On the influence and counter-influence of the spread of calligraphy
Take Inoue Ichichi and Zeng Xiang as examples.
Deng Wantai. Calligraphy is a unique art form formed in the process of writing Chinese characters. The unique characteristics of the shape system of Chinese characters contain rich historical and cultural connotations and artistic charm beyond imagination. The art of Chinese calligraphy has spread to overseas countries for thousands of years, and has also witnessed the prosperity of Chinese culture and art in various historical periods, as Yang Bin of the Qing Dynasty said in his treatise "The Great Scoop Puppet Pen": "Ancient and modern calligraphers, who can tilt foreign countries, in the Six Dynasties there is Xiao Ziyun, and the people of Baekje seek it, for the book of 30 papers." In the Tang Dynasty, Ouyang Xinben, Goryeo Jilin sent an envoy to buy it. Liu Zihou's "Ginger Sprout Post", the king of Joseon asked Xu Wenmu Gong with it. Liu Chenghang's book name is up to the outside world, and it is often purchased in goods. In Song Ze Cai Junmo's "Wan'an Bridge Chronicle", the back stone was easy to go to Japan. Zhang Wenfu's book, the Jurchen bought it with gold cakes. Ming Dong Sibai and Chen Mei Gongshu are valued by Japan. Quinoa stone book, Goryeo envoy, always seek to return. ”
In his "A Brief History of Chinese Calligraphy", Mr. Wang Yong elaborated: "As far back as the Sui and Tang dynasties, China was strong and politically prosperous, and absorbed and integrated the culture and art of all countries in the world with an open attitude. At that time, Chang'an, the capital city, was a metropolis where all ethnic groups of the world gathered together with a high degree of political, economic, cultural and artistic prosperity. Countries and states have come to pay tribute, or learn Xi advanced political system, or economic exchanges, or exchange culture and art. The neighboring countries of Goryeo, Baekje, and Silla on the Korean Peninsula were in the process of development at this time, and the political, economic, and cultural conditions were not yet perfect, and they admired the prosperity of the Sui and Tang dynasties, and through diplomatic relations and people-to-people exchanges, they learned Xi absorb the advanced politics, economy, culture and art of the Sui and Tang dynasties. Among them, the spread and development of calligraphy art in the Tang Dynasty was particularly rapid and extensive. ”
Here, I would like to elaborate on the exchange and dissemination of ancient Chinese calligraphy art in Japan. In the process of spreading ancient Chinese art overseas, it had a profound impact on Japan, and the art of calligraphy and painting as the basic art forms had a particularly prominent influence on Japan. In the process of development, the art of calligraphy in Japan has changed from monotonous to rich, from closed to open, and combined with its own characteristics, many new calligraphy works and art schools have been produced, and even later the calligraphy art of China and even East Asian countries has had a negative impact. After the Jianzhen monk crossed to the east and introduced Wang Xizhi and Wang Xianzhi's calligraphy for the first time in Japan, due to the efforts of the learned monks, the famous calligraphy of the Tang Dynasty promoted and influenced the development of Japanese calligraphy, and the three famous strokes in the history of Japanese calligraphy - Kukai, Emperor Saga, and Tachibana Yishi were all directly based on Tang Feng as teachers, and Emperor Saga (786-842) and Kukai were called "sages". Most of the classics and scriptures collected and copied by international students are from the hands of the Tang people, and the calligraphy is self-contained, and there are also extraordinary and impressive, which also represent the artistic level of calligraphy in the Tang Dynasty society, and these classics and scriptures are widely circulated in all strata of Japanese society, promoting the wide dissemination of calligraphy in the Tang Dynasty in Japanese society. The famous calligraphy presented in the emperor's inner palace was worshipped by the aristocracy, and it became a popular and elegant hobby of the upper class at that time.
In the process of artistic exchanges between China and Japan in ancient times, the spread of Chinese culture to Japan was often dominant, and calligraphy was always a very important content. Envoys sent from China to Japan often brought works by famous calligraphers as gifts, and envoys sent from Japan to China would also buy famous calligraphy treasures to bring back to Japan to spread in their own countries. In the process of Sino-Japanese calligraphy exchanges, Chinese communication dominates the exchange and interaction activities. The exchange of calligraphy art between China and Japan has been fruitful and has promoted the development of each other's arts. The spread of Chinese calligraphy art is dominated by the one-way transmission from China to Japan, which naturally promotes the development of Japanese calligraphy art and makes Japan a major beneficiary of Sino-Japanese artistic and cultural exchanges. Under the influence of China's excellent calligraphy art, the art of Japanese calligraphy has achieved great transformation and development, and in the later development, the Chinese calligraphy style has been localized, creating some unique forms of calligraphy. Of course, Chinese calligraphy has not only influenced many neighboring countries such as Japan, but also has had an important impact on European and American countries. In the 17th century, some European artists believed that Chinese characters had mystical meanings, and this explanation of the mystery of Chinese characters reflected the enthusiasm of Europe for the study of Chinese calligraphy at that time. Some European scholars have absorbed the essence of excellent Chinese calligraphy works, which has become an important driving force for the development of Western art. For example, Professor Ledehou of the University of Heidelberg in Germany is full of interest in the study of Chinese calligraphy. In the 21st century, the study of the history of Chinese calligraphy overseas is becoming an important aspect of calligraphy research.
Historically, the spread of calligraphy was mainly a one-way transmission, that is, the simple transmission of China to foreign countries in different forms, and in terms of horizontal transmission, there were countries such as East Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe and the United States;As far as vertical dissemination is concerned, the overseas dissemination of ancient Chinese calligraphy art is inseparable from the comprehensive national strength of China in various periods. Japan and China are separated by a strip of water, and the art of calligraphy has naturally spread widely to Japan due to its close ties with China throughout history. Since the Han Dynasty, China and Japan have carried out many exchanges, which also provides a good environment for the development of calligraphy art in China. The art of Chinese calligraphy has developed in the process of inheritance, innovation, inheritance and innovation. However, with the development of history, the art of calligraphy has evolved from the one-way transmission of the past to the reverse transmission of modern times, especially modern calligraphy, such as the famous Japanese calligrapher Inoue Ichi, because of the huge influence of his calligraphy works in the world, has also had a great impact on Chinese calligraphy, so that some calligraphers in China have learned from him Xi, here we will focus on Zeng Xiang.
Let's take a look at modern Japanese calligraphy first. Since the Meiji Restoration, Japan has long accepted the ideas of Europe and the United States, showing a relatively open and enlightened situation, especially after the defeat in 1945, Western artistic trends have impacted the field of Japanese art in all directions, and modern calligraphy came into being. Prior to this, Japanese calligraphy, like Chinese calligraphy, was largely based on examples of traditional Chinese calligraphy and was heavily influenced by Chinese calligraphy for thousands of years. Under the impact of Western artistic thought, a number of modern calligraphers have emerged, the most typical and the most artistic achievement is Inoue Ichi, who was the first person to introduce calligraphy to the world after the introduction of Chinese calligraphy to Japan. He pursues purity, advocates originality, the supremacy of form, and is self-centered, and his writing style is expressed in a single large character, and even "roaring book" as a way of expression. Although Inoue advocated the abandonment of all traditions inherent in calligraphy, he also advocated that calligraphy should be both literal and literary. He believes that "calligraphy is calligraphy because of writing, and it is not calligraphy without words" and "calligraphy is the perfect combination of literature and modeling". In his book "The Liberation of Calligraphy", he wrote: "The great art that has been handed down from generation to generation does not always come from the hands of famous artists, from the anonymous earthenware and wooden tablets, which are better than Picasso's pottery and Wang Xizhi's rulers. It is precisely because they are not full-time calligraphers that they do not need to write well like them, they just write, they do not have full-time constraints, so they can be pure. ......I believe that this is the fundamental crux of the reform of modern calligraphy art into a first-class art that has won the recognition of people around the world as a truly modern art. ”
Inoue is active in the Japanese calligraphy world with his maverick attitude. Whenever he creates, he always shaves his head, wields like a giant pen in the rafters, unrestrained, crawling, uninhibited, ink splashes, roars like thunder, hysteria. This is Inoue, an unruly master of modern calligraphy. At present, Japanese calligraphy, like China, is still followed by the vast majority of traditional Chinese calligraphy. There is also a part of the so-called low-character school, which is the modern calligraphers represented by Inoue Ichi, who are characterized by writing with one or several Chinese characters as the writing content, paying attention to lines, momentum, perception, and abstraction, and both brushwork and ink are far from the tradition. Saburo Hasegawa once said, "Young people who are unrelenting and passionate in their pursuit of the truth, and who are willing to dedicate themselves to the art of calligraphy, rebel against the modern world of calligraphy."Rebellion, the new modern art of calligraphy, can only arise from rebellion. ”
The Japanese calligraphy circles, especially the calligraphy achievements of Inoue Ichikashi, have had a negative impact on the Chinese calligraphy circles and brought a lot of shock to the Chinese calligraphy circles, such as Zeng Xiang's "roaring calligraphy", Shao Yan's "ink shooting", Wang Dongling's "chaotic calligraphy" and a series of calligraphy phenomena. Chinese modern calligraphy can be traced back to the "First Exhibition of Modern Calligraphy" held in China in 1985, which brought together some calligraphy works that boldly abandoned tradition, dared to try innovation, pursued lines, exaggerated and deformed, and were very rebellious, which began to open the curtain of modern Chinese calligraphy. It can be said without doubt that modern Chinese calligraphy originated in Japan, starting from the 1962 Sino-Japanese Friendship Inscription Exchange Conference, which opened the curtain of modern exchanges between China and Japan, especially after 1985, Japanese calligraphy opened a new continent of calligraphy creation for Chinese calligraphers, especially the "Japanese Modernist Calligraphy" published in 1986, the impact on the concept of Chinese calligraphy is even more intense, Mr. Xiong Bingming proposed: " Although there is no calligraphy in the West, modern abstract art and calligraphy have a lot in common, and the innovation and breakthrough in calligraphy in Japan in recent years have also given us a lot of stimulation and inspiration. In order to give new life to Chinese calligraphy, we must boldly learn from their experience and achievements. Of course, as the original Chinese calligraphy, in the history of thousands of years of calligraphy development, there is no such precedent, such as madness and drunkenness, when they create, unrestrained, longitudinal brushwork like flying, rapid wind and rain, like intoxication. The contemporary calligrapher Zeng Xiang's wild shouting and running when creating calligraphy, as well as the calligraphy works created by single characters, seem to be the Chinese version of "Inoue Yiyi".
Fig.1 There is poverty in the well
Fig.2 Inoue Ichimo is delusional about the influence and counter-influence of calligraphy from China and Japan, which is normal in world cultural exchanges, and it is precisely this kind of exchange that promotes and promotes the further development of calligraphy as an art form. If a work only pursues form, then it will contain much less cultural information and social meaning, and the work will inevitably be shallow and vulgar, so we might as well take a look at Inoue's famous works, such as his most representative work "Poverty" series (Fig. 1), "The most tragic experience of my life so far was the air raid on Tokyo on March 10, 1945." I hid in the small triangular storage room under the stairs of the school, and I squatted outside only three meters away in the crowd and instantly turned into a hell of oil. I want to write about it in my lifetime", which is the motivation for his calligraphy work "Poverty". Some people say that there are many kinds of words for "poverty", but all of them are arrogant, moving forward, standing with horizontal eyebrows, and iron bones. But I think this "poverty" is a true portrayal of the tragic scene after the atomic bombing of Japan after World War II. There are also such as "no delusion" (Figure 2), "unthinkable" and so on. Compared with Zeng Xiang, the materials used are different, Inoue has a brush that is carefully prepared for the special pen, the texture elasticity is very good, and the pen used by Zeng Xiang, it feels like a mop to pick it up, put it down is a bunch, writing is like mopping the floor, the pen is always behind, drag it to **count**, stop if you want to, go if you want to, there is no strength, there is no texture, a piece of paper is drawn until the end, no wonder some people say that it looks like a ghost drawing. Zeng Xiang's words are dragged out by a mop, that is, there is no penmanship, and there are no strips, while Inoue has a character that is written, his strokes and lines are very tense, very full, and the roar is full of power;The emotions are different, every word in Inoue is full of feelings, full of anger, sadness, pain, decadence, and frustration, while Zeng Xiang's words are too arbitrary, such as the "long live happiness" that he often hangs on his lips. These aspects may be the inevitable shortcomings and deficiencies of Zeng Xiang's initial exploration of modern calligraphy, but gradually his creations are becoming more and more sought after by people, and the influence of his works is also increasing. Let's take a look at Zeng Xiang's recent calligraphy activities:
A solo exhibition at the beginning of 2011 - 墖· Zeng Xiang Manufacturing" large-scale theme creation exhibition, held on the third floor of the Linglong Pagoda in the center of the Beijing Olympic Park, a total of 5 huge works were exhibited, including a work called "100,000 Pagoda", as for why he created such a work, according to his own introduction, it was due to the huge natural disaster that Japan suffered - 3The 11th National Congress of the Communist Party of China caused devastating damage to the Tohoku region of Japan, and the author's heart was impulsed, and he had the opportunity to hold a huge exhibition of works with the theme of the tower. These five works are "100,000 Pagodas", "Tsunami Tower", "Noah's Ark Tower", "Colorful Tower", and "Alarm Bell Tower" (Fig. 3), the author endows these works with the beautiful meaning of curbing disasters, blessing the world and human peace, hoping that Noah's Ark will save the people from suffering, arrive at a place of peace, and welcome the light, expressing the author's good wishes, especially the "Alarm Bell Ringing" reminds us to love life and protect nature. This exhibition embodies the author's lofty life realm, with a large pattern and profound implications. "Tower of Colors" (size 3.)5m 3m) expresses the author's beautiful expectations that human beings will be able to overcome difficulties and return to a better world to usher in light through our joint efforts in the face of natural disasters and pains. In April 2018, Zeng Xiang held an exhibition of Zeng Xiang's 798 works at the Art Museum of Beijing 798 International Art Exchange Center, where more than 10 works were exhibited, including four large-character works, all of which were created with the character "empty" (Fig. 4). In October 2019, the Line Zeng Xiang Works Exhibition was held at the Qi Baishi Memorial Hall in Xiangtan, Hunan Province, which was a report on the phased results of Mr. Zeng Xiang's artistic thinking and exploration in the past 10 years. The exhibition revolves around the theme of line, and is divided into four units: Character Control, Breakthrough, Extension and Growth, and the more than 70-meter-long scroll hanging at the top of the exhibition hall is particularly eye-catching. It must be said that Zeng Xiang's various attempts and innovations are undoubtedly shocking to Chinese calligraphy with thousands of years of tradition, and although this attempt has such and such problems, it is worth affirming that he broke the dull air and set a precedent for modern calligraphy, and it is unfair to blindly abuse, deny and condemn, and we must try to understand and interpret this kind of work.
Fig.3 Zeng Xiang The Tower of Alarm Bells
Figure 4 Zeng Xiangkong about Zeng Xiang's "roaring book", the factors in this are more complicated, according to his introduction, because of his extroverted personality, he usually likes to roar, sing, talk, laugh, grew up in the countryside, digging herbs, picking wild vegetables, collecting firewood in the mountains, and occasionally talking loudly and shouting when he walks at night. Singing, in order to strengthen the courage or drive away the beast, writing happy or depressed, but also shout a few times to express it, happy, slowly became a kind of daily writing norms, but more is borrowed from the Japanese modern calligrapher Inoue Ichi, through shouting, borrowing the momentum and writing, a drum, pouring the whole body, do their best in the creation, eliminate interference, forget the self, do not care about the body, so that the passion can explode, so as to achieve the artistic effect of large-character writing. It would be wrong to use traditional standards, rules, and penmanship to measure and judge the "roaring book", and we must accept it with new eyes, an open mind, and a deep understanding. In May 2021, Zeng Xiang was invited to perform live on Beijing TV's "China in Calligraphy and Painting", writing the two big characters "Love", the scene is quite grand, accompanied by a romantic and beautiful background**, it does have a visual experience of love and sex. Hong Houtian, director of the Chinese Calligraphy Association, said: "He is the master who really blends Chinese calligraphy techniques with human emotions, and eats thoroughly. If you can't understand Zeng Xiang, you can't understand contemporary Chinese calligraphy. ”
Modern calligraphy breaks through the concept of the four treasures of pen, ink, paper and inkstone and moves towards a new type of calligraphy experiment, which not only reflects the folk appeal of calligraphy, but also shows the modernity and post-modern needs of calligraphy. After years of development, modern Chinese calligraphy has far surpassed Japanese modern calligraphy, which has influenced modern Chinese calligraphy, both in terms of art form and cultural orientation. The experiment of different visions has provided some beneficial elements for the development of Chinese calligraphy art, and modern calligraphy shows the artists' desire to give new forms of expression to new artistic expressions. Therefore, the emergence of modern calligraphy is the inevitable development of calligraphy art.
The emergence of modern calligraphy is the absorption and cross-interaction of cross-border, cross-ethnic and cross-heterogeneous civilizations, and the construction of its own artistic characteristics and theoretical system in the cross-infection of cultures. After the dynamic multicultural combination, the art form of its own nation is improved and the theory is integrated, and finally the influence on the national character and national character is completed, which is a trend from the perspective of cultural development relations and the progress of social civilization, it effectively supplements the traditional calligraphy art thought, and shortens the distance between it and the world culture, which will provide a boost for the development of Chinese calligraphy art.
The author is a backbone teacher, subject leader, associate professor in Gansu Province, and the head of the Wuwei Workstation of Calligraphy Newspaper).