Oil painting Art blog by Lucas Art

Zhang Zeduan’s Along the River During the Qingming Festival was painted on silk with light colors. Most of the images were outlined by black strokes, exemplifying the characteristics of painting of the Song Dynasty–neatness and fineness. A vivid reproduction of the prosperous Bianliang (today’s Kaifeng), the 24.8-cm-high and 528-cm-long scroll is an unrivaled work of art of the 12th century. As a court painting, the Qingming scroll is unlike ordinary “folkloric paintings.” Lively, humorous folkloric scenes can easily be found in Itinerant Vendors (Huolang Tu), Children at Play (Xiying Tu) and other paintings by mediocre painters such as Su Hanchen and Li Song. In the Qingming scroll,

Zhang Zeduan gave a panoramic description of the activities of all walks of life on the Qingming Festival in Bianjing (present-day Kaifeng, He’nan province) from a bird’s-eye view as soberly and objectively as possible, making the spectacular scroll a historical epic. The scroll features scholars, farmers, business people, doctors, fortune tellers, Buddhists, Taoists, petty officials, women, boat trackers, cattle, horses, camels, various shops along streets, rivers, ports, lakes, swamps, boats, official compounds, large mansions and thatched houses. Boasting a keen observation of life, an acute mind and an excellent mastery of painting composition, Zhang was well-rounded painter skilled at portraying human figures, mountains and rivers and various forms of architecture, as evidenced by the animated, lifelike facial expressions, deftly painted trees and ripples and the seamless transition from one scene to another in the Qingming scroll. Incorporating all sophisticated painting techniques in the Song Dynasty, the scroll looks complex yet orderly. In particular, the human figures are so skillfully portrayed that each of them can be closely examined. Zhang painted the scroll with a prudent’attitude comparable to that of a historian. Using exaggeration and a comic atmosphere typical of folkloric paintings, he reproduced the social customs and lifestyles at the time, transportation on the crucial traffic rtery Bianhe River and the hard life of the working people, busy scenes that reveal his meditative thoughts.

The Qingming scroll does not carry the painter’s signature. In his postscript to the scroll, Zhang Zhu of the Jin Dynasty ascribed it to Zhang Zeduan, a native of Dongwu (in present-day Shandong province), whose birth and death years were known. He pursued studies in Bianliang, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, and was admitted to the Imperial Painting 4′ as a court painter. According to Zhang Zhu, he was good at “boundary painting,” a type of landscape or figure painting with architecture as background and used to depict cities, streets and boats. Since its completion, the Qingming hidely recognized as a valuable painting. Many reproductions of the scroll were available in the Southern ong Dynasty. They were .’oin per scroll, a fact that testified to the scroll’s special popularity. Different from ordinary folkloric painting, court painting and scholar painting, the Qingming scroll is not only aesthetically impressive but also informative and revealing. It is truly a treasure among the world’s ancient paintings.

In the Tang and Song dynasties, Chinese painters tended to use tranquil colors, and simple and unsophisticated strokes. Following the steps of Gu Kaizhi and Wu ozi, Li Gonglin (1049-1106), a painter in the North Song Dynasty, was famous for outline drawing characterized by “supple brushwork, diluted ink and absence of color and wash.” Outline drawing is a technique originally used to draft a painting, like sketching in Western painting. After Wu Daozi, painting critics came to realize that a combination of painting and calligraphy would make single-colored drawings worthy of appreciation just like calligraphy. Outline drawing can produce a marvelous effect without the use of colors. Taoist Gods Visiting the Primeval Lord of Heaven (Chaoyuan Xianzhang Tu) is the most famous painting of the outline drawing .;style in the Northern Song Dynastyaanks to the efforts of modern Chinese painting master Xu Beihong, it provides a strong testament to the mesmerizing charm of outline drawing. Li Gonglin also went down in the history of Chinese painting as a master of outline drawing with his unique paintings, such as Five Horses (Wuma Tu), Illustrations of Jiuge (Jiuge Tu), Portrait of Vimalakirti (Weimojie Tu) and Imitating Wei Yan’s Herding the Ranch (Lin Weiyan Fangmu Tu), all of which are garded as textbooks of outline drawing. Images depicted by simple brush strokes are not only perfectly vivid but also as rhythmic as calligraphy with distinctive ppeal.

compared with the Tang Dynasty, figure paintings of the Five Dynasties and ,~the Northern and Southern Song dynasties covered more subjects such as religious mythology, historical stories, and scholar life and so on. Most painters laid emphasis on the description of the figures’ facial expressions and inner feelings with an enhanced ability to convey the mental states, painting skills evolved in two directions: Meticulous style featured fine brushwork and rich colors, using more color tones than the Tang Dynasty; and in the ink-and-wash school, there emerged a freehand style with Liang Kai’s works as a representative in addition to Li Gonglin and Zhang Zeduan, who were masters of outline drawing.

Gong Kai (c.a. 1222-1304), a painter of the outline drawing school in the Southern Song Dynasty, also learned from Wu Daozi, but adopted a more wild style. He liked painting ghosts and was particularly famous for his portrayal of Zhong Kui. His Zhong Kui Traveling With His little Sister (Zhongshan Chuyou Tu) depicts an xcursion of Zhong Kui and his sister, who were each on a sedan carried by ghosts. Despite the evident gloominess, the painting was full of artistic glamour. Gong’s paintings were usually rife with punchy satire. Critics in the Yuan Dynasty believed his paintings were not to be appreciated lightheartedly. Liang Kai (birth and death years unknown) in the Southern Song Dynasty, a painter once in the Imperial Painting Academy, was also skilled at painting human figures in the outline drawing style. However, according to historical records, he changed style in his middle age, from outline drawing to ink-and-wash freehand painting–a free, unconstrained style of painting comparable to wild cursive calligraphy and characterized by varying shades of ink. His enduring paintings in latter style include The Six Patriarchs (Liuzu Tu), Immortal in Splashed Ink (Pomo Xianren Tu) and Li Bai Chanting Poems to the Moon (Taibai Xingying Tu).