There is often a sense of déjà vu when admiring ancient paintings, and looking at one painting and looking at a hundred paintings always feels similar. This is because the ancients liked to "take the ancient as a teacher" and pursue every stroke with traces of the ancients. When most painters are imitating, it leads to similar painting styles and similar works.
This painting "Nanshan Gaoyin" is a copy of the works of predecessors. Fang Xuan copied Wang Yi, and Wang Yi copied Huang Gongwang. The whole painting no longer has the taste of Yuan ren elegance, and is more in line with the aesthetic standards of the Qing Dynasty orthodoxy. Fang Kaoru strives to be perfect, even if it is stacked everywhere, it must look beautiful. This is a strange aesthetic taste, the composition is full, the pen is delicate, filled with details, and the airtight is airtight, which has become the mainstream style of the Qing Dynasty painting world. Modern people feel depressed and false when they watch "Nanshan Gaoyin", but what does it feel like for Qing Dynasty people to see this painting?
Fang Xuan Nanshan Gaoyin
Fang Xuan learned Huang Gongwang's painting style through Wang Yi's works, which in itself was a wrong way to learn. Wang Yi claimed to be the master of the ancients, and in his later years he realized that learning from the ancients should "mean to come" or "imitate their meanings". Wang Yi split the works of his predecessors into several details, which were managed by location and arranged in combination to form new works. In this way, there will inevitably be a sense of piling up and similarity.
Wang Yi copied the style, and Fang Xuan copied the details. The difference in concept caused Fang Kaoru to pay too much attention to the decorative effect. Fang wrote a painting treatise that mentioned his aesthetics. He likes "cooked" and "strange", and hates sweet and dull. Familiarity, refers to the technical characteristics; odd, refers to visual effects. However, his works do not reflect his views, which is very regrettable.
Fang Xuan Nanshan Gao Yin local
The stones are made of mountains, the square sees the circle, the waterfall flows, the mountain dwells in the elegant house, so many familiar details, representing the early Qing Dynasty painters' understanding of beauty. Fang Xuan once said that to engage in creation, you must have inspiration and creative passion. When painting, you must have a strong impulse to draw a stroke of god. The reason is very clear, and it cannot be seen in the work, which is Fang Kaoru's helplessness. In other words, he belongs to the painters with low eyesight, who is invincible in the world of reasoning, and is slightly insufficient in creation.
Of course, there should be no excessive blame for Qing painters. He could not get rid of the characteristics of the times, and he could only try to change in a limited "space". When he hit a wall, when he had no clear direction, he had to show off his pen and ink skills.
Fang Kaoru introduced the creative process through the inscription in the painting, and he paid special attention to the position of the inscription. He said that there should be an inscription in the painting. The inscription should be written in the right place, not scribbled. The final effect is the icing on the cake, or the painting of the snake, depends on the painter's aesthetic taste.
It seems that he should engage in theoretical research, and his views are all insightful, but in the process of actual operation, there is a lack of feasible methods. A master of theory may not be able to solve problems in practice, and Fang Xuan's works cannot reflect his theoretical height. If "Nanshan Gaoyin" is from the hands of ordinary painters, it can be praised. From Fang Kaoru's pen, you have to be picky.
It's not that I'm being harsh on him, it's that I feel like he should be better. When his work did not amaze the world, it was inevitable to be a little disappointed. He should have been a trailblazer, yet his work shows that he was a conservative.