It shows the aesthetic development form of "homology" of calligraphy and painting

It shows the aesthetic development form of "homology" of calligraphy and painting

——Comment on the History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics

History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics

Fan Bo

Rongbaozhai Publishing House

Published in November 2021

"History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics" is a historical masterpiece of Professor Fan Bo of Nanjing Academy of Arts who synthesizes the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting, and his works have made multi-dimensional and in-depth investigations and research on the content of the aesthetic theory of calligraphy and painting in previous dynasties and the logical history of its development and evolution. In China, the term "aesthetics" has been introduced and used for more than a hundred years since Kang Youwei and Wang Guowei. In the course of this century of "aesthetics" development, it has been continuously extended and covered as an independent discipline to various fields. After the 1980s, aesthetics has made many achievements in the field of Chinese painting and calligraphy, but there are few works that examine the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting as a unified object, and Fan Bo's "Outline of the Aesthetics of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting" was published in the 1990s, which was one of the few monographs that could fuse calligraphy aesthetics and painting aesthetics into one furnace in the form of historical outlines. After entering the 21st century, there are still few works that can macroscopically control and narrate the development of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting from a historical perspective. Chinese painting and calligraphy have been "homologous and one" since ancient times, and there is an inseparable relationship between the two, which may be an important reason why calligraphy aesthetics and painting aesthetics can be linked into a whole. The study of the history of calligraphy and painting aesthetics is not a simple superposition of the theoretical ideas of calligraphy aesthetics and painting aesthetics in previous dynasties, but a deep exposition of the historical logic of the intrinsic relationship between the two on the basis of common ideas.

The book outlines and discusses the history of the development of calligraphy and painting aesthetics, from ancient times to the present, and on The Chinese and Western, the complete form of the history of calligraphy and painting aesthetics is clearly and orderly presented in the author's pen. The change from "historical outline" to "history" took the author three years of work. The content of the re-edition of the "History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics" has doubled, and this increase is not a quantitative accumulation but a qualitative leap, not an expansion of a simple physique but a deepening of thought. In the preparation, the author integrates new materials and new theoretical horizons, and re-examines the aesthetic ideas of calligraphy and painting of many important figures and writings in the past. During the investigation, a large number of literature materials were sorted out and integrated, and a unique theoretical interpretation was carried out, and the whole book had nearly one million words, which was enough to witness the depth of the author's efforts. The book also made major adjustments to the pre-Qin part, and the author concentrated on extracting and summarizing the sixteen propositions from the works of pre-Qin philosophers and aestheticians: whether there is a symbiosis, Taoist nature, the world under one qi, the cultivation of the hun, the knowledge of several gods, yin and yang, the law of universal physics, the composition of imagery, the beauty of neutrality, the human lunbide, the aesthetic mind, the looking up and down, the technique of advancing in the Tao, the discernment of the form and the gods, the rhetorical sincerity, and the expression of temperament, and took the sixteen propositions as the logical starting point for the development of the aesthetic history of Chinese painting and calligraphy. The basic spirit and ideological background of Chinese painting and calligraphy aesthetics have also been more thoroughly revealed. In short, the History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics is a relatively complete work on the history of calligraphy and painting aesthetics so far.

The development of Chinese calligraphy and painting aesthetics has a long history, its own has a relatively independent and systematic development context, the author of the book through the six stages of historiography, from a high vantage point to grasp the historical context and overall trend of the development of Chinese calligraphy and painting aesthetics, divided into: the theoretical foundation of the aesthetics of pre-Qin calligraphy and painting, the theoretical initial construction of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting of the two Han Dynasties, the theoretical consciousness of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting in the Wei and Jin dynasties, the theoretical development of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting in the five dynasties of Sui and Tang Dynasties, the theoretical extension of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting in the Song and Yuan Dynasties, and the theoretical summary of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting in the Ming and Qing dynasties. The historical phases of these six stages actually embody the principle of unifying history and logic. Taking the change of dynasties as the external form and the aesthetic logic as the inner skeleton, we can not only see the political, economic and ideological restrictions and influences of each dynasty on the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting, but also see the independence and continuity of the logic of the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting beyond the times. It can be seen that the author has extracted and constructed a relatively complete theoretical system from the development of aesthetic ideas of calligraphy and painting in previous dynasties. At the same time, the writing of the book is based on "on" the "history", on the basis of objectively describing the history of calligraphy and painting aesthetics, it can expound the main problems in the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting, and there are many unique and profound insights in the exposition, providing readers with a novel cognitive perspective.

In the in-depth investigation and research of the historical stages of the aesthetics of the six major calligraphy and paintings, the author mainly adopts the "two ways of intertwining the character-centered narrative and the problem-focused exposition" for compilation, so as to highlight the key points and analyze the articles, so that the narrative of the "history" of the book is more rhythmic. For example, in the chapter on the extension of the aesthetic theory of Song and Yuan calligraphy and painting, it revolves around Ouyang Xiu, Su Shi, Huang Tingjian, Mi Fu, Liu Daool,

The aesthetic ideas of calligraphy and painting of Guo Ruoxuan, Guo Xi, Huang Bosi, Dong Kui, Han Hun and others were elaborated, and at the same time, the problems of literati painting and painting, the problem of ancient and modern art, the relationship between poetry and painting, the problem of constant shape and common sense, and the problem of landscapes in the north and south were discussed, and this series of relative questions actually explained the aesthetic characteristics of the aesthetics of Calligraphy and Painting in the Song and Yuan Dynasties. This allows the reader to grasp the historical context of the development of calligraphy and painting aesthetics as a whole and concretely, and can focus on the main excitement of calligraphy and painting aesthetics in a certain era.

Although the aesthetic theory of calligraphy and painting has its own development context and rhythm, its development has always been inextricably linked to the process of calligraphy and painting practice, and its historical evolution is generally based on the practice of calligraphy and painting. For example, this book uses books and paintings as objects of study in the history of aesthetics, which is a good example. It not only fits the historical situation of Chinese books and paintings being of the same origin at the time of origin, but also highlights the "same law" situation in which Chinese books and paintings have repeatedly influenced and infiltrated each other in the later independent development. The author reveals this historical evolution from an aesthetic perspective. The book's discussion of this issue mainly focuses on the fourth chapter "Zhang Yanyuan's Aesthetics of Calligraphy and Painting" and the fifth chapter "The Problem of The Same Origin and Same Law of Calligraphy and Painting". The author's narrative elaboration of this issue is not completed in one section, but distributed in chapters in different periods, with the interest of "pen breaking", which also reflects the author's academic ability to control the overall situation in the historical narrative. Carefully reading the interpretation of the same origin and method of calligraphy and painting in each chapter, the logic is meticulous, and the analysis is layer by layer, so that we have a more in-depth and comprehensive understanding and thinking about the aesthetic propositions of the same origin and the same law of calligraphy and painting. Obviously, the book's elaboration of this issue has a realistic significance for today's calligraphy and painting creation, Chinese painting itself is an all-encompassing art system, which not only has its own formal norms and requirements, but also poetry, but also books, therefore, only by fully grasping this system can we clarify the aesthetic characteristics of Chinese painting and calligraphy (especially painting) that distinguish it from Western art from an important aspect.

There are also many insights and perspectives in the book that are unique and novel and profound, and the language of the text is clear and well expressed. In my opinion, this is due to the author's own two major advantages. First, the author has a solid philosophical foundation, and can discuss the aesthetics of calligraphy and painting from a philosophical point of view, and there is a meticulous logical sequence in the discussion. Second, the author is proficient in the practice of calligraphy and painting and has rich creative experience. In the elaboration of the aesthetic theory of calligraphy and painting, we can further look at the problem of calligraphy and painting practice, and it is precisely in this way that in terms of research and writing methods, we can combine philosophy, aesthetics and calligraphy and painting practice in unity, and at the same time break the boundaries of disciplines, we can grasp the core content of the aesthetic ideas of calligraphy and painting.

The book's outline and interpretation of the aesthetic theory of calligraphy and painting and its development and evolution also represents an extension of the aesthetic thought of Chinese painting and calligraphy in the present. It can be said that the research results of the "History of Chinese Calligraphy and Painting Aesthetics" itself mean the improvement and progress of calligraphy and painting aesthetics in the new era. The promotion and breakthrough made by the book in the theory of aesthetics of calligraphy and painting have laid an important foundation for the subsequent aesthetic creation and research.

Author: Liu Jiani

Source: China Art News