"The old pen is full of perfection, and every time you see the spirit from the truth."
In September 2005, when Lian Xiaohe, who was nearly 80 years old, was constantly chasing after the calligraphy of his predecessors, he was deeply moved by this comment used to praise Lin Sanzhi. He wrote it down with a stroke of his pen and humbly said in the trek: Yu Xueshu tried his best, did not see the growth, and was ashamed of the previous cultivation.
Lian Xiaohe's work "The old pen is full of perfection, and every time you see the spirit from the real place"
Lian Xiaohe is a representative figure of the early theoretical research of the contemporary book circle in Hunan, and as early as the mid-1980s, he wrote "Essays on Calligraphy", which had an important influence on the calligraphy circles in Hunan and was invited to participate in various important calligraphy seminars across the country. At the same time, he was hired as the tutor of the first calligraphy training class of Hunan Calligraphers Association and became one of the founders of Changsha Calligraphers Association. In addition to theory, he has also made great achievements in calligraphy creation and calligraphy and painting collection.
Many years after practicing his old age, when the young calligrapher Kuang was sorting out his books and documents, he was touched to see this thick and simple work. The old man highlights his academic thinking while writing with ease and emphasizing the gestures. He improvised his feelings on paper, and at that time his heart was revealed, and many years later we also glimpsed the thinking of that generation inside and outside of calligraphy. At present, this work is on display at the Changsha Art Museum.
Mr. Chen Zhenlian, Vice Chairman of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, Vice Chairman of the China Literary and Art Critics Association, Consultant of the Chinese Calligraphers Association, Vice President and Secretary General of Xiling Printing Society, wrote the exhibition logo for this exhibition
As the first large-scale exhibition after the resumption of the opening of Changsha Art Museum, the "Duhe and Flying - Lianxiaohe Calligraphy Works Exhibition" exhibits more than 100 works of Calligraphy and Painting and Literature of Lianxiaohe, and the exhibition starts from the two main lines of scholarship and collection, showing the learning and art of the elderly. This exhibition is curated by Kuang Zheng. After the opening of the exhibition, Kuang Zheng told Artron Art Network & Art Headlines about the curation of the exhibition before and after, as well as the interaction between the post-90s calligrapher and the "post-90s" old gentlemen.
Yan Fuchu, vice chairman of the Chinese Calligraphers Association, chairman of the Hunan Provincial Federation of Literature and Literature, and chairman of the Hunan Calligraphers Association, took a closer look at the document exhibition cabinet of the Xiaohe Calligraphy Exhibition
Curator Kuang Zheng accompanied Chairman Yan Fuchu and Director Tan Guobin to watch the exhibition of Xiaohe calligraphy
Solo crane and flying crane
The solo exhibition of Lian Xiaohe is entitled "The Crane and The Flying", from "Twenty-Four Poems". First, it is implied that the old man changed his name - Lian Xiaohe was once named Xiao He, and later in the creation of the "Xiao Crane" often fell; second, it is related to the old Man's low-key and unobtrusive personality, Kuang zheng said in the curator's words, "The old man is a man of art, near the water flow, outstanding, like a crane flying high." ”
Mr. Lian Xiaohe has a wealth of life experience. When he was young, he studied calligraphy from two Xiucai, cast a pen from Rong at the age of 16, participated in the Chinese Expeditionary Force to fight in Burma and India, returned to apply for the North China University, and later stayed in Hunan with the People's Liberation Army. These resumes of Lian Xiaohe are clearly visible in the chronology of the exhibition site, and the final establishment of his professional status is the theoretical work "Essay on Calligraphy".
At the exhibition site, the exhibition line on the left is the chronology of Mr. Lian Xiaohe
At the exhibition site, some of the texts of "Essays on Calligraphy" were extracted for display.
"At that time, we were in the midst of a renaissance in Chinese calligraphy. As soon as this very systematic theoretical manuscript came out, it shocked the Hunan book circle headed by Mr. Zhou Zhaoyi and Mr. Yan Jialong, and Mr. Lian Xiaohe also won the respect of the Hunan book circle and was invited to serve as the tutor of the first hunan provincial book study seminar. If Mr. Yan Jialong made great contributions to the early organization and leadership of the Hunan book circle, then Mr. Lian Xiaohe opened the early academic atmosphere of the Hunan book circle with theoretical research. From now on, this contribution is also important. ”
The exhibition showcases the Zhang Rui Tu Kai Shu Ayamoto Hand Scroll collected by Lian Xiaohe
Lian Xiaohe recounted Xu Bangda's appraisal of the past in the inscription
In addition to theoretical research, Mr. Lian Xiaohe's collection is also quite rich, and one of the important works in his collection is a Ming Dynasty Zhang Ruitu's Ayamoto hand scroll exhibited in this exhibition.
Kuang Zheng said in the tour: "As a generation of people in the Ming Dynasty, Zhang Ruitu himself does not seem to have much intersection with Hunan. Although his works are not too difficult to see, because they are rare, especially in Hunan, many writers at that time were not very familiar with his original works. After the elder trainer got this hand scroll, many seniors expressed doubts, but the elder trainer still did not take it as ordinary. Later, Mr. Xu Bangda came to Hunan to identify the collection of calligraphy and paintings, and the old man held the scroll to ask for advice, and Mr. Xu opened the volume and promised it to be genuine. "Here we can see the wisdom of the elderly.
At the exhibition site, there is an idle chapter in the works of Lian Xiaohe: "Born with joy and joy."
Collection and theoretical research have become the best nourishment for the artistic creation of Xiaohe. His calligraphy creation takes many methods, especially the Ming people's cursive script as the keynote, dating back to the Jin and Tang Dynasties, there is an extremely rare relaxed and relaxed state, of which cursive writing has the highest achievement. Kuang Zheng introduced that one is related to the personality of the old man, and the other may be related to the old man's habit of drinking and smoking: "The old man has experienced the alternation of the old and new society, and his life has been full of twists and turns. But he treats it with blandness, and with this blandness he harnesses his calligraphy. Therefore, there is a lot of romance, excitement and dashing in his writing, and there is also a lot of uninhibited, which is not limited by many rules, but also in the rules. ”
The circle of friends of the old gentlemen
This is the second time that he has deeply participated in the exhibition planning of the older generation of calligraphers in Hunan after the 2020 "Xiang Huai RuoShui - Hu Liujun Calligraphy Works Exhibition". When combing through the exhibitions and activities he had planned and participated in in the past two years, Kuang Zheng found that many of the old gentlemen he had studied and interacted with had a very good relationship with each other. For example, Hu Liujun and Mr. Lian Xiaohe, they are close friends who have frequent exchanges, such as Li Zetai and Mr. Li Li, and they are also Jinshi teachers and friends who have had close contacts with each other, and they all show Kuang Zheng a vivid and wonderful circle of friends.
Exhibition site
Exhibition site
In 2007, Kuang Zheng, who was in junior high school, visited the calligrapher Mr. Shi Mu for the first time, and Shi Mu and his younger brother Shi Peng, who was famous for poetry, called him "The Second History of Hunan": "The first time I met, he left me with a very elegant image. For the first time, I found an accurate image of the 'Confucianism' spoken of in traditional Chinese culture. Mr. Shi Mooon had mentored me, but I didn't have much contact with him, and he was already in bad health. But mr. Shi Moo's ink can always be seen. In Changsha, many signs are written by Mr. Wang. ”
More than six years of interaction with Mr. Li Li have allowed Kuang Zheng to be used to this day.
"Mr. Li Li is a student of Mr. Qi Baishi, and I had a preliminary understanding of Mr. Li Li when I first studied seal engraving. Since junior high school, I have had the opportunity to visit Mr. Li's 'stone house' until the old man passed away when I was in college. In the past few years of exchanges, the old man was very kind to me, and I remember that when he first came to the door, he showed me the original letter written by Qi Baishi to him, and there were inscriptions by Mei Lanfang and others on it. For me, who was 16 years old at the time, seeing such a treasure really had a sense of dislocation of historical time and space, as if the history of a hundred years was right in front of your eyes. ”
Li Li and Qi Baishi took a group photo
Kuang Zheng helped Mr. Li Li to print
Kuang Zheng recalled that the first time he knew Mr. Li Zetai was at Mr. Li Li's home: "On the page of a famous family album, there was a note inscribed by Mr. Li Zetai, which was written very strictly, and I silently remembered this name at that time. Unexpectedly, when I had the energy to do the research of the predecessors later, I just started from Mr. Li Zetai. ”
At the beginning of 2020, the first series of the Wangshan Academic Journal (Hunan Jinshi Everyone Li Zetai Special Topic), edited by Kuang Zheng, was officially published. The original intention of the journal was to clarify the geographical fundamentals through the study of Xiangxian's case. As Kuang Zheng wrote in his speech: Ninety-five years ago, the twenty-six-year-old Xiangren Li Zetai, with the support of his father Li Chengli, established the Dongchi Printing Society with the help of his old friend Qi Baishi, and set a precedent for compiling three issues of the Dongchi Society, which left a profound influence on the indian community. Whenever I flip through the three yellowed volumes of the Dongchi Society, we know that we are also doing things that our predecessors have not done.
The first series of the Wangshan Academic Journal
Wangshan Academic Journal, Vol. 1
In the later work, Hu Liujie and Lian Xiaohe, two old gentlemen, successively entered Kuang Zheng's research horizons. Kuang Zheng found that the old gentlemen who originally seemed to have little to do with each other had inextricable relations with each other: "Mr. Li Zetai's father was Qi Baishi's young seal carving teacher, and Mr. Li Li was a student of Qi Baishi in his later years; while Hu Liu was a descendant of a family that grew up in Hunan and received a very good education, and Lian Xiaohe took root in Hunan after going south, and they all had close contacts with Mr. Li Zetai." After sorting out these relationships, I restored the path of study, the road of becoming a talent and the road of pattern of the predecessors of the scholars, and also let me establish a clear positioning of the predecessors and the current situation of the Hunan book world. ”
The display cabinet includes the publications of the Crane Theory and his personal collection. There have been many works by writers of the same period, such as Li Zetai, Zhou Zhaoyi, Yu Yifu and so on.
The road to post-learning
As mentioned by Mr. Qian Jibo and other scholars, the collective rise of the Elite collective in Hunan in the past 200 years, Tao Shu, Zeng Guofan, Zuo Zongtang, He Shaoji, Wang Minyun, Qi Baishi, Tan Yanmin and other people are intertwined in this system network and cannot be cut. The same is true of the Hunan book world.
While lamenting the wonder of fate, Kuang Zheng plunged into the pile of old papers, and through the works and documents, he "had a divine friendship" with these old gentlemen who were the youngest over 90 years old, and also had his own views on the history of Hunan books.
"Hunan book circles have been relayed from generation to generation, with a clear vertical inheritance. Tracing the development of modern and contemporary books in Hunan, He Shaoji bore the brunt of it as an important town of Calligraphy in the Qing Dynasty. The second important figure to emerge after He Shaoji is Zeng Xi, whose large solo exhibition was launched by the Hunan Art Museum last year. During the Republic of China period, Hunan produced a large number of calligraphers, seal engravers and painters, and later Tan Yanmin, Tan Zemin, Zhou Zhaoyi, Yan Jialong and other gentlemen in the same line. Since Mr. Yan Fuchu presided over the Hunan Calligraphers Association, the research projects of Hunan calligraphers such as He Shaoji, Tan Yanmin, Li Zetai, Zhou Zhaoyi, Yan Jialong and other Hunan calligraphers have been launched in the Hunan Provincial Book Court. These are all books and history studies that belong to our own locality, and only by starting from the local area can we have lasting vitality and can we really get out of the great calligraphers who are based on the locality. Qi Baishi's success gives us a great enlightenment, no matter how his status changes, he has never given up his local feelings and peasant nature throughout his life. ”
Kuang Zheng visited Mr. Zhou Lingzhao on the second series of the Wangshan Academic Journal
"Play with the old man when you are young, and play with the young man when you are old." Kuang Zheng has always remembered this sentence that Mr. Li Li said to him, "Although we are young, through reading and extensive interaction with old gentlemen, I have found that my energy in life is limited, and what we do is also limited. Then what we can do should be sober, clear, and accurate. ”
Kuang Zheng is currently a member of the Hunan Calligraphers Association, deputy secretary general of the Changsha Calligraphers Association and deputy director of the Seal Book Committee, and has devoted himself to the study and research of the history of modern and contemporary calligraphy and painting in Huxiang in recent years. Regarding his own creation and learning, he is not in a hurry when he is just standing this year. Because calligraphy has never existed independently, it is deeply related to personal experience and cultivation. All experiences are nourishing the nourishment of art.
"My mother taught me a lot of specialties since I was a child, but calligraphy has always persevered. I have learned a lot from the lessons of my predecessors. I was born in a military family, and I embarked on the road of art, purely unintentionally planting willows, and it is inseparable from the care of my predecessors. The inspiration that the old gentlemen have brought to me throughout their lives has given me a lasting inner strength. Calligraphy is a transmission of spiritual power, and what I want to convey is the pure spirit of Huxiang's predecessors, which makes people dare not be arrogant, let alone slack. ”
The images in this article are provided by Kuang Zheng. Intern Mengke Zhou also contributed to this article.