On one side is oil paint and on the other side is ink, and he has never been embarrassed

At the end of the 20th century, Zhu Qizhan rose rapidly with the "wild" character as the first heavy color freehand at his old age, which revived the literati Jinshi's freehand painting style, and also made the artistic trend of combining Chinese and Western styles soar again, not only shocking the art world, but also playing a strong sound of the history of modern and contemporary Chinese painting at the end of the 20th century. This also makes people's understanding of Zhu Qizhan in the past usually focus on the changes in his old age.

In fact, Zhu Qizhan's lifelong creation has two major peaks, in addition to his works of the elderly change method, there are also his theme creations in the 1950s and 1960s. If we only pay attention to the changes in his old age and do not study the connection between these two peaks, it is difficult to truly understand and grasp the formation and value of Zhu Qizhan's art. Understanding the "wild" interest of Zhu Qizhan's changes in his old age also has multiple dimensions. At present, with a series of activities to commemorate the 130th anniversary of Zhu Qizhan's birth, perhaps people will get the opportunity to re-acquaint themselves with this Master of Shanghai Art.

Zhu Qizhan, "The Sound of Landscape and Water", 1982

Feeling the new atmosphere brought by the new China, Zhu Qizhan actively devoted himself to creation with surging enthusiasm. From collective labor to construction projects, from the construction of new appearances in mountain villages to the construction of towns, they have become the source of nourishing the lush atmosphere in his paintings

Since entering the Shanghai Art College in 1912 and officially stepping into the painting circle to the founding of New China, Zhu Qizhan has always regarded himself as a devout scholar who has also studied and loved Both Chinese painting and Western painting. His oil paintings learned authentic late impressionism, while his Chinese paintings studied authentic literati paintings since the Yuan and Ming dynasties, although they gradually deviated from the wild taste of rough clothes and chaotic heads, they were still decent. It should be noted that at this time, Zhu Qizhan did not want to melt Chinese and Western paintings into one furnace, but immersed himself in the two completely different art worlds of Western painting and Chinese painting.

The new atmosphere brought by New China has brought surprises and self-confidence to the people of the times. At that time, Zhu Qizhan was already in his sixties and actively devoted himself to creation with surging enthusiasm. Marked by the Shanghai Academy of Chinese Painting, which entered the construction in 1956, Zhu Qizhan's landscape paintings have undergone fundamental changes in both taste and form in the following decades.

During this period, Zhu Qizhan's creation can be divided into two major types: First, the sketches of pure life, such as Huangshan and Jinggangshan. This kind of work, compared with the past, there is no substantial change in brush and ink, but it gets rid of the desolate and cold mood expressed in the literati paintings of the old days. The key to its change lies in the composition and point view. The author replaces the previous program with the vividness of what he sees, and replaces the artistic conception of the old inner pursuit of absurdity. For example, compared with the coldness of the masterpiece "Ten Views of Gufu" in Taicang in his early years, the brush and ink of Zhu's new work is undoubtedly full of rhythm and vitality, compared with the melancholy and artistic conception of the old landscape paintings, his paintings at that time were obviously full of upward emotions.

What really represents the level of Zhu Qizhan's theme creation is another type of landscape figure painting, which mostly shows the theme creation of the old appearance of the mountains and rivers and the earth, and can also be called Zhu Qizhan's representative works that break away from the old aesthetics.

Zhu Qizhan, The Holy Land of Revolution, 1960

At that time, Zhu Qizhan's brush and ink on landscape paintings were still the same as before, and the coarse head was chaotic, and what changed was Lu Yushao's so-called "cool and cool" and "isolated and isolated" atmosphere. The core of his aesthetic "return to the ancients" lies in the fact that the fireworks of the human world are thrown out in his works, such as the scenes showing fishing boats, cars, new buildings and even the labor of the masses, which make his pictures full of vitality.

This kind of fireworks comes from Zhu Qizhan's diligence and earnestness, constantly going deep into life, and capturing the vitality in reality. Zhu Qizhan was one of the most diligent and diligent painters in the painting academy at that time, and his figure was almost indispensable to his activities. From the collective labor of the people to the construction of projects, from the construction of the new appearance of mountain villages to the construction of towns, they have become the source of nourishing the lush atmosphere in Zhu Qizhan's paintings, such as "Farmland Irrigation" and "New Construction in Mountainous Areas" and a large number of well-known masterpieces, all of which are infiltrated by his diligent efforts in those years.

It is worth mentioning that there is another special variety in Zhu Qizhan's theme creation, that is, the urban theme of Shanghai's new appearance, such as "Green City (International Hotel)" and "Shanghai Lu Xun Memorial Hall" composed in 1959, which not only reflects his personal joy for Shanghai's urban change, but also becomes a precious artistic historical material to witness the development of this city.

In some works, in addition to pen and ink, in terms of color, Zhu Qizhan obviously borrowed from late Impressionism, such as "Out of Work", "Maqiao Commune", etc., and even some borrowed from the late Impressionism and Fauvism's childish and wild brushstrokes in pen and ink.

The theme creation of this period is one of the two major peaks of Zhu Qizhan's life's creation.

Zhu Qizhan, "So Many Delicate Rivers in the Mountains and Mountains of the Motherland, Infinitely Good", 1960

Using the rhythm of music, Zhu Qizhan not only expresses a profound sense of the universe through landscapes, but also expresses the simplicity, simplicity and strength of colors and brushstrokes through landscapes and flowers, so as to highlight the "wild" interest of unscrupulousness and freedom

Zhu Qizhan's method of changing the chronology, which is a combination of traditional capitalization and late Impressionism, began in the late 1970s. What brought about the great changes in Zhu Qizhan's art was also a turning point of the times.

In 1977, Zhu Qizhan was eight or six years old, and in the face of a new era that had been quietly opened, a work called "Imaginary LowerCase", which was very different from the previous style, came into being in his pen. "Imaginary LowerCase" can be regarded as an important signal for Zhu Qizhan to start changing the law of the elderly years, and the painting style has become romantic and relaxed. The author is thinking about the grand questions of life. Imaginary LowerCase begins to focus on the subjective world of the artist himself.

Regarding the motivation for the creation of "Imaginary LowerCase", Zhu Qizhan once confessed to being inspired by his friend Lin Qiqing. Lin Qiqing said that the highest artistic conception needs to be in the same vein as heaven and earth. This is the "cosmic sense", and there are two sides to the performance: the "subtle" place of feeling infinite time and space, and the "subtle" place of feeling the biochemical machine. This led Zhu to write:

Does the painted mountain and water, one scene and one thing stay in the plane of personal interest, or can it enter the category of history and tend to enter the category of the universe? To write about the "subtlety" of the birth-born celestial machine, I did yearn for it. I did not think of expressing the "microcosm" of infinite time and space. My recent twelve sketches of Imaginary LowerCase can be seen as my attempt at two "cosmic senses."

Zhu Qizhan knew that his life had reached its final stage. Perhaps he is ready to say goodbye at any time, for the world and for himself, and some sense of "Imaginary LowerCase" may be a confession.

With open-mindedness, transparency and ease, Zhu Qizhan, who was approaching the advanced age of Jiuyi, unexpectedly broke into another era. At this moment, his former peers have passed away, and he silently chooses to release himself and release the passion that has been silently accumulated in this life.

Zhu Qizhan's opportunity for artistic change first stemmed from music.

In this regard, Zhu Qizhan left an important historical material in the "Painting Tan of The Habit": "Painting must have a 'sense of music'. This inspiration came from old friend Zhang Junwei. He also said: "On the eve of 1972, I listened with bated breath to a few symphonies by the Finnish composer Sibelius, and I was shocked, and the melody of the galloping majesty was one picture after another in front of my eyes. I was so excited that I went home that night and painted a landscape to give to Elder Zhang, and the next day I painted a painting of "Mountains and Rivers of the Motherland" to send him, so as to give it to me. ”

Zhu Qizhan has made a detailed analysis of the similarities between music and painting:

Music and painting are two different arts, but there are common artistic laws and laws, for example, first of all, according to the content to be expressed, the author uses various forms and techniques to express his feelings about objective things, such as ideals and interests, and to reflect deep and subtle, giving people a feeling of spiritual beauty. In addition, the law of "contrast, change, and unity" is an important law that must be followed in creation.

The influence of music on the changes in Zhu Qizhan's years is the dynamic that the melody brings to the picture. And this sense of movement and the momentum formed by it became the most significant feature of Zhu Qizhan's later paintings. It is not difficult for anyone to feel the rhythm and rhythm of Zhu Qizhan's works in his later years, and it is this rhythm and rhythm that solidly promotes the "wild" interest of Zhu Qizhan's paintings.

This kind of "wild" interest also comes from his pursuit of heaviness and simplicity, and music has become a medicine for boosting.

Zhu Qizhan's new wind of change was accomplished by means of the "force" of rhythm. He runs through the "potential" with "force". To highlight this "force," we must rely on "simplicity," because it is not easy to see its "force" in "complexity."

This "force" also refers to the pen force, and the ink method is heavy, and like "Jane" and "potential", it becomes a means to cooperate with its "force". "Jane" is freehand, and "freehand" must be made by means of "potential", which strengthens the thick black and heavy ink method and also promotes the "wild" interest of Zhu's painting style.

What needs to be explained is that this "force" is also the combination of Chinese and Western paintings. Zhu Qizhan's combination of Chinese and Western paintings is mainly a combination of Western painting colors and Chinese painting brushstrokes. "Force" includes the simplicity and simplicity of brushstrokes and colors in Western paintings, that is, the strength and sense of quantity of colors, and also involves "simplicity" and "potential", which is the commonality between traditional capitalization and late Impressionism.

Zhu Qizhan uses the rhythm of music to express not only the profound sense of the universe through the landscape, but also the simplicity, simplicity and strength of the colors and brushstrokes through the landscape and flowers, so as to highlight the unscrupulous and free-spirited "wild" interest.

Zhu Qizhan "Narcissus"

Zhu Qizhan, who was once both a Western painter and a Chinese painter, painted with heavy oil paint and waved a clear ink, in a sense, he seems to be consciously pulling away the distance between the two. After the founding of New China, the paintings were based on the Soviet roving school of oil paintings, and the Western modern paintings taken by Zhu Qizhan, Liu Haisu, Lin Fengmian and others were once indifferent. At that time, although Zhu Qizhan's creation had a certain color expression of late Impressionism, it was still a reference from the perspective of Chinese painters. By the 1980s, as China opened its doors, Zhu Qizhan's old learning was reactivated, and under the catalyst of the atmosphere of the times, he actively combined the two.

Zhang Daqian, Liu Haisu, Zhu Qizhan are all influenced by Western modern painting and move towards the integration of Chinese and Western painting, Zhang Daqian because of a long time overseas, more inspired by abstract expressionism, and also in the Tang, Song, Ming and Qing dynasties a number of ink methods, good at using silk, cooked paper, the expression is still the cold style of literati painting. Liu Haisu and Zhu Qizhan lived in China, relying on the late Impressionism that prevailed in Shanghai in the 1920s. Liu Haisu is as good at spilling as Zhang Daqian, but Liu Haisu is a warm and unrestrained and sloppy style because he takes the road of Jinshi freehand and mostly uses raw paper. Although Zhu Qizhan is similar to Liu Haisu in terms of aesthetics and teacher inheritance, what he has created is a deep and rambunctious, frank and simple style.

Just as everyone in the Yuan Ji is a teacher of Dong Yuan, but the style is different, the art is not about the teacher, but about the independence of Zhuoran. From the perspective of painting style, Zhu Qizhan was not directly influenced by Zhang Daqian, but he was obviously infected by the wind of color and ink blending at that time, and his late Impressionist color gene was instantly reactivated, blending with the thick brush and heavy ink he was good at, moving towards majesty and magnificence, and then pushing the "wild" interest into a situation that he had not imagined in the past.

Zhu Qizhan's change of the elderly years is mainly through two ways, one is his most common heavy color landscape, but also dabbles in heavy color flowers, the two are similar in taste. The other is still his lifelong love of ink Meilan Bamboo Chrysanthemum, and the pen and ink are becoming thicker and thicker. His Meilan bamboo chrysanthemum, from the early years of the Qing vine style of the clear open, to the middle-aged tend to be shitao style, Wu Changshuo style of Cangxiong, to the late years finally formed a wild, wild, vast and childish Zhu color.

In 1991, Zhu Qizhan's 100-year-old painting exhibition was successfully held at the Shanghai Art Museum, and he shook the painting world with his huge canvas and brilliant thick and frank color ink, so that the aesthetic that formed a huge contrast with his own idyllic and gentle disposition in the trend of Chinese and Western fusion that ran through almost the entire 20th century bloomed at the end of the century.