In the Qing Dynasty, there were many painters who were good at painting flowers and birds, among which the more famous ones were Yun Shouping and Zou Yigui.
Yun Shouping was an important painter in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, the founder of the Changzhou School of Painting, and one of the Six Schools of the Qing Dynasty. His achievements in flower and bird painting are very remarkable, creating a unique painting style of boneless flower painting, pushing boneless flower and bird painting to an unprecedented peak, and having a great influence on the creation of flower and bird painting in later generations.
Yun Shouping's boneless flowers and birds are beautiful and elegant, elegant and elegant, and although he has made some innovations, he has not abandoned tradition, on the contrary, he is very respectful of the ancients, believing that only in the laws of the ancients can he find a way to break through and thus innovate.
Yun Shouping's boneless flower and bird paintings inherit the tradition of attaching importance to sketching in the Northern Song Dynasty's gongbi flower and bird paintings, realize the essence of the painting methods of predecessors, and finally integrate into the contemporary freehand tendencies, thus completing the innovation.
Look at Yun Shouping's flower and bird paintings, the brushwork is delicate and neat, the color is elegant, the picture details are vivid, and the natural colors of flowers and birds are the mainstay, which is full of life interest. It is precisely because of this that his flower and bird paintings will leap to the authentic and new tradition of boneless flower and bird painting in the early Qing Dynasty.
Yun Shouping's painting techniques had an important impact on the entire art world at that time and after that, especially on flower and bird painting, and his descendant Zou Yigui was also deeply influenced by him in flower painting.
Zou Yigui went through the three dynasties of Kang Yongqian, and the official did a great job, achieving the rank of cabinet bachelor, which is rare among painters.
Regarding the relationship between Zou Yigui and Yun Shouping, in addition to Zou Yigui learning Yun Shouping on flowers, there is also a widely circulated saying that Zou Yigui is Yun Shouping's son-in-law.
Yun Shouping had a son and two daughters, the son was called Nianzu, the two daughters did not leave names, but it can be found that one is married to Yang Shumei, one is married to Mu Xue, and there is no Zou Yigui thing here.
Zou Yigui's wife is indeed surnamed Yun, named Yun Lanxi, and is a female painter. Some people probably misunderstood this, thinking that Zou Yigui was married to Yun Shouping's daughter, but in fact, they were not Weng son-in-law at all.
However, this surname is really uncommon, and there must be a connection here. Then go to find the information of Yun Lanxi, and find that she is the sister of Yun Yuanjun, and Yun Yuanjun is the ethnic group of Yun Shouping.
Well, this is clear, the only contact between Zou Yigui and Yun Shouping is Yun Lanxi, a junior of the same clan, who is not as close as Weng's son-in-law.
It is also said that Zou Yigui and Yun Shouping are teacher-student relations, Zou Yigui was born in 1686, Yun Shouping died in 1690, at this time Zou Yigui was only 4 years old, and the teacher-student relationship could not be established.
Originally, the younger generation of painters learned from the predecessors, and did not have to go through the real professor, learning the works left by the other party is also learning, so this pass, that is, the two people's life era overlaps, and the painting style is close, so that these xu statements appear.
Zou Yigui's mastery of flowers, absorbing Yun Shouping's boneless flower method, coupled with the influence of Xu Xi and Huang Xiao's style, formed his own unique style, reaching the realm of "branching and leaves, free and free, setting clear colors, and qinggu ye yan".
Zou Yigui's more famous flower creation is his "Hundred Flowers Scroll", which painted hundreds of flowers, each of which was inscribed with a poem, and later dedicated to the Qianlong Emperor, Qianlong looked at it and liked it, and also inscribed a hundred sentences on it.
This is Zou Yigui's "Painting the Pear Blossom Night Moon", painting a large branch of pear blossoms, branches and leaves of flowers, proper layout, vivid shape, behind the flowers, there is a round of bright moon, which sets off the clear posture of pear blossoms.
The painting method of this painting is learned from Yun Shouping's boneless method, the petals are directly dyed with color dots, and the veins and tendons of the leaves are slightly painted with lines, and the color is beautiful and elegant.
Zou Yigui's flowers and birds have great achievements, and he also summarized his own experience and wrote a "Small Mountain Painting Notation", which explained in detail the painting methods of various flowers.
For example, he talked about his own painting sketching concept, originally put forward the "four knowledges" of knowing the sky, knowing the earth, knowing people, and knowing things, knowing the sky is to understand the influence of the four seasons on the plant; knowing the land is to have different regional conditions, plant growth is also different; knowing people refers to the influence of artificial cultivation; knowing things is to understand the state and differences of the plant itself, the so-called "one tree and one flower, a thousand flowers, a flower petal, different petals."
Observe and taste the aura of heaven and earth in the "Four Knowledges", and understand the nature of flowers, so that you can draw lifelike flowers. The knowledge here, Zou Yigui has been clearly covered, it can be seen that his kung fu is also extremely deep.
Whether it is Yun Shouping or Zou Yigui, the achievements of the two people in flower and bird painting are extremely prominent, Yun Shouping's flowers and birds have basically become a model for future generations to learn, and Zou Yigui also has his own new realm, and his cultivation is very deep. Looking at the flower and bird paintings of these masters is really an experience and enjoyment of beauty again and again, and looking at it every day, I feel that my mood can change a little better.
Reference: Wang Lin's "Yun Nantian Annals"