Author: Zhu Wanzhang, Research Librarian, National Museum of China
Wang Jian (1598-1677), one of the "Four Kings" of the early Qing Dynasty, said in an inscription on a landscape painting by Wu Weiye (1609-1672): "The painting is divided into the Southern and Northern Sects. Nan took right cheng as the ancestor, and since Dong Ju's two-meter Yuan Ji everyone, as well as Shen Shitian and Dong Wenmin, had passed on the right pulse, so Nanzong was prosperous. After Dong Wenmin, several guangling were scattered. Recently, Duwu Lou Wu Dasicheng and Wang Fengyu held the bull's ear, and they were pen and ink masters, and Hai Nei was respected as a model. This frame is Si Chenggong's game Samadhi, such as inadvertent, but the vitality is well-informed, participating in the creation, that is, thinking hard about the years, can not come here, the true Dan Qing treasure raft, can not be made ordinary view also. This is the first mention of "Danqing Bao Raft" as a metaphor for the height of its painting style. Last year, the Shanghai Museum took this as the theme and planned the Dong Qichang Art Exhibition, which was extremely popular and had a great influence, so the term "Danqing Bao Raft" was even more in-depth and well-known in the painting world.
Coincidentally, in the Qing Dynasty, there was indeed a person named Bao Raft and Ya Danqing, but because his name was unknown and there were not many paintings, few people knew him. He was an active monk of the Haidong Temple in Guangzhou during the Qing Dynasty and the Guangxu Dynasty, and the "Bao Raft" was his legal name, the character Lianxi, the lianxi Daoist, gong poems, good paintings, and "Lianxi Poetry Cun" was written. He also likes to collect famous paintings, and his fasting room is a painting zen hall. Regarding his life deeds, there are not many texts, and only some fragments can be extracted from the poetry collection and the calligraphy and paintings passed down from the generations, and the general situation can be roughly understood: Yang Yongyan (1818-1903), a scholar from Panyu in Guangdong Province, has the sentence "Little Little Fellow Villager Well, Resign family affairs and world dignity" in the title "Lianxi Poetry Cun", which shows that Bao Raftdang and Yang Shi are both From Panyu, Guangdong. Bao Raft has a poem "Ding Hai New Year's Day" in the "Lianxi Poetry Cun": "The years and years are also very strange, and the remnants of the passage are also spring." Eighteen thousand days is now, forty-nine years know yesterday is wrong. Shigu has many materials to allow me to be clumsy, and the law is not fattened. The Yuan Dynasty bombarded the spring cannon everywhere, and I only had the old clothes of Yunshan Mountain. Its self-annotation cloud: "Fifty years old". Because Bao Raft was at the same time as Yang Yongyan, Chen Pu (1820-1887) and Julian (1828-1904), it can be inferred that this "Ding Hai" should be the thirteenth year of Qing Guangxu (1887), according to which it can be seen that his birth year is the eighteenth year of Qing Daoguang (1838). In the "Preface to the Poetry of Lianxi", He Guilin, the old man of Jinsu, claims that he died on the seventeenth day of the fourth month of Xin Di, that is, the seventeenth year of Guangxu (1891). From this, it can be determined that the year of birth and death, the life expectancy of fifty to four.
The raft's achievements in Buddhism can no longer be examined, but in his poems and paintings, his artistic achievements can be understood. Most of his poems are concentrated in the Lianxi Shicun, but some of them are scattered in paintings and other anthologies. Among the more than two hundred and sixty poems in his lifetime, the most superior is the landscape leisure poem. Geese take pictures, improvised, often have feelings and hair, sincere and sincere, such as "Mingyue Temple": "Luofu has a first place, Yunshui ancient jungle." Mingyue knows this, and qingshan has grown up to this day. The three realms of Bell Han are silent, and the hall is dark and a lamp is deep. Laughing asked the world, where is Mei He looking? The other type is the song of the wind, quite like the words of bamboo branches, which are catchy to read, and contain a kind of musical beauty in the kindness, such as the cloud of "Huazhou Xiaodu": "The flowers on the shore reflect the water is low, and the wind blows through the west of the sea pearl." The water moon will fall, and the soft few smoke fans will be heard. Among his poems, the largest number is still inscription poems and remuneration poems. The former is a mixture of good and bad, and when you see Zhujie, such as the "Picture of the Tianmao Hut in Yang Jiaoping" ("Yang Jiaoping" is Yang Yongyan): "The Qing white family is famous in the past, and the Han xue in front of the building is just beginning to clear." Painting the thatched hut is early, and the spring wine is brewing. The corridor is full of Buddhas and sangs, and the old trees on the wall make autumn sounds. With the public talk of the countryside garden affairs, infinite low wandering back and forth. "Although the latter is a number of works that are suitable for the scene, the artistic value is not large, but it is of great documentary value, which is of great supporting significance for the study of the life and art of the author and the characters involved." Bao Raft had friends with calligraphers and painters at that time, such as Ju Lian, Pan Feisheng, Yang Yongyan, etc., and had many songs and works with Pan Feisheng and Pan Guiqing. In the thirteenth year of Guangxu (1887), on the sixtieth birthday of Ju Lian, dozens of celebrities in the academic circles and art circles chanted poems and painted in congratulations, and the raft was also given two poems to express his admiration. One of the clouds: "Jia Zi reopened the Yue Descending Feast, and the old man saw the star in front of the mountain." Luan Feng Xiao Ao Qin invited the moon, and the flowers and grasses were peacefully painted in the annals. Looking at the true life of King Kong, it looks like the stone ancient and natural. Can be passed on the cause spread throughout, a hundred years old Long Huang Zhu Yan Tian. The second cloud: "Ju Fang Chongyang Evening Festival Fang, Qunying to match the claw eyebrows." Ji Cheng Lingjin learns from others, and there is smallpox scattered incense in the room. Hua Fa still leaves him white, and his childlike face does not change the old time. At that time, I also went through the family to celebrate mr. Shouchang. According to this, although the raft is a person who has been shaved, it does not completely disappear from the empty door, but is circling between the worldly and the Buddhist door.
Bao Raft is also good at painting, especially landscapes. Wang Yi (1632-1717), one of the "Four Kings" of his landscape method, but in several works handed down, the traces of Wang Yi are not obvious, but they are a fusion of the brushwork of various families since the Ming and Qing dynasties, and the ancient rhyme is full of ancient rhyme. Bao Raft's "Han Lin Tu" (Collection of the Hong Kong Museum of Art) written by Po Raft for Pan Guangying (Jue Qing) in the second year of Guangxu (1876) is said to be imitating the brushwork of Yun Zhengshu (Yun Shouping), but in terms of his painting style, there is no lack of self-intention in addition to Yun's brushwork, but the pen strength is slightly inferior to Yun. The author inscribed a poem in the painting: "The cold forest is light and cloudy, and the stone marks are divided into shadows." Someone rolled it under the mountain window, but it was south China autumn water. "His poetry blends with the painting context, highlighting his artistic achievements in poetry and painting." Another "Landscape Album" (guangdong provincial museum collection) written for Huang Jiting in the sixth year of Guangxu (1875) claims to be composed by Tang Liuru (Tang Yin), but in terms of its penmanship, it is similar to the "Hanlin Tu", which is a mixture of the brushwork of the predecessors and their own intentions. Others, such as the "Landscape Fan" composed in the twelfth year of Tongzhi (1873), the "Shulin Pingyuan Tu" (all collected in the Guangzhou Art Museum) in the fourth year of Guangxu (1878), and the "Landscape Map" (collected by the Dongguan Museum of Guangdong) in the sixth year of Guangxu (1880) are also similar to the retro and ancient style of landscape painting in the same period, with more than enough ancient rhyme and insufficient novelty, and its personality is not distinct.
Although the raft was only a small member of the countless painters at that time, in a small range, his poetry and paintings were still sought after by many people. According to legend, when Zhang Zhidong (1837-1909) and Wang Mingjian were inspecting Guangdong, they heard his name, asked for poetry and painting, and wanted to see each other but could not, Bao Raft said: "The princes love monk poetry, but they do not love the monk." And the poet Yang Qiguang (1862-1925) inscribed his poem: "Slightly smell the noise of Brahma, the bell is silent and poetic, the hands are not shallow, and they are willing to go through this." Poetry is like painting, and samadhi creates its extreme. On his paintings: "Borrowing paintings to illustrate the poetic realm, the vitality is full of vitality." "His poetry and paintings are the same, and there are no words of praise. Huang Yingkui (1855-1929) also has "a few people outside the Danqing Fang returned, dot dyeing Yunshan into the chemical industry" to see his suggestion. Looking at several paintings and artistic deeds of Bao Raft, it can be seen that not only can it not rank among the mainstream painting history, even in the history of regional painting, it is difficult to occupy a place, but he is like many lonely and unknown painters of the same era, he is the epitome of the trend of the times. They continued the painting style since the "Four Kings" and made a living among the ancients, which was caused by the development of landscape painting to the late Qing Dynasty, chen Chen Xiangyin, and the conformism of the times, and it was also the prelude to the change of painting style under the influence of European wind and rain in the early twentieth century, which is a typical mark of the times. Therefore, compared with the "Danqing Treasure Raft" that Wang Jian said, "The Vitality is flexible and participates in the creation", it is not the same as the "Danqing Treasure Raft".