In my office, there is a Chinese painting hanging. It is not large, about 5 square feet. She doesn't look pretty, only black, white, and yellow. The object of her painting is not famous mountains and rivers, rare animals and animals, she is not even the real handiwork of the painter himself, just a reproduction. But she has a very unique meaning and fate for me, she accompanied my financial career and amateur learning path, like a grass snake gray line in the past time and space, stretching out to this day.
In the upper right corner of the painting, three lines of text are inscribed vertically, the far right line is "Trickle of Water Merges into a River", in the middle is "Gengwu New Autumn Ying", on the left is "The Order of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province to Write This Qihou", and on the left side of the words "Write This" and "Qihou" are stamped with two seals "Wei" and "Qihou". This is a work created by a painter named Wei Qihou in the early autumn of GengwuNian (1990) according to the proposition of the Shandong Branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. So who is Wei Qihou? Why did he paint at the behest of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province?
(Mr. Wei Qihou (left) and Mr. Qi Gong)
Speaking of Mr. Wei Qihou, he is a well-known "everyone" in the national calligraphy and painting industry and the financial circles of Shandong Province. Born in 1920 in Jinan, Shandong Province, he studied in the department of Chinese of Fu Jen University in Beijing in his early years, studied calligraphy and painting in his spare time, and was taught by Mr. Pu Xinqi, Pu Xuezhai and Qi Gongzhu. After engaging in financial work, he spent his spare time traveling with the calligraphy and painting circles, making extensive ink friends and entertaining himself with calligraphy and painting. Landscape bamboo stone law Song and Yuan literati painting and its own novelty. Calligraphy of the Second King of the Early Tang Dynasty and the Northern Song Dynasty, the real book is more subordinate, the cursive book is more chapters, and the line book is close to the Miyuan Chapter.
In 1981 and 1989, he visited Japan twice and held exhibitions of calligraphy and paintings, and won the highest special prize of the Japanese White Fan Calligraphy Association. His works are collected in museums, libraries, and art galleries at home and abroad. Mr. Wei Qihou was a director of the China Book Association, a member of the Creative Review Committee, the honorary chairman of the Shandong Provincial Book Association, and an advisor to the Shandong Academy of Painting.
His art of calligraphy and painting has not only won the attention of Ji Xianlin, Qi Gong, Ouyang Zhongshi, Shen Peng and other predecessors, but also won the respect of thousands of calligraphy and painting enthusiasts. Wei Lao's life was not a profession of calligraphy and painting, but he gained greater artistic freedom, and the perfect balance between the standardized and rigorous financial career and the romantic artistic expression of the heart reached a perfect balance here. Mr. Wei Qihou retired from the Shandong Branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in 1980 and died in Jinan on December 9, 2009 due to illness at the age of 90. He often said: "I am not a 'professional painter', I belong to the financial world." The old man with high moral standing and fame all over the world, whenever he mentions the unit where he once worked, is always such a fist and fist affection.
As a descendant who worked for the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province, I was very interested in this painting by Wei Qihou's elder predecessor, consulted a lot of archival materials, and tried to trace the background and imprint of the times behind it: On December 24, 1984, the artificial two banks were separated, and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province was formally established, undertaking the industrial and commercial credit and savings business originally handled by the People's Bank of China. Among them, the savings business has three major types of savings business: whole deposit and whole withdrawal, zero deposit and whole withdrawal, and demand savings.
After that, on the basis of consolidating and developing traditional business varieties, we vigorously innovated the varieties of savings business, and successively opened a large number of new varieties and new businesses, such as fixed-live two-pen savings, large transferable time deposit certificates, bonus savings, value-preserving savings, savings deposits in different places, savings deposits in different places, savings traveler's checks, personal remittances, fixed amount bills of exchange, personal checks, wage transfers, and wages on behalf of others. At the same time, it has established the strategy of establishing deposits and the basic principle of "deposit first", adhered to the principle of "grasping by the president, handling the whole bank, and saving by words", adopted measures such as increasing the number of savings outlets, developing joint savings offices, implementing the responsibility system for savings contracting, innovating products and business varieties, promoting high-quality services, and implementing the electronic construction of outlets.
In particular, on February 15, 1986, the Provincial Bank held a grand opening ceremony of the "Prize Savings Activity" in the Pearl Spring Auditorium in Jinan, and the customers who won the "several large" prizes at that time, such as television sets and refrigerators, smiled and ran to tell each other, and the atmosphere was very warm. Mr. Zhang Jingtao, then Vice Governor of Shandong Province, also attended the meeting to congratulate and encourage this "new thing".
Under the fiery form of the whole bank's vigorous development of savings, the art of calligraphy and painting, as a good propaganda medium, has also played an important role in it. In March 1985, the Provincial Bank held the "National Savings Calligraphy and Painting Exhibition" at the Provincial Agricultural Exhibition Hall. In April 1990, the "Provincial Savings Calligraphy and Painting Exhibition" was held, which created a strong atmosphere. The bank's multiple measures and collective efforts around the work of increasing savings and income have been transformed into a strong vitality for the growth of savings deposits, and the bank's savings deposits have achieved substantial growth year after year, with a balance of more than 10 billion yuan in 1988 and a balance of more than 20 billion yuan in 1991. Wei Lao's painting was born in the context of such an era, "trickling water" symbolizes the vivid situation of the whole bank struggling to organize deposits and raise funds through multiple channels, and "Huicheng River" shows that savings deposits have grown year after year, and the strong momentum is gratifying.
Wandering through the long river of history, we can find that finance and calligraphy and painting have been intertwined several times, forming an indissoluble relationship. Looking at the life history of many famous calligraphers and painters in modern times, you can always find that they have a deep or shallow fate with the old banks and money houses. During the period of socialist construction, calligraphy and painting, as an art form that was popular with the masses, was also widely adopted by banks, and a group of well-known masters of calligraphy and painting were invited to splash ink and interpret the theme of savings for the benefit of the country and the people, and Wei Lao was undoubtedly one of them.
(Mr. Wei Qihou painted "Trickle of Water Into Rivers" for Shandong Branch in 1990)
Let's enjoy this painting quietly! I have seen many paintings with similar themes, most of which are filmed using the traditional Chinese painting "scattered perspective method" - the deep spring water hidden in the lofty mountains forms a trickle of streams that meander down, forming a wonderful curve, and flowing into the big rivers under the mountains. Some also depict the vast sea of rivers rushing forward into the distance, the sea is rough, and a red sun in the sky is vigorous and radiant, and the picture is really majestic. However, Wei Lao reversed this normalized mode of thinking and creation, and adopted a scene similar to the "focus perspective method" in Western art, focusing the creation object on several scenes in the vicinity, using a "three-stage" composition, with two small trees in front of it, a calm pond in the middle, and a staggered slope in the back. The height of the slope stone outline line is exactly on the "golden section line" of the whole picture, and the large blank space behind the slope stone is water, smoke, or sky? Leave people with unlimited imagination.
In fact, this kind of painting method exists in a large number of Yuanren paintings advocated by Wei Lao, such as one of the representative works of Ni Yunlin, one of the "Four Families of the Yuan", "Six Gentlemen's Map", which is such a pattern, although it does not have the momentum of the mountains, rivers, rivers and seas, but the scenery of Pingyuan gives people the feeling of tranquility and tranquility and floating out of the dust.
Judging from the use of ink colors, this painting uses only ink and ochre colors, which is simple and unpretentious. But just in the ink dripping, ink staining appeared a wonderful sense of transparency, ink five colors make the black tone not monotonous, naturally divided into tree levels. The "thick line" of the trunk contrasts with the "thin surface" of the leaves, the "block surface" of the slope stone transversely and the longitudinal "thin line" of the thin stream. In the quiet picture, from the graceful rhythm of the trickling water lines, people can clearly hear the sweet notes of the ding-dong, feel the slow passage of time, let a painting suddenly "move" from "quiet", there is really a white stone old man for a mountain stream tadpole diagram named "frog sound ten miles out of the mountain spring" poetic meaning, let people read tirelessly.
Speaking of which, I am still quite related to this painting. Our first meeting was in 2005, when I first came to work at the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. Located in the Yingong Building in the core area of Jinan's old commercial port at No. 310 Jingsi Road, the touching Wei Lao calligraphy and paintings in the building gave me, an amateur calligraphy and painting enthusiast, the opportunity to get close to and feel the artistic charm of Wei Lao, and also let me quickly become an authentic "Wei fan". In my spare time, I wandered through the bookstore gallery to collect all the graphic materials related to Wei Lao. I especially like to visit Zhongshan Park, which is close to the unit, because there is the largest used book market in Jinan, and you can find a lot of "treasures".
It was an early summer afternoon, and I came here again after work, and the golden sunset illuminated the whole park exceptionally clearly, the breeze was blowing, the speckled light and shadow of the bright green leaves falling on the ground were dancing briskly, and the air was filled with the aroma of flowers and earth. Walking into the used book market, I saw an 8-folio book book on the book stall at the front door, and I looked closely - the golden cover of coffee, the title of the book inscribed by Mr. Qi Gong, ah! Isn't this the "Collection of Paintings and Calligraphy of Wei Qihou" that I am looking for?! She lay there quietly, slightly dusty, like a tired child who had been away from home for a long time, waiting for her family to take her home. Without hesitation, I paid for it, took out a paper towel and repeatedly wiped the cover clean, and returned to the dormitory like a cigarette, and I read it carefully without worrying about eating.
The book was published by Shandong Fine Arts Publishing House in June 1992, and was edited by the Shandong Branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the Shandong Branch of the Chinese Calligraphers Association and the Shandong Academy of Painting. The book is preceded by three prefaces, namely " Wine Without Persuasion " by Mr. Shen Peng , then chairman of the Chinese Calligraphers Association (Acting), "Straight as a Vermilion Rope, As Clear as a Jade Curling Ice" by Mr. Song Xiuyi, the first president of the provincial bank, and "Not Agitated, Not Strong, Wind and Rules, And Self-Discipline" by Mr. Zou Zhenya, then honorary chairman of the Shandong Calligraphers Association. The book contains a total of 67 works, including 44 calligraphy and 23 paintings, which basically cover Mr. Wei Qihou's masterpieces from the 80s to the 90s. In the painting section, there are two provincial propositional paintings, one of which is "Trickle of Water Into Rivers" (included on page 56). Because the inscription on the provincial bank is written, I have a deep impression on many works.
According to the memories of old colleagues who worked with Wei Lao, in 1990, the provincial bank held a provincial savings calligraphy and painting exhibition, and "Trickle of Water Into Rivers" was written by Wei Lao at the behest of the provincial bank. At that time, there were three propositional paintings, the other two were titled "Full of Vitality" (included in the collection of calligraphy and paintings on page 63) and "Nian Nian Youyu" (not included in this collection of paintings and calligraphy). It is said that in order to publish the collection of calligraphy and paintings, Wei Lao personally carefully selected the works and entrusted a colleague in the industry to contact the publishing house about the preparation of the edition. This colleague was very conscientious and conscientious, and immediately returned all the original works to Wei Lao after the work was completed. He said: "These works were taken out of Wei's hometown by my hand, and they must be sent back by me, and not one of them can be less!" "Entrusted by people and heavy promises, a word is out of the weight of Tarzan, the ancient road of the people of that year made us sincerely admire today."
(Inscription by Mr. Wei Qihou)
My second encounter with this painting was on August 24, 2012. On that day, the opening ceremony of the Provincial Bank History Museum was held on the 9th floor of the Yingong Building, and I was also fortunate to visit the History Museum for the first time as an employee representative. The preparation of the museum lasted for 3 years, truly recording the 28 years of glorious history of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province, and showing the spirit of diligent pursuit and hard work and dedication of successive generations of Shandong Industrial and Commercial Bank. The museum follows the historical development context and is arranged in chronological order, covering an area of 500 square meters and an exhibition area of more than 1,500 square meters. It displays more than 1,200 pieces of various ancient coins, old bills, financial materials, financial machinery, old objects and other physical objects, displays more than 1,000 pictures, and 97 charts, and is the history education base, inheritance and culture window and publicity and exchange platform of the whole bank, and also the first bank history museum in the financial circle of Shandong Province.
In the dense photo exhibition area of the History Museum, the designers specially opened up a whole page for Wei Lao, introducing the life and artistic achievements of this financial calligrapher and painter who belongs to the pride of the whole bank, accompanied by two spray-painted reproductions of representative works. A calligraphy work is a large cursive character inscribed by Wei Lao in early 2009 for the 25th anniversary of the founding of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province, "The scenery is unique here". A painting is this "Trickle of Water Merges into Rivers". As precious historical materials showing the operation and development history of ICBC in Shandong Province, they tell the history to the future and encourage all employees of the bank to continue to write a new chapter in the reform and development of ICBC. Every time I stopped and stood in front of her, I seemed to be able to hear her narration, feel her affinity and warmth, and did not want to leave for a long time.
Soon after, we met again on the web. At that time, the Internet was becoming more and more developed, which also provided more convenient conditions for my "fever" and "Taobao" of Wei Lao's art. On tudou, Youku and other websites, you can search for many short videos of famous calligraphers and painters splashing ink on the spot. From some videos of Elder Wei painting in the "Jin Yuanzhai" in the Jingwu Road TaiheLi, I actually saw that on the wall behind the old man, it was actually hanging this painting "Trickling Water Merges into a River"! From the perspective of Wei Lao's choice of art, he was immersed in the high realm of "Jin Ziyuan Painting" by "holding his own opinion and acting alone", in order to maintain a high level of appreciation, as he wrote in his own poem, "Eating vegetarian bitter bamboo shoots, and serving the Duck Pill at night." The four-wall bell Zhang Xixian, the dream Mijia painting the boat." In the study room with four walls full of zhong Zhang Xixian and Yuan Ren's famous paintings, "not very harmonious" hangs a painting of herself many years ago, which shows how much the old man loves her!
I believe that the zhong zhang xixian and yuanren famous paintings chosen by Wei Lao, who pay attention to the details of pen and ink, must be excellent reproductions, so this painting that accompanies the owner day and night "Trickling Water Merges into Rivers" must be the most proud authentic painting of Wei Lao! Maybe it's not just because of that? The inscription "Shandong Industrial and Commercial Bank" in the painting is also a plot in the old man's heart, a plot about "home".
Our fourth encounter was at the Wei Qihou Calligraphy and Painting Art Museum in Jinan, located at the foot of Hero Mountain. Because of the common topic and the enthusiasm for spreading the art of Wei Lao, I became friends with the curator, Mr. Li Desheng. I have also become a regular visitor to the art museum, and often go to the museum to admire the treasured collection of Wei Lao calligraphy and paintings. In December 2017, the exhibition hall exhibited a number of Wei Lao's early works, a large part of which is the original works included in the "Wei Qihou Calligraphy and Painting Collection", "Trickling Water Merges into Rivers". Lingering in these original works spanning nearly 40 years and the paper has been yellowed, I was deeply shocked and felt the charm that many prints could not express.
Seeing that I was reading carefully, the enthusiastic Curator Desheng stepped forward and communicated with me. I mentioned the painting to the curator and talked about my deep understanding of what it meant for Elder Wei to hang her behind her. After listening to my words, Director Ne Zhi Desheng smiled slightly and said a sentence that made me stunned: "What Elder Wei hangs behind him is actually not a genuine original, it is a replica." Huh? On the video where the background is not very clear, I didn't even see it! While I was still confused, the curator told me a story about the collection of these exhibits.
After these works were returned to Wei Lao, they have been treasured by the old man's home. In the autumn of 1996, after recovering from a serious illness, Elder Wei began to think about his hundred years aftermath and left a will: "I have come to this world empty-handed for more than seventy years, and it has given me a lot. Personally, in the future, there will be no need except for full warmth. Only the calligraphy and paintings, and the collection and creation of my life, must be returned to the world and handed over to the children. Write as many paintings as possible, and that's just going away empty-handed. ”
Shortly after Wei Lao's death in 2009, in accordance with this will, the family handed over a batch of Wei Lao's calligraphy and paintings in the family collection to the Jinan Wei Qihou Calligraphy and Painting Art Museum for safekeeping, and through regular theme exhibitions, so that calligraphy and painting lovers could appreciate these art treasures, so that Wei Lao's wish of "returning all to the world" could be truly realized. It turned out to be so! A past that was not as good as smoke made me even more solemn about Elder Wei and all the people who properly placed these collections. For thousands of years, the circulation of the context, the continuation of the spirit, and the inheritance of civilization may have been carried out in this way.
(Photocopy of Mr. Wei Qihou's introduction to this picture)
Being able to get this painting was thanks to our fifth encounter. In 2019, at the invitation of Director Desheng, I participated in the editing of the large-scale album "Qihou" published by Shandong Fine Arts Publishing House to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Mr. Wei Qihou's birth. After the album was published, he continued to join the editorial board of the journal "Wei Qihou" and made a modest contribution to the dissemination of the art of Wei Lao's calligraphy and painting. When reviewing the first issue of "Wei Qihou", I was pleasantly surprised to see "Trickling Water Into Rivers" on page 34, and even more surprisingly, on page 35, I actually published a photocopy of the text that Wei Lao wrote with a pen on the letter paper to introduce the painting!
Elder Wei said: "This "Picture of the Cold Spring of the Stream" was drawn by Elder Wei based on his sketches after the rain on the mountain road to Foyu combined with his memories. Here is a long ravine, rain after the sun, the mountains and rivers are like countless mountain springs babbling down, which constitutes this 'trickle of water into rivers' savings propaganda picture. From the perspective of the picture, it is a sketch with a lot of depth and pastel, and from the perspective of Chinese painting, it is very picturesque with Ni Yunlin, Huang Zijiu and Ke Jiusi. "Mao Sai Dun opened! It turns out that this painting has another name, where it was taken, why it was painted, how to understand it from the perspective of Chinese and Western painting, And Elder Wei explained it clearly and clearly for us. Especially when mentioning himself, the old man jokingly obeys everyone's tone and calls himself "Elder Wei", which makes people directly feel his usual humor and freedom, and can't help but smile.
After completing the review, he went to the Wei Qihou Calligraphy and Painting Art Museum to hand over the manuscript to Director Desheng. During the conversation, I suddenly saw that on the bed behind Director Desheng, in the center of it was a large replica of the original "Trickle of Water Into a River". She is well-made and has the effect of a watermark painting on a woodboard of Rongbao Zhai. Set in a delicate mahogany frame, it is even more beautiful and atmospheric. I felt that even putting her together in the real handiwork would be inseparable for a while. The attentive Director Desheng saw that my gaze stayed on the painting for a long time, and before I could speak, he said directly: "You are a worker, Elder Wei made this painting for ICBC, she is related to you, I will give her to you!" I couldn't believe my ears, and I couldn't say a word except to get up and say thank you deeply.
Since then, "Trickle into Rivers" has entered the Provincial Industrial and Commercial Bank, came to my office, and began to compare with me. As a young worker, after 19 years of career, whenever I see her, I will have a lot of thoughts and constantly read new meanings. This painting has passed 32 years since its creation, the years have passed, the times have changed, ICBC as the last state-owned bank separated from the People's Bank of China system, from state-owned professional banks to wholly state-owned commercial banks, and then to the international public-owned joint-stock commercial banks, 39 years of extraordinary road, has gone through the glorious process of continuous growth from scratch, from weak to strong, from China to the world. As a microcosm of the brilliant achievements of China's reform and opening up, and as a representative of the vigorous development of the mainland banking industry, the history of ICBC records not only the trajectory of the growth and development of a bank, but also a magnificent development history of China's banking industry.
And the "savings" of that year have long changed the old appearance. With the diversification and personalization of customer needs brought about by the rapid development of science and technology, ICBC continues to change with the times and the situation, and always pursues excellence. Today's personal financial liability products are more diverse, giving customers more choices, customers can not go to the bank branch, as long as they log on to the Internet banking with their fingers can handle personal access business, convenient, fast and safe.
If you are willing to visit our outlets, spacious and clean halls, advanced and intelligent self-service machines and professional quality, first-class service level staff will surely bring customers a more intimate quality service experience. The "prize savings" that had to rely on luck to draw back then have now been transformed into various value-added products issued perennially and customer preferential profit activities, constantly allowing customers to get real value-preserving and value-added services. Finance for the people, convenience, benefit for the people, benefit the people, has become the clear theme of the times for ICBC's personal financial services.
But I think the theme of "trickling water into rivers" will never go out of style. Whether it is personal finance business or other professional lines, employees are always the most valuable asset of ICBC's vigorous development and evergreen business. Every cadre and employee who works hard in different posts is a trickle of water, and all of them flow into the gushing rivers of the collective family of ICBC with the lofty attitude of "struggle + implementation", which flows endlessly and flows into the ocean of financial tide and change of the times, surging in the golden years and writing a new chapter.
If Wei Qihou's elders could see all this, he would definitely be sincerely pleased! He must not have imagined that this painting, which made him very proud, spanned a full 32 years, from the collection of calligraphy and paintings, from the wall of the study, from the Internet, from the memorial hall, and finally returned to the Industrial and Commercial Bank of Shandong Province in the form of a copy of the "first class of authentic works", back to the place where he had struggled all his life in his career. She hung quietly on the wall, like a kind old man with a story in his heart, smiling and looking at the descendants of ICBC, and we were with us day and night again.
He is currently working at Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Shandong Branch. He is currently a member of the China Financial Calligraphers Association, the Shandong Young Calligraphers Association, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Calligraphers Association, and the Shandong Financial Calligraphers Association. Most of the calligraphy creations are self-written poems, and some of the poetry works are included in the collections of "Literary Highlands" and "Silver Sea Songs". Some of his prose works are included in The Financial Literature Circle and The Connoisseur.
One point number Shandong financial literature