Shen Zhou was a famous painter of the Ming Dynasty, and he was a native of Suzhou. It is said that his ancestors were good friends with the famous painter Wang Meng of the Yuan Dynasty, so he had seen many of Wang Meng's true works. This painting "High Trees in the Streams and Mountains" is a work by Shen Zhou, which clearly bears the characteristics of Wang Meng's dense body landscape, and looks like the pen and ink are smooth and imposing. In a trance, it seems that you can walk into the painting and feel the happiness and ease brought by the endless high trees of the stream and mountain.
The ancients painted mountains in a process of development and evolution, and the mountains painted by the Painters of the Northern Song Dynasty almost occupied the entire picture. With the passage of time, the proportion of mountains in landscape painting has become smaller and smaller. By the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the mountains in landscape paintings sometimes even became "supporting characters". This shows that the ancients' understanding of landscape painting has been deepening, from seeking shape to seeking god.
Shen Zhou Xi Mountain Tall Tree
Shen Zhou's mountains have the characteristics of pursuing gods, and there are few peaks in nature with such dense rock heads, and the peaks in nature are rarely as tall and beautiful as in the paintings. Shen Zhou's painting of the mountain in his heart also makes people feel the momentum of the mountain, which shows that he has grasped the charm of the mountain.
At first glance, he did not break through the dense landscape style created by Wang Meng in the Yuan Dynasty, in fact, he retained a lot of Song Dynasty courtyard style in his creation. Some people call this creative method "blending the south into the north". That is to say, when he painted landscapes, he grasped the tone of pen and ink in one hand and the momentum bone method with the other. With both hands, paint the "rich and moist" side of the Jiangnan landscape.
Shen Zhou XiShan Tall Tree Local
Look closely at the interlaced pen and ink lines in the painting, and each stroke is full of power. The stiff lines are combined with the moist rendering to form a combination of rigidity and softness. Originally, there were already wrinkles, dots, dyes, and various techniques in turn, and Shen Zhou would continue to add details. This increasingly dense form of expression is very difficult to draw, and if you are not careful, it will become a mess.
When Shen Zhou processed the part, he fused the different characteristics of the two Song courtyards. After reading this part, you will feel that Shen Zhou is a top "technical school", and after watching the peaceful and simple atmosphere presented in the whole "High Tree of Xishan Mountain", you will feel that he is a standard literati painter. This shows that literati painting cannot abandon techniques and talk about pen and ink interest. Literati painting should pay more attention to the expressiveness of pen and ink.
Shen Zhoubo took advantage of the strengths of many families to create the Wumen School of painting and promoted the further development of literati painting. At the beginning of the emergence of literati painting, it was often titled "ink opera". From the Yuan Si family to Shen Zhou, he finally got rid of the idea of ink drama. It can be seen from "High Trees in the Mountains and Mountains" that Shen Zhou's study of the painting style of the two Song Dynasties and his love for the Yuan Sijia, especially the landscape paintings of Wang Meng. It can be seen even more that he has produced creative changes on the basis of antiques.
"High Trees in the Stream" has a sense of ease and smoothness in the use of the pen. Shen Zhou has begun to explore the combination of calligraphy art and painting art. In fact, Wen Zhengming's success is because he continues to move forward in the direction of Shen Zhou's art.
Seeing this, I couldn't help but hope that Shen Zhou would paint a little more densely. Even if he wants to show off his skills, then he can know where the limits of his creation are. But on second thought, if he only knew how to show off his skills, he wouldn't have drawn such a wonderful work.