Mark Xuan
"Little Tadpole Finds Mother"
"MuDi"
Deer Bells
《Landscape and Water》
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The last ink animation man died of illness
Mark Xuan, a 76-year-old former director of the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio, died of illness in Shanghai on April 6. When the news came out, some media immediately said that "the last person in China to do ink animation died", and some people mourned: "He took away our entire childhood memories." ”
Many people may not be familiar with Ma Xuan's name, but the classic Chinese animation films he participated in creating, such as "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", "Landscape and Water", "Three Monks", "Tianshu Qitan", "Nezha Noisy Sea", "Little Tadpole Finds Mother", "Mudi" and so on, have left a beautiful childhood memory for countless people while also leaving an insurmountable artistic peak for Chinese animation films.
Mak Xuan, born in Shanghai. After graduating from the Affiliated High School of Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts in 1959, he entered the Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio as an animation, animation designer, art designer and director. He was a professor and vice dean of the School of Animation at Jilin University of the Arts, and before his death, he was a professor in the Department of Animation at the School of Software and Microelectronics of Peking University. In the 1950s and 1960s, he worked as an animation producer in the cartoons "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", "The Little Tadpole Finds His Mother", and "Mudi", and later served as the chief or main animation designer and art designer in the animation films "Three Monks" and "Nezha Noisy Sea". In the 1980s and 1990s, he independently directed or co-directed the animation films "Twelve Mosquitoes and Five People", "New Doorbell", "Super Soap" and the ink animation film "Landscape and Water", which won many awards at home and abroad.
Before his death, Mark Xuan was a professor at the School of Software and Microelectronics of Peking University, and a doctoral supervisor and professor at the School of Animation and Digital Arts of Communication University of China. After hearing the news of his death, the students sent microblogs to mourn: "Dear Teacher Mark Xuan, I wish you all the way well, can become your last student, I am very happy, in the future, whether poor or rich, I will definitely do my best to carry the road of animation with my greatest enthusiasm and inherit your persistent spirit." "Deeply remembering Teacher Mark Xuan and working with Ma Lao in just three months, I have seen in Ma Lao a lot of modesty and purity that is difficult to see in people now."
Ma Lao is not only one of the main creators of Shanghai Fine Arts Studio, but also a participant and witness of the glorious era of Chinese animation. Today, many of his contemporaries have left, so his death also makes people miss and lament the era of Chinese ink animation that was once incomparably brilliant.
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There is a lack of successors to Chinese ink animation
Ink animation introduces traditional Chinese ink painting into the creation of animation films, and makes a major breakthrough in the artistic style of animation with the virtual and realistic artistic conception and light and elegant pictures. Ink animation is a major innovation of Chinese animation and the most Chinese aesthetically pursued art genre in the field of world cinema.
In 1960, the Shanghai Mei film Studio made the first ink animation film "Little Tadpole Finds Mother", which caused a sensation in the world. The 14-minute cartoon is based on Qi Baishi's chickens, fish, shrimp, frogs, tadpoles and other images. The simple and casual lines, melodious and frustrated ink color, let the audience seem to see a flowing Chinese picture.
In 1963, Shanghai Mei film studio filmed "Mudi". Asking the Chinese painter Francis Zhongzhong to take the design, Master Li Keyan lent out a cattle herding drawing for the reference of the film crew. This idyllic work borrows a shepherd boy to find cattle all the way, showing the common high mountains and mountains and the meteorology of flying streams in Chinese landscape paintings, achieving the artistic conception of lyricism and scene blending. It creates a fun that is very different from Disney cartoons.
In 1982, the studio again filmed the ink animation film "Deer Bells". The art design is served by the famous painter Cheng Shifa. The film does not have a single monologue or narration, but the unique form of expression of ink painting makes the whole film blend with the scene, realizing the poetry and charm of silence over sound.
In 1988, Mark Xuan took the lead in filming "Landscape and Water". This 18-minute film integrates the artistic conception and pen and ink interest of Chinese poetry into every picture. The film is lyrical and the scenes blend, the cloud-shrouded mountains, the smoky water, the virtual in the real, the real with the virtual, showing the deep tradition of Chinese art. At the same time, various modern animation techniques closely integrated with it have pushed Chinese ink animation to a new realm.
The reason why ink animation has won international reputation is that there were a large number of artists who were willing to be lonely and maintain their style at that time. However, as the social environment becomes more and more famous and profit-seeking, people's hearts are impetuous, and ink animation is facing an embarrassing situation of unsustainability. The production process of ink animation is cumbersome and time-consuming, the artistic value and commercial value are seriously separated, and at present, the people who are keen to create ink animation and can taste ink animation are getting smaller and smaller. The most frightening thing is that in addition to external forces such as the market, more is that people are losing their sincerity, ingenuity and patience with ink animation.