The status of court painting in the history of Chinese painting has always been in a very special position, in the history of painting with literati painting as the main narrative trunk, it is often not obvious, it seems to confirm the "master is wandering" of this is the golden rule that people talk about, but in fact, in the depth of entry, court painting on the temperament and style of an era seems to be more into the wood than literati painting, its innate political nature makes this painting have an innate representation, The mainstream style and status of court painters reflected the personality of an era.
Jin Tingbiao's "Burden Map"
As far as the Qing Dynasty is concerned, the grandeur of court painting is not less than that of the Song and Ming dynasties. After the Manchu Qing dynasty entered the Central Plains, this trend of cultural integration made the composition of the Court Painters of the Qing Dynasty more open and inclusive, especially in the heyday of Shunzhi, Kangxi, Qianlong, etc., due to the emperor's own personal practice, the court painting at this time reached its peak, a large number of court painters with their crowned painting talent, in accordance with the Holy Intention to paint a large number of court painting works that interpreted the martial arts of Wenzhi, while promoting the vigorous development of court painting. It has also left its own deep or shallow mark on the history of painting.
Qing Dynasty court paintings have special places of activity, but they do not have the strict organizational structure of the Song Dynasty Painting Academy, nor are they purely "outsiders" like the Ming Dynasty court painters, and they are scattered in various halls in the palace under the name of Jinyi Wei. Qing Dynasty court painters from the beginning of the extensive management to the later refined management, Kangxi, Yongzheng Dynasty court painters by the palace internal affairs office management, set up "painting office" and "painting" two institutions, of which the painting members are mainly low status craftsmen, at this time the court painters are generally called "southern craftsmen"; the Qianlong Dynasty set up a Ruyi Hall in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, painting institutes, etc., the painter changed to "painter"; and after the Jiaqing Dynasty, court painting began to decline, and then the painter was renamed "painter".
According to the "Draft History of the Qing Dynasty", the status of court painters in the Qing Dynasty also had a gradual evolutionary process, "the initial class of craftsmen, and then gradually used the stream of scholars, introduced by the minister, or summoned by the dedication of paintings, and the system of offerings to the courtiers was different." The specifics can be roughly divided into three categories:
These can be called Hanlin painters or Shiliu painters, whose main job is not to paint, but sometimes to paint. For example, Wang Yuanqi's official position in the "Four Kings of the Early Qing Dynasty" was "Hanlin Academy Attendant Lecturer Now Transferred to Hanlin Academy Attendant Bachelor"; Dong Bangda was even in the Qianlong Dynasty official to the Libu Shangshu, when editing large-scale court painting ceremonies such as "Shiqu Baodi" and "Secret Temple Zhulin", he was "ordered to enter the inner court xiangshi", and his son Dong Yu was also an official to the university scholar, but he also "served the South Study" because he was good at painting landscapes; in addition, Song Junye, Gao Qipei, Zou Yigui and others were such painters. Such painters are in the top position among the painters of the Qing Palace, both politically and in terms of treatment, because of their status as literati doctors, their works are biased towards the pen and ink interest of literati in the overall style, and these people often play the role of leaders in the creation of certain major painting themes or the compilation of important classics. For example, after the return of Kangxi's second southern tour (1689), two years later, he organized the painting "Southern Tour Map" to achieve its prosperity, which was led by Song Junye, the left deputy capital of the Duchayuan.
Qing Dong Bangda 《解角圖》
"Kangxi Southern Tour Map" (partial)
The second category is professional painters born of painters. This group was relatively dominant among court painters, but their rank was lower than that of the Hanlin painters. Among these large number of court professional painters, even if they also served in the inner court, due to different births and identities, they were selected and divided into first, second, and third grades according to the level of skill, which were collectively called "painting academy offerings" or "painters". These court painters enjoyed different treatment according to different ranks, and according to the standard of the six years of Qianlong, the first class was 11 silver per month, the second class 9 two, the third class 7 two, and the non-equal was below 6 two. For example, Qianlong's six-year internal affairs office's "Each Work Done to Do Work Clearance File" records:
Treasurer Bai Shixiu said that the eunuch Gao Yu passed on the instructions: Jin Kun, Sun Hu, Ding Guanpeng, Zhang Yusen, Yu Sheng, Zhou Kun, and six others were first class, and they were given food money, grain, silver, and three two public expenses; Wu Gui, Yu Xiao, Cheng Zhidao, Zhang Weibang, and four others were given food money, grain, silver, and three public expenses and three silver every month; Dai Hong, Lu Zhan, Wu Tang, Dai Zheng, Xu Tao, and other five people were given four times a month, four grains, silver, and three public funds. Thanks.
However, these grades are not fixed, according to the performance appraisal and the emperor's aesthetic hobbies, they can go up and down, such as the above-mentioned second-class painter Cheng Zhidao, who ranked first-class painter in the Yongzheng period. In addition to these painters within these ranks, painters who have just entered the palace in the examination period generally only pay rice silver and no public fee silver, that is, they manage the meal money regardless of the wages, such as Wu Gui and Wu Tang, who "temporarily gave meals three or two silver every month" when they entered the palace in the fourth year of Yongzheng. In addition to normal promotions, the emperor also had additional rewards for his favorite court painters, generally with money, goods and holidays, such as the court painter Leng Ming, who received a one-time reward of 50 taels of silver in the seventh year of Qianlong. What's more, it is possible to break the convention and obtain honorary titles such as official rank, such as the Qianlong Emperor once gave a certain official rank to his favorite court painter.
Ding Guanpeng's "Tai Clan Origin and Diagram"
Yu Province", "Flower and Bird Map"
The third category of court painters is the foreign painters who are now widely known, and these missionary painters from Western Europe are a special group in the qing court painting academies. During the heyday of the Qing Dynasty such as Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong, many missionaries successively entered the court, serving as translators, making clocks and firearms, drawing maps, engaging in astronomical calendars and paintings, which played an indispensable and important role in the exchange of Chinese and Western civilizations at that time. In addition to painting portrait oil paintings, foreign painters in the court also drew on the characteristics of traditional Chinese painting and created a series of propositional paintings with the characteristics of both Chinese and Western paintings, which included birds and beasts, landscape works, and paintings on political themes such as documentary battle feats, which constituted an important part of qing dynasty court painting. According to incomplete statistics, about a dozen such painters have entered the court painting academy, and the more famous ones are italians Lang Shining, Andeyi, Pan Tingzhang, bohemian Ai Qimeng, Frenchman Wang Zhicheng and so on. These Western painters used the techniques of Western painting on perspective and dark contrast in their creations, so that the picture showed different characteristics from traditional Chinese painting, and also influenced the creative style of some court painters at that time. But in general, this kind of painting was not high in the eyes of the orthodox painters at that time, as the famous court painter Zou Yigui mentioned at that time:
Westerners are good at Pythagorean methods, so their paintings are far and near in the yin and yang, not bad, and the characters and house trees they paint have sun shadows. The color and pen used are very different from those in China. The cloth shadow is wide and narrow, measured by triangles. The painting room is on the wall, which makes people almost want to enter. Scholars can participate in one or two, but also the body method. However, there is no brushwork at all, although the work is also a craftsman, so it is not included in the painting.
However, their influence on Qing Dynasty court painting is still obvious, such as the works of court painters Jiao Bingzhen, Leng Ming, Chen Mei and even Zou Yigui himself, almost all of which absorb the techniques of Western painting to a greater or lesser extent, such as the paintings of Jiao Bingzhen and others pay more attention to the focus in perspective, while Zou Yigui's flower works such as pins and vegetables also borrow the expression techniques of Western paintings in chiaroscuro.
Lang Shining《 "Hundred JunTu Scrolls"
Jiao Bingzhen 《Hundred Sons Reunion Album》 (partial)
Looking at the entire history of painting, the Qing Dynasty court painters this group, their court painting creation left many works, these works, in addition to the first type of so-called Hanlin painters, Shiliu painters because they have a deep traditional cultural roots, so some of their painting works are more in line with the aesthetic values of traditional Chinese painting, the latter two types of painters in the history of painting generally belong to the list of painters, their proposition composition of the nature of the painting works of the political nature is far greater than the artistry, and lack of personalized aesthetic characteristics, It is almost negligible in promoting the development of traditional painting, so it is not valued by the history of orthodox painting. However, on the whole, due to the emperor's preference for painting subjects, the political and documentary monumental production was better than that of previous dynasties, and the Qing Dynasty court painters painted a dynasty's paper style with their collective co-creation, which is also another unique cultural value with great historical information.
Chatting about the Court Painters of the Ming Dynasty: a group of Jinyi guards without the power of a chicken, leaving another kind of lonely figure