A piece of ice in the jade pot
Luo Ping's seal book "Curling Autumn Moon".
Xue Yuanming. The emergence of the "Eight Monsters of Yangzhou" is the result of the right time, place and people. Tianshi is the general trend of the development of calligraphy in the early Qing Dynasty, mainly the rise of stele science; The geographical advantage, that is, the salt merchants of Yangzhou brought economic prosperity; Harmony, according to today's popular words, is to huddle for warmth, resource integration, can better attract people's attention. However, this is not just hype. The ancients had real kung fu. The achievements of "Yangzhou Eight Strange" are in many aspects such as "poetry, calligraphy, painting and printing", and "strange" is mainly calligraphy, which is basically calligraphy. Among them, Jin Nong and Zheng Banqiao are the most famous, and their calligraphy styles are the most individual. The difference is that Jin Nong has the highest reputation in art history, while Zheng Banqiao has more folklore.
As the name suggests, the "Eight Monsters" have their own strange methods, harmonious and different. Luo Ping is one of the eight monsters, the youngest of them, a protégé of Jinnong, especially famous for painting. Luo Ping has paid attention to the light and shadow and space modeling in the modeling and expression of Chinese painting, especially the water surface of Chinese painting landscapes, which is no longer simply outlined with lines, but uses ink color and space blank space to set off the light and shadow effects of landscapes, which is of great innovative significance. Luo Ping is famous for his ghost paintings, and "Ghost Scroll" is his masterpiece, which depicts the strange and strange world of ghosts in an exaggerated way, and uses it as a metaphor for social reality, which can be called an outstanding ancient comic. Under the social and historical conditions of the time, Luo Ping dared to break the stereotypes and develop the tradition of Chinese literati painting, which inspired the reform of modern Chinese painting and had a great impact on modern and contemporary times.
Check the relevant information of Luo Pin, there are very few entries, mainly paintings, and there is basically no calligraphy, which is an unpopular figure. Although Luo Ping's artistic point of view cannot be found, it can be inferred from the common artistic proposition of the Eight Monsters, there must be something in common, the so-called "things gather by like, people by groups", and "Yangzhou Eight Monsters" come from all over the world and come together for a common goal.
Fig.1 Luo Pingshu curling autumn moon banner
Luo Ping is known as a "ghost talent", and the monster among the monsters is a ghost. The only calligraphy that can be seen in Luo Ping's calligraphy now is the four-character seal script banner "Curling Autumn Moon" (fig. 1), which seems to be deliberately funny, and there is a flash of inspiration, and then no other works exist. The work is the absolute center of the old penmanship, the four words are dynamic, none of the words are flat, the word "ice" is obliquely drawn with four strokes, the word "pot" is large and small, the left and right parts of the word "autumn" have oblique pens, and the word "month" is completely oblique, which shows that Luo Ping is not a person who is peaceful, and there is indeed a strong idea of seeking blame.
In terms of technique, it is to write the seal with the subordinate, in other words, it is "the book is printed out". This point is undoubtedly influenced by the "Xiling Eight Families". Luo Ping once painted "Ding Jing Statue" to show respect. Among the "eight families", Huang Yi and Xi Gang engraved many parties for Luo Pin. "Eight families" seal script works are rare, mainly to the name of the book, the printed text is mainly to the law of the transformation of the seal, the seal is subordinate to each other, to the province of simplicity, the main characteristics of the square. Luo Ping used a similar method to create seal scripts, to achieve an effective circumvention of the "Erli" mode, without the need to obey the law of the absolute center, to avoid the absolute stillness of the glyphs. People who pursue the beauty of wild monsters certainly don't like to limit themselves by absolute normative requirements. Luo Ping not only had contacts with the Indians of the Zhejiang School, but also had close contacts with Deng Shiru, a fellow countryman, but they maintained their independent artistic preferences and directions, which is commendable. This has a certain enlightening significance for the current creative status quo of the book world blindly following the trend, like a swarm of bees and a mother's life.
Although it is impossible to find more information about Luo Ping's seal script today, it can be compared with the few seals that have been handed down to the world, which is undoubtedly the best evidence. From the seal, we can further see the origin of Luo Ping and the "Xiling Eight Families" and the Deng faction, and it can also be seen that he skillfully borrowed between the books and seals, and the seals came out of the books, and the books came out of the prints. The "Friendship of Ice and Snow" seal (Fig. 2) bears witness to its relationship with Deng Shiru, and the "Liangfeng" seal (Fig. 3) is a typical "Zhejiang-style" technique. The "Born of a Person" seal (Fig. 4) shows the interoperability of calligraphy techniques. The four-character strokes are simple, not easy to deal with, through ingenious arrangement, the two "people" words echo diagonally, the same and there are differences, the word "day" is bent in the horizontal painting, and the word "sheng" is borrowed from Kaili as a seal, and the stone is turned into gold. These techniques and habits can also be appreciated from "Curling Autumn Moon".
Fig.2 Intersection of ice and snow
Luo Ping's unique seal book, there is no time to write, there is no nostalgic text, I don't know what year and month it was made, and I don't know the specific background, and even when I first saw it, I couldn't help but wonder if it was a partial enlargement of the inscription on Luo Pin's painting. However, it is such a work that makes Luo Ping have a place in the history of seal script in the Qing Dynasty, representing a kind of "road number", which has had an impact on later generations of calligraphers, such as Pan Tianshou and Zhang Daqian have used similar brushwork to create seal scripts, and interestingly, these two painters also have the identity of calligraphers and seals. In the process of changing the law, the Qing Dynasty seal calligraphers did everything they could, and their works were also superior. Grass seal with a line of grass brushwork, undoubtedly more extreme, drawing on the Miao seal, focusing on the seal, the combination of the subordinate, with the official method to write the seal, concise and ancient. Seals and subordinates are connected, which itself has a possibility, an advantage, and is also an effective way.
Fig.3 Two peaks
Fig.4 People are born on a daily basis