The Artistic Ideology of the Chinese Traditional Painting By Li xiaoheng

During the ancient times before the Han Dynasty, artists in China were thought of as laborers. At that time, artists were identical to carpenters or simple craftsmen. However, beginning with the Han Dynasty, which was from 206 B.C to 220A.D. paintings, poetry, and music became the noble occupations of the court officials and the scholars. Who were also the Confucians, thought that the highest destiny of life was to foster a good relationship among people. This ideology contained justice, honesty, wisdom, and other morals. At that time, the ruling class and the noble class were replenished through a national examination. In that examination, painting and the other kinds of arts occupied an important position. Many Chinese administrators could paint,

do calligraphy, and write poetry.

Most of the famous artists of that time were also officials in the government. As a matter of fact, a lot of them were already well known calligraphers before becoming famous

painters. In order to master the education stipulated by the Tao of painting, a painter had to go through rigorous intellectual development and the knowledge training. The essence

of Chinese ideology and the wide knowledge a painter gained informed the ideas and concepts of his/her painting. In other words, the ancient wisdom modeled a painter’s

character and nourished his /her soul.

Regarding to the Chinese ancient philosopher, Confucius, the painting activities cold help to

make an artist tally with the universal principles. Art is the intellectual training of temperament.

The expression of moral character and exploration of nature. Actually, to art, this view is

considered against the natural doctrine of the subject matter. Chinese painters are neither

concerned about the imitation of the appearance of a matter nor express their desire of matter

ideally. The things in which Chinese painters are concerned is inner emotional strength. They use the medium such as the scenery of mountains and waters; flowers and birds; or the figures to

fully express their wealthy inner emotional world. Hence, they emphasize the progress of painting instead of the result. Chinese painters think that the great significance and the value of aesthetics are in the progress They think that the progress is the purpose of the whole art activity. During this progress, their pain, happiness, and the

pursuit can be released; their spirit can gain the true freedom. Their feeling is gushing, as the

gate of sentiment is unlocked. This is just like a pianist who is thoroughly immersed in his own composition. The speed and weight painters apply in setting the paint brush to the paper completely express their infinitely abundant

emotions and the rhythm of their temperament.

In the traditional Chinese painting, the model is not an important factor. On the other hand, western artists would firstly focus on the structure of the matter, followed by the model itself. How ever, Chinese artists would firstly concentrate on the progress of setting the paint brush under the emotional control.

I saw a painting of an orchid painted by a famous contemporary artist, Shi Lu, in his old age, in that painting, he seemed to hardly move the brush, even half an inch. That produced the pile and dry ink marks, which are related to his suffering and depressions 。 there, we can see that the main part of the feeling was far beyond the subject matter; the expression of the model’s significance is directly exposed through the progress of manipulating the paint brush. In painting, because of the special functions created by tools and materials, each single tip, every single layer of the painting, the feelings of the painter, can be felt by the viewer. Take for example, you can see the bold religious factor in the painting of Liang- Kai from Song Dynasty, but you will see the antisocial feeling in the painting of Ba-Da and Xu-Wei from the Ming Dynasty. They used painting as their tools to express their soul. They expressed their true desire through painting. Hence, so many different personal styled emerged that objectively helped to propel the improvement of painting. The most valuable essence that was left for the disciples was spiritual. A disciple cannot raise the standard achieved by his teacher because the disciple only learns the teacher’s technique. The teacher’s philosophical thinking and emotion cannot be gained through the disciple imitating the teacher .there’s a proverb in Chinese that goes” true success can only come late or towards the end.” This means that it takes many years, perhaps a lifetime, before greatness in one’s art is manifested. I agree with that because we need to have a certain level of the maturity of mind and technique and especially an understanding of nature. Or else, we won’t be able to become a good artist.

Chinese traditional painting is a part of the traditional

philosophy. I cannot imagine how a person without any knowledge about Chinese

philosophy would understand the palace of

Chinese traditional art. The special philosophy thinking

and the consummate technique both make up the

foundation of Chinese traditional painting.

I would like to emphasize one point from the technique perspective, that is: other than the calligraphy, the fundamentals of manipulating the paint brush became an important factor in the painting appreciation. In ancient China, a Chinese traditional art-theory specialist, Xie He did emphasize this point in his second article out of the philosophy collection” Liu-Fa.” In the Han Dynasty, the characters used were presented as a beauty of art. Then, in Tang Dynasty, there were so many styles emerged in calligraphy. This kind of delicate appreciation of beauty quality of calligraphy occurred not only prior to the painting but also established a standard for painting. Chinese specialists in art have special sensitivity to the inner quality and technique of the beautiful quality in calligraphy. They do so because they went through a long time of practice and self-training, in order to reach the perfect level. It is very complicated; there are many different kinds; and it is very tedious and hard for a non-artist to understand its delicacy, which i

s as special as the using of colors in canvas.

In fact, there is no fundamental difference between Chinese art and western art. A Chinese poet from Song Dynasty said before,” I thinks in the universe originated from the same theory.” After all, on matter Eastern or Western, we all are in the same Earth. Sometimes we can appreciate each other’s outst

anding art. This tells us that there is something common in our art after all.