Fan Meijun|How to split ink in half?

I majored in Chinese painting as an undergraduate, and the first words among my classmates were about flowers and birds, landscapes, and figures. Even when I said "ink", it only meant Chinese paintings without coloring. No, ink painting has become popular as a hot word in recent years and its popularity continues unabated. Theoretical research, academic exhibitions, ink painting criticism and art auctions have all taken shape accordingly. In my mind, important exhibitions include the 2013 Metropolitan Ink Exhibition in the United States, the 2015 Hong Kong Ink Art Expo, and the Shenzhen International Ink Biennale, which has been held for eight consecutive years. Critics such as Liu Xiaochun, Pi Daojian, and Lu Hong , almost becoming an expert in ink criticism. The China Artists Association has a Chinese Painting Art Committee. Will there be a dedicated ink art committee in the future? In any case, the prominent ink painting has left the industry somewhat at a loss.

I published "The name of "ink" in the 10th issue of "China Collection" in 2015: Necessity or expediency? "The first sentence of the article is: "A ghost, a ghost of ink, wanders on the land of art..." I sorted out the generation of ink and compared it with many forms of contemporary art and Chinese painting. I believe that ink is important to both the medium and the spirit. Traditional Chinese painting is also inseparable from the contemporary art forms that are unscrupulous and innovative, but the media has similarities and differences. In other words, it has been squeezed out by mature art forms and is left with only the meaning of the medium. It is not yet an independent art from material to core, but is just an expedient term that favors the medium.

Ink painting in today's context is obviously different from the concepts, content, techniques and patterns of traditional Chinese painting. Chinese painting cannot be separated from water and ink, but it is by no means only water and ink. There is no ink and wash in the thirteen subjects of Chinese painting. Wang Wei said that "among the masters of painting, ink and wash are the best", which means that it is better not to use color. Nowadays, the names of ink and wash are not fixed, and there are also titles such as experimental ink and wash, modern ink and wash, contemporary ink and wash, and new ink and wash. According to the content, it is divided into urban ink painting, cartoon images, text composition, abstract composition, etc.; according to the style, it is divided into modern ink painting, new literati painting, new meticulous painting, etc.; according to the form of existence, it is divided into painting, installation, video, comprehensive materials and other forms.

Figure 1: 2007 Chengdu Biennale scene by Fan Meijun/photo

What do you think of this new art? You might as well be a little more violent here and split the ink into two halves so that you can get a deeper look inside.

How to split it? In terms of concepts, on the one hand, it abandons the inherent logic and concepts of traditional Chinese painting and new Chinese painting, and on the other hand, it picks up its brush and ink materials to paint pictures that are more contemporary art aesthetics. It seems that this is better than some contemporary oil paintings that use oil painting materials to paint Chinese paintings. More authentic;In terms of aesthetics,on the one hand, it breaks away from the traditional aesthetics. It seems that the uglier the painting, the more ink-wash, the darker, rougher and more avant-garde the painting. On the other hand, the relatively beautiful paintings such as Du Dakai and Tian Liming Ink painting;In terms of painters,on one hand it is the transformation of Chinese painting majors such as Gu Wenda, on the other hand it is oil painting, printmaking or an academic background of unknown origin;In terms of media,on the other hand it is related to ink painting It is purely hand-painted, or painted with watercolor or even acrylic or gouache. The material does not necessarily use rice paper. The effect emphasizes the dense smudged ink or the gorgeous color ink. On the other hand, it is an installation or video installation composed of other items; In terms of communication,on the one hand, it is a clarion call for the avant-garde to escape from the domestic art tradition, and on the other hand, it is the cultural symbols of the Eastern Tang Dynasty in international art;In terms of exhibition,on the other hand, it is a folk academic exhibition or double The special exhibition of the annual exhibition features some common ink paintings in recent years that are composed of repeated pig heads and dog heads. They have also been selected for the official Chinese painting exhibition, just like the "cartoon style" oil paintings of Xiong Yu and others were selected for the national art exhibition;Education In terms of:On the one hand, the China Academy of Art has established an undergraduate program in ink painting, but on the other hand, most schools do not; It is because most ink painters are in poor living conditions.

If you look at it from the perspective of traditional Chinese painting, you will find that ink painting is quite unusual. Most of the ink and wash themes are commonplace, but there are few such as plums, orchids, bamboos and chrysanthemums. Even if they are painted, they are completely new scenes that are different from literati paintings. Needless to say, many ink paintings do not have the brush and ink of Chinese paintings, and the inscriptions are painted calligraphy or ugly calligraphy, which basically does not need to be printed. The technical aspects of many of the works are very poor, and may not be much better than those of children who have never held a brush, but they are still as courageous and calm as young painters trying out new dishes. Some works are attractive and have a certain level of quality, but many of them destroy the usual aesthetic objects and are very willful in terms of artistic conception. They either use focused perspective to draw a large chandelier, or use large pieces of ink to draw inverted silhouettes of characters. Especially for those hanging and stacked ink installations, viewers may not be able to understand their profound concepts, and may think they are the mess left behind by some calligrapher or painter. Seeing this kind of work once or twice still feels fresh, but after seeing it more often, you feel at ease.

Figure 2: Chen Zizhuang's "Double Ducks", 34×650px, Chinese painting

(Contained in "A Hundred Years of Chen Zizhuang" Sichuan Fine Arts Publishing House, 2015 edition, page 249)

And what is the beauty of traditional Chinese painting? I don’t want to give a general overview here, but let’s talk about specific works. Take Chen Zizhuang's small painting "Double Ducks", which was "discovered" in the anti-traditional trend in the 1980s and is not easy to understand, for example. Among the weeds in Shulang, two ducks, one gray and one white, nestled in each other and disappeared. The division of the picture space, the title and the seal are exquisite. The painting is shaped like a center with a bone-style brush. The brush appears to be scribbling wildly, but in fact it has a profound foundation. The brush is everywhere but the meaning is not the shape. The density, the density of the virtual and the solid, and the blending of the color and ink are all well controlled, and it seems to be precise. To a state where one increase means more, and one decrease means less. The painting has a strong flavor of life and is deeply inspired by the brushwork and ink interest of traditional literati paintings, and the objects and images are also vivid and pleasant. I once copied from a picture album and found that I couldn't write without considerable pen and ink literacy and special calligraphy skills. Therefore, although Chen Zizhuang has many forgeries, it is difficult to achieve both form and spirit, especially the spirit and spirit. This is the charm of tradition.

If we take the old-fashioned idea of ​​the relationship between inheritance and innovation and cut it down, we can naturally see that there is less inheritance and more innovation in ink painting. What I inherited were only tools and materials such as pens, inks, paper and inkstones, and the techniques were mostly broken forms of Chinese painting. The pens and inks were mostly stuck in engraving, and the creative concepts and aesthetics had little to do with Chinese paintings. Ink and wash was actually just the ink version of contemporary art. This is its greatest innovation. Why does this happen? I think that firstly, Chinese painting, which has a long history, is relatively mature and conservative, needs a certain amount of stimulation to update. Secondly, with the development of contemporary art in the form of oil painting, installation and video, there is indeed a lack of local elements such as ink and wash. chain. In the 1950s, Liu Guosong called for "revolution of the life of the center" and the worldwide influence of the traditional French abstract painter Zao Wou-ki inspired the abstract path of ink painting that was anti-realism, anti-theme, and anti-object. Influenced by Liu Guosong, Hong Kong has more than 40 years of ink painting experience. I have contacted some Hong Kong artists and found that the works on their tablets are mostly composed of dots, lines and planes in ink, which have nothing to do with Chinese paintings in the mainland. The anti-traditional ink painting of the 1980s, the aesthetically constructed ink painting of the 1990s, and even various "ink +" in recent years, such as + stunts, installations, behaviors and concepts, etc., the scope, form, expression and aesthetics of ink art have already broken through He has lost the concept of flat painting and has become an ink jungle with ever-expanding boundaries, wild growth and infinite possibilities. He no longer struggles with the early ambivalence of borrowing from the West but wanting to get rid of the West, absorbing tradition but wanting to subvert it.

Figure 3: (Dynasty) Li Ernan and the video installation of "Journey to Streams and Mountains", 2011 Chengdu Biennale

Undoubtedly, this kind of ink painting, which is externally internationalized and internally subversive, must be recognized as an artistic upstart to express leap-forward and explosive innovations, and we must also see the abandonment of tradition that brings about the collapse of some rituals and happiness. To put it simply, not all “ink paintings” are necessarily good or avant-garde. An editor of a contemporary art publication once said to me: "Contemporary art works are all disgusting, and none of them are pleasant." Although this is an extreme statement, it is still accurate for certain works. Some ink and wash works can also be called crude and vulgar, such as those depicting eating, drinking, men and women, and heavy bodies. The techniques are deliberately lowered to magnify the helplessness of certain realities. They are similar to the "ruffian realism" contemporary oil paintings, such as zombie-like dull images, or silly and self-deprecating paintings. The image of the bald head is exactly the same. And many ink artists with evil smiles seem to have been looking for various imaginary enemies in art and life.

From this point of view, I really don’t know whether the manifestation of ink painting is due to the logic of the self-disciplined development of art, or whether it is the result of capital and media hype.

Fan Meijun, art critic, member of China Art Association, member of Chinese Calligraphy Association, professor of Jincheng College of Sichuan University.