Yuan Jiang (袁江), courtesy name Wentao, was a Yangzhou painter during the Kangqian period in the early Qing Dynasty. The year of birth and death is unknown, but Yuan Jiang's existing works are arranged in chronological order according to the inscriptions of the paintings, and his painting career is roughly between the thirty-second year of Kangxi (1693) and the eighth year of Qianlong (1743). The distance is about fifty years, and it is roughly estimated that Yuan Jiang was born around the tenth year of the Kangxi Dynasty and died eleven years after Qianlong. Yongzheng (1723-1735) was enshrined in the Yangxin Hall and summoned to the court as a marquis. Landscape science Song people, pavilion Seiko. Regarding the whereabouts of Yuan Jiang, at present, it can only be found from the paintings. He lived in Yangzhou in his early years, and later went to Jiangning (present-day Nanjing) and Huiji (present-day Shaoxing). According to Yuan Jiang's authentic "Zhan Yuan Tu", Zhan Yuan was the residence of Xu Da, the general of The Ming Dynasty Zhu Yuanzhang, and the Zhan Yuan Tu should be a work of the Nanjing period. According to Yuan Jiang's "Pictures of Flowers and Birds" (the Palace Museum in Tibet), the signature of "Yuan Jiang Painting of the Ancient Rong of February," he may have also been to Fuzhou, because "Rong" is another name for Fuzhou. In the second year of Yongzheng (1724 AD), he went north to Beijing to paint. Guo Weiruo quoted Yuan Jiang's painting as "Make this picture in Yantai" as proof. In his later years, Yuan Jiang returned to Yangzhou, as evidenced by the large number of works of "Yuan Jiang on Hanshang" that he signed with an annual model. In the book "Index of Seal Engravers in Chinese Calligraphy and Paintings in Past Dynasties", co-edited by Shang Chengzuo and Huang Hua, according to Yuan Jiang's later works, there are two seals of "Xiuquan" and "Quan", and it is believed that "Xiuquan" is another name of Yuan Jiang, whether this is the painter's own name or the collection seal of others, which still needs to be carefully considered.
Yuan Jiang's "Hejing Na LiangTu"
The "Yangzhou Painting Record" records that Yuan Jiang "first learned Qiu Shizhou", and at the same time deeply studied and studied the landscape techniques of Li Sixun's father and son in the Tang Dynasty and the Zhao Boju brothers in the Song Dynasty, and in his works, there are many distinctive characteristics of Tang and Song landscapes. His paintings have profound skills, especially inheriting the tradition of green landscapes, and the green landscapes he has made are simple and elegant. In middle age, he "received the paintings of the ancients who were not named, and his skills advanced greatly." He integrates the majestic mountain color with the magnificent pavilions, which are both delicate and magnificent, effectively improving the expression ability of "boundary painting" and being pushed as the first "boundary painting" in the Qing Dynasty.
Yuan Yao's "Map of Penglai Xian Island"
Speaking of Yuan Jiang, it is natural to introduce Yuan Yao. Yuan Yao, zi zhao dao. Regarding the relationship between Yuan Jiang and Yuan Yao, there are three kinds of father-son theory, uncle-nephew saying, and brother-in-law saying, and many scholars agree with the father-son theory, but in fact it remains to be examined. The earliest record of Yuan Yao is found in the Qianlong Shicheng's "Painting People", which is attached to Yuan Jiang's entry: "There are sons named Yao, landscape pavilions, and still abide by the family law." The year of Yuan Yao's birth and death is also not accurately recorded, and can only be inferred based on the work. Yuan Yao's earliest works were painted in the fourth year of Qianlong (1739 AD), and the latest work seen was completed in the forty-third year of Qianlong (1778 AD). Scholars speculate that he was born in the late Kangxi dynasty and died in the forty-third year of Qianlong (1778 AD) or a few years later.
Yuan Yao, "Landscape Courtyard Strip Screen"
Perhaps the fates of the painters are similar, and Yuan Yao's experience is roughly similar to that of Yuan Jiang. In his early years, he painted in Yangzhou and lived a life of selling paintings for a living. In the ninth year of Qianlong (1744 AD), he was invited by the salt merchants of The He clan in Shanxi to attend the he garden gathering and was warmly received. Three years later, he wanted to return to his homeland in Shanxi, and Yuan Yaote wrote "Farewell Map of Guangling" and inscribed a poem. Due to the inconvenience of searching, it is copied here. "Travel all over Jianghuaisheng and drive back to your hometown." The warbler flowers end in March, and the tobacco willows are long. The donkey's back adds a poetry axis, and the sunset falls on the cloud mountain. When the spring night is silent, the moon flies together. "It's heartfelt and very moving. For a long time after that, Yuan Yao was invited by Shanxi merchants to paint at the Wei family in Taiyuan, and some works were handed down. In his later years, he returned to his hometown of Yangzhou, and in the forty-third year of Qianlong (1778 AD), he composed "Yangzhou Scenic Spots Picture Screen", the four screens were respectively inscribed "Chuntai Mingyue", "Wansong Stacked Cui", "Stratosphere Gushing Waterfall", "Pinggang Yanxue", painting the scenery around Shugang - Slender West Lake, leaving valuable information with gong pen.
There is a Qing dynasty pushed as the first "boundary painting" is a subject in traditional painting, with pavilions, palaces, buildings and other buildings as the theme of painting, depiction should use a boundary ruler to draw lines, to ensure that the lines are regular and not deformed. In the Yuan Dynasty, Tao Zongyi divided the types of painting into thirteen disciplines in the "Record of Quitting Cultivation", including the "Boundary Painting Terrace". Regarding the definition of "boundary painting", Mr. Lu Xun said in a letter to Wei Mengke in 1934: "The 'iron line drawing' of the ancients, although the characters did not use instruments, but there were houses and the like, which used instruments. I see that it is a boundary ruler, and a semi-circular wooden pole, which is close to the brush, tightly squeezed and crossed by the boundary ruler, it is neither bent nor thick, this kind of diagram, called 'boundary painting'. The history of "boundary painting" is quite long, and it has been found in Dunhuang murals and Tang Dynasty tomb murals, but after the Song and Yuan dynasties, literati paintings have become increasingly prosperous, and boundary paintings are regarded as a means of craftsmen, less and less valued, and gradually depressed in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties. Tang Li once said in the "Treatise on Painting": "On secular painting, there are thirteen disciplines of painting on the day, the beginning of landscape and water, and the foundation of boundary painting." "The status of boundary paintings at that time is evident.
Yuan Yao's "Jiucheng Palace Map"
The "Yuan School" represented by Yuan Jiang is unique in its green landscape paintings, which are very different from the pen and ink forms of various schools, and revitalize the ancient paintings that have been in decline since the Yuan and Ming dynasties. Yuan Jiang and Yuan Yao's previous pavilion boundary paintings mainly depicted buildings, reflecting the skill of the pen meticulously, meticulously and meticulously, but lacking artistic conception and life interest. Similar to today's design of the renderings, it is not very attractive. As soon as the works of Yuan Jiang and Yuan Yao came out, they brought a fresh wind. On the basis of inheriting the techniques of the pavilions of their predecessors, the yuan father and son integrated the techniques of landscape painting into the boundary paintings, so the works were full of changes and no longer lost in rigidity. Yuan Jiang's green landscape paintings depict history, mythology and other imaginary scenes, such as Afang Palace, Lishan Mountain, Penglai Wonderland, Taohuayuan, etc., each theme has a legendary story left in the world.
Yuan Jiang's "Summer Escape Map of Li Palace"
Yuan Jiang's green landscape paintings have a unique style.
The first manifestation is that he integrates natural features such as landscapes and buildings very well. Whether compared with the boundary paintings in history or the same period, Yuan Jiang's green landscape paintings are extremely well depicted in both architecture and landscapes, each with its own beauty, but it is completely integrated, which is something that the previous generation of painters did not achieve. Some people commented that he "wrote that the temple pavilions in his pen, or relying on solid mountain rocks, or with the vast rivers and lakes as the background, painted mountain stones with axes, ghost faces, and cirrus clouds, to build a real and credible space for the fairy-like pavilions, and the delicate and magnificent buildings also add color and interest to the indifferent mountain stones, thus giving the pavilions a far-reaching artistic conception and grand momentum." For example, "Haiwu Dip Planning" is Yuan Jiang's representative work, the first impression of the work has a strong sense of reality, but this sense of reality is different from photos or architectural renderings, although the performance of real mountains and real water, but it contains the creator's artistic ideas and aesthetic concepts, there is the author's re-creation of the real scene of nature. On the picture, the river rolls up, the waves rise and fall, and a majestic palace stands next to the water, which has a mirage-like fantasy scene. The depiction of the palace is extremely delicate, and the strict structural proportions seem to be a sketch of real scenes. The rubbing dot dyeing of the mountain stone trees in the painting is quite Song People's brushstroke, with fine outline and elegant blending. The shadows of the trees between the mountain peaks in the distance, and the several roofs are hidden in them, which has a great sense of endless rivers and mountains. Another example is his large-scale masterpiece "Lishan Summer Escape", which features Emperor Tang Ming (Xuanzong) in Lishan Summer Recreation as the theme. It depicts the pavilion of the tower, surrounded by ancient trees, scattered between the mountains and rocks, and the lake under the mountain. The whole picture is complex in composition, the scene is grand, the part is exquisite, and the most eye-catching is the palace built deep in the mountains. The color is extremely intense, bright and strange. ”
The large size of the painting is the second characteristic of the formal style of his works. Judging from the green landscape paintings that Yuan Jiang has survived in the world, almost all of them can be called "macro-masterpieces." The richness of architectural styles is also a major feature of Yuan paintings. Looking at the architecture in Yuan Jiang's green landscape paintings, it is easy to find that the components and monomer forms of the same kind of architecture are also changeable in different paintings, and it is by no means a simple appropriation and repetition. Yuan Jiang's works are divided into two ways from the painting style: fine brush and fine brush. Most of them are neat and meticulous, and a small number are rough with pens. In addition to the paintings of gongshan water pavilions, Yuan Jiang also doubled as a flower, and also handed down some works. Yuan Yao's style is basically the same as Yuan Jiang's. If Yuan Jiang is given a fair historical positioning, he should be a generation of masters in the field of "boundary painting landscapes" who inherit the past and open up the future!