue Lu and other animation directors themselves have profound experience in film, puppet drama creation, animation film creation, news reporting, and literary creation, which can make up for the shortcomings of the play itself. In other words, these experiences themselves are either part of the thinking of the play, or have a broader and thicker social, historical and cultural background than the simple play, and have similarities with the connotation of the play. Driven by them, He Yumen, Wang Shuchen, Xu Jingda, Qu Jianfang and others formed the ability to compose plays in the process of creation. From 1963 to 1965, Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio had nearly 20 writers and editors specializing in fine art films. This period was also the peak of the "Chinese Animation School".
Director Jin Xi once wrote an article in the 1980s that animation creators should go to the new countryside of the mountains and countryside to experience life. "What are rural children thinking and doing after the implementation of the responsibility system? What has happened in the thinking and life of the children of peasants who have become rich first, the children of peasant families who have mastered professional skills, and the children of peasants as we have known before... Perhaps, their leap of thought has long since gone far beyond what our writers know about them. And what can I contribute to them? Now it's just a blank. The above analysis of jin Xi, a director who had participated in revolutionary work, is not a simple summary of artistic experience, but a sociological analysis, which reflects that the creative ideas of early animation directors are not limited to the animation works themselves, but are regarded as a small carrier of vast real life or relying on ancient themes to express real life. Some animation directors have passed away one after another, resulting in the emptiness of the animation screenwriting team and no successor.
In the end, the loss of talent led to difficulties in completing animated feature films, and domestic animation could only survive by relying on experimental animated short films to win awards. And those TV animation series that have a roughly similar structure in each episode have a structure and technique that is incomparable to that of animated feature films.
A 1982 domestic ink animation short film "Deer Bell" is still novel, because its emotional preparation, advancement, and change are all in accordance with the trajectory of the film drama, which comes from the film director Sang Arc's play foundation. Unfortunately, most domestic animations at that time did not have such a drama effect. Reflecting on the shrinkage of domestic animation in a certain period after the reform and opening up, in addition to the entry of foreign animation, the lack of standardization of the market environment, the defects of animation production and other external factors, the weakening of internal factors such as drama and modeling is the crux of the problem. This is intertwined with the weakening of Chinese children's literature. In contrast, the rise of animation in the Soviet Union in the 1950s complemented the development of children's literature and children's films, Japanese manga serials and animated stories had a "past life" history, and the prosperity of American animated films was closely related to the development of its film dramas.
Many domestic animation models have gradually lost the unique charm of "seventeen years" animation styles. After the Cultural Revolution, the artists involved in animation styling were: Cheng Shifa ("Deer Bell"), Han Meilin ("Fox Hunting"), Zhang Tong ("Nezha Noisy Sea"), Fang Pengnian ("Landscape"), and Han Yu ("Three Monks"). However, the animated short films after "Three Monks" in 1980 lacked sharp imagery and fantasy fun due to the lack of painters involved in modeling design.
In addition, the structure of the "seventeen years" of art film creators is that famous painters participate in modeling design, directors understand film scheduling, painting scenes have art skills, and screenwriters have life backgrounds. This is actually much the same as Disney's commercial production staff structure. However, due to the trauma of the Cultural Revolution, the loss of talent, and the entanglement of commercial interests, the process system with the budding significance of modern animation has turned animation creation into a personalized or niche "workshop-style" self-talk.
The essence of the "Chinese Animation School"
It's about refining real life
Therefore, we should have a clear understanding of the glory of "art films" and "seventeen years" of domestic art films, and can learn from many aspects. First of all, the animation creation of "seventeen years" is generally based on the experience of real life, modeling, conceiving the script, selecting natural scenes for background design, etc., so the domestic animation at that time had a natural, real, simple and timeless charm. Moreover, the "seventeen years" of domestic art films have made a lot of attempts and explorations in the animation transformation of traditional Chinese art, and have cast the banner of "Chinese Animation School". Some people believe that today's popular three-dimensional animation, Disney has cut two-dimensional animation, so traditional Chinese art is not suitable for traditional animation based on single-line flat painting, and also lags behind three-dimensional animation featuring simulation and realism. In fact, this is a one-sided view. For example, French animation has inherited the Impressionism in color and formed the characteristics of today's French animation, and the French animation art has a paper-cut style of "I Grew Up in Iran" and a occasional animation style of "The Little Prince", which shows that which animation shape and material are used depends on the story itself. In contrast, so far, domestic animation has not yet formed an animation art language that is recognized by the world audience and embodies a distinct Chinese style, so we should better learn from traditional Chinese art on the basis of the "seventeen years" of domestic art films.
In order to achieve this goal, animation majors in colleges and universities need to increase the curriculum training of traditional art, so that learners are familiar with the works of traditional Chinese art and the evolution of genres, and have a good foundation in terms of traditional Chinese art lines, colors, and shapes. Second, the concept of great art with traditional Chinese culture as the core is formed, that is, to help students form a general vision in Chinese painting, calligraphy, oil painting, sculpture, printmaking, video, installation, and landscape design. Only in this way can traditional Chinese art and traditional Chinese culture truly form a deep-rooted growth trend in domestic animation.
(The author is an associate professor at the School of Animation and Digital Arts, Communication University of China)
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