Why is it said that Chinese gardens are alive

□ Lin Yi

Chinese gardens integrate literature, architecture, poetry, calligraphy and painting, opera, etc., and are one of the traditional Chinese cultures. According to Mr. Chen Congzhou, the biggest feature of Chinese gardens is the "literati garden", and its dominant idea is the literati thought, or the scholar-doctor thought, which is expressed as poetry and painting, pursuing far away from the hustle and bustle, and sending love to the landscape. The situation of contemporary Chinese gardens is awkward. Avoiding the hustle and bustle and sending affection to the landscape is already rare. Not to mention the literati thought of the Dongpo poem "Poor families sweep the floor, poor women comb their hair", which Mr. Chen admired. The "Chinese garden" that is usually talked about now is far from the real classical Chinese garden, and in our context, it is more of a landscape of yesterday. So, how to make Chinese gardens gain new vitality?

This is the theme of "Living Chinese Garden". The book originated from Tang Keyang's 2008 exhibition "Living Chinese Gardens" at the State Art Collection in Dresden, Germany, and for 13 years, Tang Keyan has been thinking about the contemporary fate of Chinese gardens, and the book is the crystallization of his thinking about this proposition for more than 10 years.

"Living Chinese Garden", by Tang Keyang, Beijing Yanshan Publishing House, October 2021 edition, 68.00 yuan.

Speaking of Chen Congzhou, Tang Keyang described him as "a person who intuitively understands the interests of traditional gardens". The book cites the views of many garden experts and architects, discussing the vertical and horizontal aspects and speaking freely. For example, after Chen Congzhou, Tang Keyang then commented on Ye Shengtao and Tong Liao, arguing that Tong Liao's questioning of traditional landscape painting in the 1930s, his modern vision of the garden "is by no means exhaustive as a floor plan", and Ye Shengtao's craftsmanship spirit of "only wishing visitors to get the beauty of 'as in the picture'", although the two have differences, the common point lies in the cultural heritage behind them.

"Living Chinese Garden" begins with a stroll through the tea mountain of Dongguan town, and its intention is profound. Dongguan represents the scene of prosperity and hustle and bustle of contemporary China, no one expects to have unexpected poetry here, there are many cities similar to Dongguan in China, they still have spiritual and cultural needs, which is why Tang Keyang was hired here. The "Chinese garden" of Chashan, a pavilion made of cement, can also be seen everywhere around us, how to look at this contemporary simple "Chinese garden"?

Don Keyan did not use this as a perfect target for criticism. The cement pavilions, pocket parks, and artificial bonsai of Chashan are far from the purpose of the Chinese garden way of nature, but they provide a natural stage for the drama of life. In Tang Keyang's view, a place like Chashan, even more than Suzhou, which is famous as a garden city, can provide a living and convincing sample, Tang Keyang affirmed Guangdong's achievements in reshaping the cultural history of Chinese gardens, pointing out that "living Chinese gardens" must be related to the social history and cultural history in development, and its real lasting vitality comes from the invisible but certain continuous nutrition, not just a certain time and place, a certain immutable gene.

Most books about Chinese gardens talk about aesthetic characteristics and traditional interests, and the superiority of "Living Chinese Gardens" is that it does not go to the retro corner, but pays attention to finding a "living" path for Chinese gardens with an open mind, macro vision and practical strategies.

"Living Chinese gardens" need to consider both ideals and reality, as well as rationality and sensibility. Chinese gardens have always paid attention to "construction", while the modern context pursues "landscape design", how to bridge the dislocation between tradition and modernity?

A balance between "new" and "old" should be grasped. In modern times, Chinese the supremacy of the new and developed an aversion to the "old". Tang Keyang cites Wu Hong's argument to illustrate the "presence" and "absence" in visual culture. The spread of "picturesque" images of Chinese ruins is a cultural dialogue dominated by Western tastes that emerged after the door of modern China was opened, and Chinese art was no longer self-sufficient and closed, but was caught up in the global circulation of images, media and visual arts. Tang Keyan captures a touch of wild fun in the deserted gardens of the small town of Chashan, but this taste is soon replaced by a new, trendy substance. At the same time, what has been erased is the aestheticized poetic ruin image, which is the obsession with "moment" and "time flow" in the European romantic vision, but we can actually find that Chinese classical aesthetics also has a sigh of "thinking of heaven and earth". All art forms, including gardens, have some similarities, both ancient and modern, Chinese and foreign. The feeling of beauty should be synaesthesia.

What our artists are committed to is what is focused on this. The book combines many "living" models of garden design. For example, from the "abandoned garden" to the "Yan Garden", Tang Keyang once wrote a special work for this purpose, and the success of the Yan Garden made good use of the layout of "borrowing scenery", which has always been valued by classical Chinese gardens. Tang Keyang has also discussed the construction history of Chinese gardens, the history of Suzhou gardens, and garden designers such as Liang Sicheng, Liu Dunzhen, Wang Shu, etc., and the works have always run through the internal connection in the capricious gallop, and the atmosphere is continuous and self-organized.

The book focuses on the analysis of Pei's works. Modern cities basically do not have the spatial conditions of ancient garden construction, and it is difficult to form a harmonious effect with the surrounding environment, I.M. Pei's modern architecture is 21st century, but in the sense of time to show the inheritance, so the design highlights "a kind of local style of quiet (pane) pattern", or reused geometric figures, circle in the square, square in the circle, even road lamps, stair railings, tables and chairs Have this kind of repetition, or highly unified colors: outdoor white, gray, granite natural color, indoor white, Grey and wood colours. The craftsmen of Chinese gardens, from space, layout to sensibility, from large to small, from structure to detail, have become objects that can be abstractly separated. The location of the Suzhou Museum borrows the traditional garden in the north and follows the garden rules of architecture and environment. The museum itself is a type of architecture born out of the Western concept, which is far from the purpose of the Chinese garden, and Pei tries to make up for the difference between the two in the cultural sense with the help of "seeing and being seen".

The object of this work is the garden, the purpose is to "live", but Tang Keyang's vision is actually not limited to the garden, it can be said that from a grand perspective to think about the revival of traditional Chinese culture, and at the landing point is quietly placed in the visual arts of the way of viewing. The space and context of the garden have changed, but the mood it expresses can still be retained in our visual responses. In Dresden, Don Keyan realized: "The garden, or the museum that is incarnated in the garden today, contains a certain uncertainty in itself, and this uncertainty is the first problem that the exhibition needs to face, and everything is still related to 'seeing and being seen'. Over the next 10 years, from Dresden to Dongguan Tea Mountain, "Living Chinese Garden" gradually took shape.