Mention of chromatic printing, many people may first think of Japanese ukiyo-e, and China is actually the inventor of chromatic printing, Chinese traditional woodcut engraving printing technology began in the Tang, flourished in the Song, through the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, so far about 1200 years of history. Recently, "Five Colors : Four Hundred Years of Chinese Chromatic Printmaking Art" was presented at the Minsheng Art Museum in Beijing. The exhibition features more than 120 kinds of color printmaking books and independent works that began in the Ming Dynasty and ended in 2020 and spanned more than 400 years, in order to sort out the flow of Chinese chromatic printmaking art in different eras.
Exhibition site
When it comes to chromatic printing, many people may first think of Japanese ukiyo-e, and China is actually the inventor of chromatic printing, and the emergence of this technique has made everything in the colorful world - mountains and rivers, birds, insects and fish, chess and piano calligraphy and painting - retained into shadows and spread around the world.
Traditional Chinese woodcut engraving printing technology began in the Tang Dynasty, flourished in the Song Dynasty, and went through the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, with a history of about 1200 years. Judging from the existing objects, the title painting of the Vajrapani Prajnaparamita Sutra of the ninth year of Tang Weitong (868) is the earliest exquisitely painted woodcut print. In the long history since then, with the maturity of papermaking and ink making technology, engraving and printing technology has been continuously improved, and people have pursued the integration of paper, ink and printing while copying words and images, giving birth to color printing technology and applying it in printmaking production, making printing an original art form.
The exhibition begins with a set of "Cheng's Ink Garden" in the 33rd year of the Ming Wanli Calendar (1605) Cheng's Zilantang color print, which is an ink spectrum carved and printed during the Ming Dynasty's Wanli Dynasty. The book contains more than 500 kinds of ink samples carved by famous artists, and the whole book is rich in content, including precious pattern materials such as mountain and river scenery, grass, trees, animals and animals, and Buddha's Tao Xiangrui. The ink products produced are divided into six categories: one type of famous yuangong, two types of famous public opinion, three types of famous officials, four types of famous materials, five types of famous Confucian proverbs, and six types of famous yellow. Participating painters include Ding Yunpeng, Jiang Shihui, Zheng Yigui and so on. "Cheng's Ink Garden" is a representative work of Huizhou printmaking during the Ming Dynasty.
"Cheng's Ink Garden"
Another noteworthy presentation of color overprinting techniques in the Ming and Qing dynasties was Hu Zhengyan's compilation of the Ten Bamboo Zhai Painting Notations. "Ten Bamboo Zhai Painting Notation" was first printed in the Chongzhen period of the Ming Dynasty, as a color overprint, it contains a total of eight spectacles and sixteen volumes of calligraphy and painting notation, bamboo notation, stone notation, Mohua notation, plum spectrum, fruit spectrum, etc., which is a wonderful painting textbook. This set of paintings has had a great influence on later generations, and even the ukiyo-e in neighboring Japan can be seen in both the level of painting art and the level of printing technology.
Qing Dynasty color overprint of the "Ten Bamboo Zhai Painting Notation"
There is a description of the pomp and circumstance when this note was printed at the moment: "From the ten bamboo notes, then first stacked, four-way appreciation, light carriages and heavy horses, and postal transmission, not only Jiangnan paper is expensive." And "Ten Bamboo Notes, a collection of ancient and modern famous traces, a collection of art gardens, the renovation of the old, the extreme change of poor work, is it not too grand?" And there is still a saying. Cover arch flowers, heng plate of the xing, colorful, not not dazzling, but a strong dress, to seek it as thick in the light, light in the thick, never get, why not? It talks about the important arch flower process of this period.
Engraving is a overprinting technique developed on the basis of woodcut color overprinting. According to the color requirements of the color drawings, they are copied separately, carved into dozens or even hundreds of small woodblocks, and then glued in the designated position, and overprinted or overprinted in turn from light to dark with ink and pigments. Regarding the "arch flower", the article "Colorless Arch Flower Technical Examination" introduced: "Put the paper on the engraved pattern, the top of the paper needs to be cushioned with a soft cushion like felt, and finally the paper is pressed into the groove of the pattern, under the action of the force, a raised pattern appears on the paper, forming a three-dimensional visual effect, which is somewhat similar to the steel print on today's personal documents." ”
RongBaoZhai collects the "Ten Bamboo Zhai Notes" edition
We can also simply understand the woodblock color printing technique from these prints, which is mainly divided into five types according to the number of brush plates and techniques: first, single-plate multi-color multiple printing; second, single-plate multi-color multiple brush printing; third, multi-color multiple overprinting; fourth, multi-color multi-color overprinting; fifth, plate arch flower. The earliest surviving color printed object is the "Diamond Sutra Notes" from the Yuan Dynasty to the Zhongxing Road Zifu Temple. However, this technology did not mature and be widely used until the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty. And from single-plate multi-color brush printing to multi-plate multi-color overprinting.
"Mustard Garden Painting Biography" Qing Kangxi original publication
The song and Yuan albums of 1957 Rongbaozhai woodboard watermark silk on the scene are also very eye-catching.
It is understood that in the year of Guangxu Bingshen (1896), RongBaozhai set up the "RongbaoZhai Thesis Set", organized engraving personnel, self-engraved self-printed poems and letterheads, inherited the traditional "Rao" printing technology, and laid the foundation for the development of woodblock watermarks. From the establishment of the "thesis set" to the woodblock watermarking technique, during which 120 years, the woodblock watermarking business has been passed down from generation to generation. The production process of woodblock watermark painting is based on the thickness, curvature, dryness, rigidity and softness of the original handwriting, as well as the change of shade and shade, and then engraved into several plates, and then superimposed sequentially according to the original work from shallow to deep. Woodblock watermark painting products strive to restore and reflect the original appearance and charm, the paper, ink, color and other raw materials used are the same as the original, coupled with decades of reproduction experience and exquisite skills of craftsmen, its finished products can be "almost chaotic".
Rongbao Zhai wood board watermark Song painting
This exhibition also focuses on the "Gusu Edition", the so-called Gusu Edition, which is a folk name for suzhou chromatic printmaking that was influenced by the perspective, proportional relationship and other techniques of Western painting in a specific period of the Qing Dynasty.
The "Gusu Edition" uses perspective to express the spatial relationship of the scenes in the painting, and at the same time draws on the line arrangement technique of Western copperplate engraving, and uses fine lines to form light and dark changes, shadows and other factors that have never been seen in previous Chinese prints, so that the western objects present three-dimensional characteristics.
Gusu version of the snow scene
Snow details
Gusu version
The overall picture tone of the "Gusu edition" is fresh and elegant, and the "Gusu edition" of the Qing Dynasty further separates the prints from the book illustrations and becomes a completely independent art class, because it is a single print, so it is relatively rare in existence, and there are almost no surviving in China before, and a small number of works have begun to flow back to China in recent years.
After 1949, the talents and beauties in the art of chromatic printmaking and Katsugen Koyama were replaced by the lives of laborers and a new world in full swing, and chromatic prints were greatly broadened in subject matter.
Chromatic prints after 1949, exhibition site
Since the 1990s, avant-garde artists have no longer stuck to the scrutiny and indulgence of chromatic technology, and the huge size and variety of tools have made artists more free in expressing themselves, more impactful in display effects, and more suitable for today's grand art museums - unconsciously, the color set has also jumped from personal private small spaces, small-scale book illustrations used or enjoyed by relatives and friends, independent art works, jumping into public art spaces, competing with the art of other media.
Liu Wei Monkey 2008 200x200cm silkscreen prints Hand-drawn
Fang Lijun 2003.2.1 2003 400x852cm woodblock print
Su Xinping Wasteland No. 3 2017 300x200cm copper engraving
It is understood that this exhibition has been supported by many academic units such as the Central Academy of Fine Arts, the Chinese Ancient Prints Research Association, the Library of Nanjing University, the Institute of Chinese Ancient Books Conservation of Fudan University, the Research Center of Art History of China Academy of Art, and the China Bookstore. The exhibition will be on view until 30 April.