Feng Defu
Calligraphy and painting appraisal is a complex system engineering, which requires many disciplines and knowledge, especially to be familiar with and master the author's creative style, life habits, moods and sorrows, hobbies and taboos in different creative periods.
Take Qi Baishi, a giant of modern Chinese calligraphy and painting, as an example.
To identify his calligraphy and painting works, we must fully grasp his life trajectory and life details, otherwise we will be led by a large number of fakes and cannot extricate ourselves! It's like drinking fake Maotai and suddenly one day drinking real Maotai will definitely say that the real Moutai is not right! Just like porcelain identification, the story of the Ming Water Margin is based on the Northern Song Dynasty and prevails with the Yuan qu of the Yuan Dynasty. Shi Nai'an (1296-1370, who lived in the Yuan Dynasty for 72 years and died after only two years in the Hongwu year of the Ming Dynasty, compiled it into a novel, which was officially published and distributed by his descendants in the Ming Dynasty. On the Yuanqinghua porcelain, the appearance of Water Margin characters and stories is perfectly normal! And there are so-called Taidou-level experts, who will always jump out and make a fuss: "Water Margin was written in the Ming Dynasty, how could it appear on the porcelain of the Yuan Dynasty?" ”
These so-called experts often have the right to speak, and thus sentence life and death, will there not be unjust, false and wrongly decided cases? Let national and private collectors lose their national treasures!
I have a friend who is the chairman of an auction company and is very strict about the authenticity of the lot! A few days ago, he had a hard time collecting several authentic goshawk drawings from different periods of Qi Baishi, and he sent them to 3 calligraphy and painting appraisers in a row. One of the appraisers was very responsible and quickly sent this comment: "Qi Baishi lived 93 years and 94 years old. Born January 1, 1864, died September 16, 1957. One of the eagles is inscribed with the title of Tatsunian, that is, 92 years old in 1952, and the painter will not make such a big mistake in his age! If the painting is not signed 92 years old, it will still be confused in the past, and the person who imitated this painting is not bad, but it is a pity that the resume of Bai Shi himself is not enough to grasp, and make a joke! ”
The appraiser admitted that the painting was of a good level, and if it did not "make jokes", it would be confused.
In fact, this appraiser will know that it is the "joke" on the painting that the age of self-signature is 4 years older than the actual age of the painter, which is the secret of the painter to hide the sky and the sea, and it is also the trick to identify the authenticity of Qi Baishi's works after the age of 75!
If you see Qi Baishi's works after the age of 75, the style, seal, paper, black marks, and mounting are no problem, that is, the age is not right (70 to 75 years old two years old, 77 to 93 years old 4 years old), then you have to congratulate you, if it is not printed, including woodcut watermarks, this is definitely the real qi Baishi!
Qi Baishi died of illness at the age of 93, why is the painting 97 years old? For the mystery of Qi Baishi's age, Hu Shi found out the truth when writing Qi Baishi's biography, but qi Baishi was not happy! Please also ask Ai Qing to rewrite the biography!
According to the book "The Self-Description of the Old Man of Shiraishi", he once met a fortune teller who said that he had an ominous disaster on March 12 of the lunar calendar in 1937 and gave a way to crack it! After Qi Baishi complied, on the cover of the "Book of Destiny" approved by the fortune teller," he inscribed "Twelve Days of Fortune and Fortune", and then wrote in the "Book of Destiny": "It is advisable to cross the sea with concealment of the sky, seventy-five this year, can be called seventy-seven, as a way to escape the seventy-five-one pass."
Add two years to yourself and skip the unknown year, which is called "hiding the sky and crossing the sea". Qi Baishi believed it, and since then he has added two years to his calligraphy and painting works.
Although he added two years, the age difference between the age of his work and the actual age is 4 years old, and what is the other two years old?
That's the second reason.
According to chinese folklore, the age-counting method of starting from one year old, which is the so-called "imaginary age", is considered 1 year old as soon as a person is born. That's 1 year more. In addition, Qi Baishi was born on January 1, 1864, which was November 22, 1863 in the lunar calendar, so Qi Baishi calculated his birth date according to 1863 years, so that he had an extra year.
Because of these two reasons, Qi Baishi's age is 4 years more than his actual age.
The reason why Qi Baishi did not want Hu Shi to write out his actual age was that he had the psychology of avoiding his real age, and second, he hoped that the age he identified could also be recognized by society.
So, usually we look at Baishi's paintings, how to cut off the paintings according to Qi Baishi's self-signed age? How to convert Qi Baishi's self-signed age to his real age?
In fact, the conversion is very simple, the painting fell before 1937, or self-signed works less than 75 years old minus 2, after 1937, or self-signed works over 77 years old minus 4, is Qi Baishi's real age, that is, the age of one year. The age of one year plus 1864 is the age when Qi Baishi actually created.
Qi Baishi's life is full of legends, and there are many legendary anecdotes. To identify Qi Baishi's works, according to his different creative ages, specific problems, specific treatment, specific analysis, we must not take Qi Baishi's pure writing in his later years, to compare and analogously his early works!
As we all know, Qi Baishi was born as a carpenter, and between the ages of 27 and 50, he turned from a carpenter to a painter, during which he studied poetry, calligraphy, painting and printing one by one, but unfortunately he was not recognized by the painting world at that time. After settling in Beijing at the age of 55, under the suggestion of Chen Shizeng, the "decay and change method" changed greatly, and his painting style changed greatly, and he eventually became a generation of masters.
Qi Baishi really met his teacher learning to draw in 1888, at the age of 24. He paid homage to the folk artist Xiao Qianqian to paint portraits of his teachers. Next, in 1889, when Qi Baishi was 25 years old, he was heavily valued by Hu Qinyuan, a famous squire in Hunan at that time, taught him poetry, and from then on, he broke away from carpentry and made a living by painting portraits.
A few years ago, I saw a huge Buddha statue "Iron Abduction Li" painted by Qi Baishi in 1897 at the Su's Collection in The South Zheng District of Hanzhong Province, and when Qi Baishi created this work, he was 33 years old at the time and was already famous in the local area.
The painting hung on the wall of the antique shop corridor for several years, and no one recognized it as the work of a famous artist.
The material of this painting is coarse cloth, and the inscription: Qi Huang was made in the garden, in September of the year of Ding You. Qi Baishi changed his name to Qi Huang when he was 27 years old, and the garden was Qi Baishi's residence in his early years, and he once wrote a "Diary of Sending a Garden". Ding Younian, that is, 1897. Ink: White Rock Mountain People. One of the huge collection chapters is: Ren and Shen's Old Collection. Judging from the collection chapter, this work was once collected by Xia Yan. Elder Xia changed the phrase "treasured" to "once hidden" by ordinary people, which meant that although these calligraphy and paintings were once hidden by me, they were not always in my collection, and they must eventually be returned to the state. The text of this seal was carefully decided by Mr. Xia Yan and engraved by his friend Mr. Qi Yanming, a seal engraver.
Xia Yan and Qi Baishi have been friends for many years, Mr. Xia Yan went to Mr. Qi Baishi's residence to order his calligraphy and paintings, and Qi Baishi told him to take "new money" when he came to pick up the works. Xia Yan has donated 25 Qi Baishi works to the Zhejiang Provincial Museum.
The reappearance of this huge work of Qi Baishi in the early years of The Collection by Mr. Xia Yan and exiled to the people caused a great sensation in the collection circle of Hanzhong in that year!
Unique insight, fully grasp the creative process of Qi Baishi in different periods, and deeply understand the "art of concealing the sky and crossing the sea" of Qi Baishi's age, which is it
The trick to identifying Qi Baishi's calligraphy and painting works!