with the material reality, the effect is not a jarring assertion of the artist's ego, but a
complete harmony with nature. How was this achieved, and how did this peculiat
tradition grow up?
This artistic tradition did not come by chance or by an accidental discovery. Its
characteristics may be most conveniently summed up, I think, in the word lyricism,
and this lyricism came from a certain type of human spirit and culture. For we must
remember that Chinese painting is closely related, in spirit and technique, to Chinese
calligraphy and Chinese poetry. Calligraphy gave it its technique, the initial twist
which determined its future development, and Chinese poetry lent it its spirit* For
poetry, painting and calligraphy are closely related arts in China. The best way of
understanding Chinese painting is to study these influences which went into the
building of that peculiar tradition.
Briefly stated, this peculiar tradition, which we have called its lyricism, is the result of
two revolts which modern Western painting is going through, but which came to the
history of Chinese painting in the eighth century. They are the revolt against the
subjection of the artist's lines to the painted objects, and the revolt against a
photographic reproduction of the material reality. Chinese calligraphy helped it to
solve the first problem, and Chinese poetry helped it over the second. A study of these
revolts and of the genesis of this artistic tradition will enable us to see why Chinese
painting came to have its present character.
The first problem of Chinese painting, and of all painting, is; What shall be done with
the lines or strokes as paint is put cm the canvas or ink on the silk? It is a purely
technical problem, the problem of "touch." But no artist can escape it, and the touch
used will determine the whole style of his work. If the line is mechanically used to
trace the lines of the painted objects, it can have no freedom of its own. Sooner or
later, we shall get tired of it.
It is the same rebellion which we see in modern art, a rebellion which came up in
China with Wu Taotzu (c. 700-760),
"A HORSE," HY Pl'.ON JU, A CONTEMPORARY CHINESE
PAINTKR, HHOWINir HOW THK KHYFIIMIC STROKES AND
MASTEKY OF
THE WKUSII AUK DKVKLOI'KD FROM THK
rULTlVATlON OF f'AI MciUAl'HY AND STILL REMAIN
AKIN TO IT IN TECHNIQUE.
and Wu Taotzfi solved it by his mastery of the brush, dis- tinguished by its boldness and freedom. Instead of concealing
the line, the artist glorified it. (We shall see the same principle
in Chinese architecture.) Thus in place of the dead and servile
lines of Ku K'aichih (346-407) which were more or less even
as if drav/n by a steel pen, Wu started the so-called "orchid-
petal line/' curling and constantly changing in width, due to
the natural rhythm of a stroke laid with the sensitive brush.
In fact, it was from Wu Taotzu's strokes that his pupil Chang
Hsu created the extremely swift style of entwining ropes in
calligraphy. Wang Wei (Mochieh, 699-759) further developed
and modified the stroke in painting, sometimes abolishing the
traditional method of "tracing outlines," and consequently is
generally credited with having founded the "southern school."
Its far-reaching consequences we shall soon see.
The second problem is: How shall the artist's personality be projected into the work
and make it worthy of the name of an art, transcending mere efforts at verisimilitude,
yet without sacrificing truth, harmony or reality? This revolt against mere physical
accuracy is also back of all the new tendencies in modern art, which may be described
as searching for an escape from the material reality and for methods of indicating the
artist's own ego in the work. The same revolt came in the history of Chinese art in the
eighth century with the new school. People felt tired or dissatisfied with photographic
reproductions of the material reality.
Here was the same old problem: How could the artist invest the objects with his own
emotions or reactions without producing a grotesque caricature? The problem had
already been solved in Chinese poetry. The revolt was a revolt against mere accuracy
and minute craftsmanship. The contrast between the new and the old school is
interestingly shown in the story of two paintings of Szechuen landscapes on palace
walls, done by Li Ssfihsiin (651-716) and Wu Taotzu during the reign of T'ang
Minghuang. It is said that Li, the master of the "northern school," did his landscape in
about a month, with all its tracery work and golden colours, while Wu did his grand
landscape of the entire Chingling river in a day's time in splashes of ink, and the
Emperor said, "Li Ssuhstin did it in a month, and Wu Taotzii did it in a day, and each
is perfect in its own way."
When this revolt against minute artistry came, there was Wang Wei, a first-class
landscape painter himself, and he introduced into it the spirit and technique of
Chinese poetry, with its impressionism, its lyricism, its emphasis on atmosphere and
its pantheism. Thus the "father of the southern school," which makes Chinese painting
deservedly famous, was a man nurtured in the Chinese poetic spirit.
Chronologically, the development was as follows: It seem that the Chinese artistic genius first became conscious of itse] in the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries. It was in
this perio< that art criticism and literary criticism were developed. An< it was Wang
Hsichih (321-379), belonging to one of the mos artistocratic families of this time, who
became known as "thprince of calligraphists." During the following centuries th<
influence of Buddhism was at work, giving us the famou sculptures of Tat'ung and
Lungmen. The style of writin] which developed in Northern Wei, now preserved in
the so called CfWei rubbings" from inscriptions of this period, set thi high watermark
for Chinese calligraphy, in my opinion stil the best in its whole history. The Wei style
was the great style it was not merely beautiful but had beauty and power an< finesse
combined. Hsieh Ho in this period first enunciated th< principle of "rhythmic vitality"
which became the centra principle of all Chinese painting in the last fourteen hundrec
years.
Then came the great eighth century, which, for some reasoi or other which I cannot
quite explain, became the mos creative period of Chinese history, in painting, poetry
anc prose. The cause was at least partially to be found in th< infusion of new blood
which took place during the chao; of the preceding centuries. Li Po and Wang Wei
were botl bora in the north-west, where race mixture was most active but we lack
more adequate genealogical data. Anyway, th< human spirit became free and creative.
This century gav< us Li Po and Tu Fu and a good number of other first-claa poets: Li
Ssuhsdn, Wang Wei and Wu Taotzii in painting Chang Hsti m the "ninnmg style'* and
Yen Chench' ing in th< formal style of calligraphy, and Han Yti in prose* Wang Wei
was born in 699, Wu Taotzu about 700, Li Po in 701, Yen Chench' ing in 708, Tu Fu in
712, Han Yii in 768, Po Chuyi in 772, and Liu Chungyiian in 773 梐 ll first-class
names in Chinese history. And in this century, too, a beauty of beauties, Yang
Kweifeij was born to keep the Emperor company and grace the court with the poet Li
Po. Xor was this period distinguished by peace, either.
However that may be, the "southern school" came into being, and it is the southern
school that we are primarily interested in, as being most peculiarly Chinese. This type
of painting became known as the "scholars' painting, " and later on in the eleventh
century, under the influence of Sung scholars like Su Tungp'o (1035-1101), Mi Fei
(1050-1107) and his son Mi Yiijen (1086-1165), it reached still greater simplicity and
subjectivity. It was also known as "literary men's paint ing." Su Tungp'o even painted a
bamboo tree without its joints, and when someone protested, he replied by asking,
"Did the bamboo grow by adding one joint to another?" Su, who \vas a great writer
and poet, specialized in painting bamboos, and he was so fond of them that he once
said, "I would rather go without meat in my meals than go without bamboos in my
house." His bamboo was, like his "drunken style" of "running script," a splash of ink
without colours; and his manner of painting was to get drunk and, a fter dinner, under
the stimulation of alcohol when his spirit was heightened, dip his brush in the ink and
write characters, or bamboos, or poetry as the inspiration came 梚 t did not matter
which. Once, in such a state, he scribbled a poem on his host's wall, which is hardly
translatable: "Sprouts come from my dry intestines, moistened by wine, and from my lungs and liver grow bamboos and rocks. So full of life they grow that they cannot be
restrained, and so I am writing them on your snowwhite wall." For now painting was
no longer "painted," but "written" like characters. Wu Taotzu, too, often did his
paintings under the inspiration of wine or of his friend's sworddance, whose rhythm
he incorporated into his work. It is evident that work done under such momentary
stimulation could have been accomplished only in a few strokes or a few minutes,
after which the alcoholic effect would have already vanished.
Back of all this drunkenness, however, there was a very fine philosophy of painting.
The Chinese painter-scholars, who left behind a tremendous amount of very profound
art criticism, distinguished between ksing, or the objects9 physical forms, K9 or the
inner law or spirit, and jz, or the artist's own conception. The "scholars' painting" was
a protest against slavish verisimilitude, of which it would be easy to give quotations,
from the earliest to modern times. The Sung scholars emphasized especially li 梩 he
inner spirit of things. Mere accuracy of detail was the work of commercial artists,
whereas painting worthy of the name of an art should aim at catching the spirit* It
was not just mere drunkenness.
But the fact that such painting was the work, not of professional artists but of scholars
at play, was of profound significance. It was their spirit of amateurism which enabled
them to deal with painting in a light and pleasant spirit. For during the eleventh
century, when there was a brief outburst of the spirit of "scholars' painting," such
painting was referred to as mohsi) or "play with ink." It was a pastime of the scholars
when they were in the playing mood, like calligraphy and like poetry. There was no
heaviness of spirit. It seemed as if the scholar, after having obtained mastery of the
brush in calligraphy, had an exuberance of energy which he applied to art as a
pleasant and interesting change. The material equipment was the same: the same
scrolls, the same brushes and the same ink and water, and they were all there before
his desk. For no palette was necessary. Mi Fei, one of the greatest of scholarpainters,
sometimes used even a roll of paper for his brush, or the pulp of sugar-cane, or the
stalk of a lotus flower. When the inspiration came and there was magic in the scholar's
"wrist," there was nothing which seemed impossible to these artists. For thty had
mastered the art of conveying fundamental rhythms, and everything else was
secondary. There are to-day painters who make sketches with their bare fingers, and
one even with his mobile tongue, dipped in ink and licking the paper as he dra \vs
along, Painting was, and still is, the scholar's recreation.
This playing mood accounts for a certain quality of Chinese painting, called yi. The
nearest word for this in translation is "fugitiveness," if this word may be used to
denote at the same time "romanticism" and "the spirit of the recluse." It is this quality
of light-hearted and carefree romanticism which distinguishes Li Po's poetry. This yi
or "fugitive59 or "recluse" quality is prized as the highest quality of the scholar's
paintings, and it comes from the playing spirit. Like Taoism, it is the effort of the
human spirit to get away from the workaday humdrum world, and achieve a light-hearted freedom.
This desire is understandable when we realize how much the scholar's spirit was
restrained in the moral and political spheres, and in painting at least, it did its best to
recover that freedom. Ni Yiinlin (1301-1374), a great Yuan painter most distinguished
for this quality, said: "My bamboo paintings are not intended merely to paint the
fugitive spirit in my breast. What do I care whether they are exact or not, whether the
leaves are thick or thin, or whether the branches are straight or crooked?" Again, he
said: "What I call painting is only a few swiftly-made strokes of the romantic brush,
not intended to copy reality, but merely to please myself"
One should recognize, therefore, in Chinese ink-drawings of human figures and
