Almighty painter

Chapter 340
In the famous British drama "Sherlock".

Relying on a star that was in the wrong position on the background of the oil painting and should not exist, Juan Fu determined that a famous painting by the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer, which was auctioned for 3000 million pounds, was a forgery by later generations.

Many viewers of the TV series on IMDB commented on the film, and they all lamented that Western oil painters were really terrible at recreating reality. In an ancient painting from 400 years ago, even the stars in the background of the sky were not randomly clicked. Going up gave the protagonist Juan Fu room to play.

With this obsessive-compulsive accuracy in capturing the stars, the painter can switch careers to become an astronomical observer and draw star maps.

It is no coincidence.

Almost at the same time as Johannes Vermeer, the Eastern Xia on the other side of the ocean in the [-]th century also had a somewhat similar story.

No. 1 calligraphy and painting house in the late Ming Dynasty.

In Xu Wenchang's sketch "Xuanzhao Leijie", he mentioned that in the former Song Dynasty, Su Dongpo and his friends were appreciating paintings. When they saw a pastoral landscape painting that their friends took out, their expressions changed several times. He nodded first, then shook his head, and sighed.

The friend was puzzled and asked Su Shi why he was like this.

Student Su replied that his painting ability is pretty good, but there is just one shortcoming.

There are two rice plants in the painting. One rice plant has round and moist ears, which is in the shape of tribute rice from the Xinghua River in Qingyuan Prefecture, while the other rice plant has long ears. It is clearly a rice only found in Meizhou, Bashu. The two are in the same place. The sky is south and the earth is north.

"We are opposites, but we live next to each other."

Isn't it strange?

Cao Xuan took Gu Weijing's painting and looked at it with his eyes, and unconsciously thought of the story he had read in his mind.

The old man let out a breath.

His eyes were fixed on the photo in his hand, and his skinny fingers were caressing the flowers and leaves one by one, as if he wanted to touch the moistness of the young man's pen tip.

"Spring silkworms spin silk, spring clouds float in the sky, spring water melts ice, and the trickle of spring water is to convey the spirit, which is the way of a painter." Cao Xuan said softly to himself.

Old Yang next to him curled his lips.

Listen.

As expected, he had everything right. Even Mr. Cao would be surprised in front of this picture.

Spring silkworms spin silk, spring clouds float in the sky, and spring water melts ice.

He didn't quite understand what kind of realm this was describing.

But in all these years, Lao Yang has never seen any young "kids" under the age of 40 facing Mr. Cao, who is even willing to say such a high evaluation as "coinciding with the way of a painter".

Not once.

This painting shocked me. Wasn't it that he, Old Yang, didn't understand it? Even Old Cao was moved, right?
Just look at this painting.

The main thing is that one look at it will make no one say a word, and the next look will make other people's jaws drop.

After all, the assistant is just an outsider.

He would not know that Lao Yang had tried his best to overestimate Gu Weijing.

In fact, I still underestimated the weight of the old man's words.

If Professor Lin Tao, who has been my teacher for the longest time, was by my side at this moment, I would definitely be shocked, wide-eyed, and scratching my beard at a loss.

Liu Ziming probably wanted to take out a collection of ancient paintings from the Ming and Qing Dynasties in exchange for the old man putting this comment on him.

Downing?

She was already pinching her fingers frantically and biting her teeth in jealousy.

This is no longer the reason why the old man appreciates Gu Weijing or evaluates the quality of his paintings.

Everyone is a well-known artist who has been famous for a long time.

It wouldn't matter if I put it in any other way.

Even though Cao Xuan praised Gu Weijing as a flower, he always looked up to the sky and laughed with great joy when he looked at the painting.I don’t know how complicated the emotions in their hearts are, but the city on the surface must be full of them.

But what Mr. Cao said just now has a completely different meaning.

The secret that only Mr. Cao's disciples know - [Spring silkworms spin silk, spring clouds float in the sky, spring water melts ice, and the trickle is meant to convey the spirit].

These seemingly meaningful twenty words were the last twenty words Cao Xuan's teacher, their ancestor, wrote for Cao Xuan before Su Hang died of illness.

It was both a gift and an expectation. From then on, the yin and yang were separated.

To an ordinary Chinese painting painter, this sentence might sound like just a compliment, but to a few of Mr. Cao's apprentices, it might mean more than anything in the world.

"Looking at this wisteria flower, it looks like what the teacher said Su Shi meant by looking at wheat ears." Cao Xuan nodded.

The famous painting master during the Guangxu period had two loves in his life.

One loves to watch plays, the other loves to read, and collects various rare editions of Song and Ming editions.

This short piece by Xu Wei was found by the teacher among the pile of old papers.

Literati in the late Qing Dynasty appreciated commentaries and liked to delve into the structure and usage of words.

Take pride in the strange and difficult.

Although Tang poems and Song lyrics were originally used by dignitaries and literati to express their feelings, they are often read in a catchy way, and there is no shortage of Mr. Bai Letian and Du Fu who use simple and moving writing styles that old women can understand and children can sing.

This was not the case in the Qing Dynasty.

Almost every chapter requires reading a lot of annotations to understand it. The more odd words, strange words, and unpopular allusions, the better.

The poetry and articles that the scholar-bureaucrat class liked aesthetically have become separated from the common people and have become a game where a few people in a small circle ask questions and solve puzzles with each other.

Objectively speaking, this resulted in the dissemination vitality of Qing Dynasty articles not being very strong, but it was also a popular social fashion at that time.

Cao Xuan used to be confused.

Why does my teacher like this seemingly uninteresting essay so much?

He was even ordered to learn to recite, and on the 15th of every month, he had to copy it several times.

The calluses on the old man’s fingertips were all worn out!

When I was a child, I was much more familiar with this short article of about [-] words than "Cai Gen Tan" or "Zeng Guang Xian Wen".

He thought this made no sense.

Xu Wei's articles are often shocking, but they are not unpopular.

This is not knowledge that can be brought out to show off at parties, and the writing is not gorgeous and interesting enough, nor is it strange enough or strange enough, or even the story itself.

Since it was written by Xu Wei, even its authenticity is highly questionable.

Xu Wenchang has the spirit of a madman in the Wei and Jin Dynasties.

Painters are the product of the times and individuals.Xu Wei, a layman from Qingteng, is one of the few unparalleled geniuses who can be famous even in today's modern society.

Many of his actions and quotes are very "performance art", and he is the kind of artist-like character that is modeled on the stereotype that the media loves and is most obsessed with.simply put--

Xu said he was a little crazy.

He is different from Li Bai's madness. Li Bai's boldness carries the smell of wine, while Xu Wei's wild and unrestrained style carries the bitterness of life, a hero who has lost his way, and a sadness and confusion with no way out.

He accidentally killed his wife, hanged himself nine times, and stabbed his kidney sac with an awl. Mr. Xu Wei used his whole life to explain what it means to use life to make art.He also likes to frequently make shocking remarks such as "calligraphy has been dead for a long time", which may sound a bit headline-grabbing to ordinary people at first, but may sound shocking later.

When Cao Xuan was a child, he lived in a cultural environment and social level where famous Confucians and masters gathered.

It is completely different from Gu Weijing, a local dog who knows only a little about Eastern Xia cultural allusions and believes whatever is written in Shishuoxinyu.

Cao Xuan had long known that the world said that layman Qingteng had a peculiar quirk and loved to compile the writings of his predecessors.

Most of the various stories he wrote, such as Yan Zhenqing talking about calligraphy and Zhang Xu's wild cursive writings, were all made up by him under the guise of ancient quotations.

This is quite similar to how modern people post on Weibo and always say "Lu Xun said balabala".

One time when the Spring Festival was approaching, everyone of his age went to the temple fair and watched the social opera. Cao Xuan sat alone at dusk under the cold candlelight, looking at the words he copied and the calligraphy written in his pen. Hearing the constant sound of firecrackers outside, he really couldn't bear it. .

He turned around and specially found rice from the south of the Yangtze River, and spent money to send a telegram asking his fellow villagers to find a way to send through the post office the unthreshed rice ears from Sichuan that were left over from last autumn's harvest, and show them to the teacher.

Cao Xuan said that now in the Republic of China, newspapers are focusing on Mr. De and Mr. Sai.He very scientifically pointed out to the teacher that there is not much difference in the varieties of rice in the two places, and the growth is more affected by light and precipitation.

Even though Su Dongpo loved cooking, he was born in Shuzhong and became an official in the south.

It is probably extremely difficult to tell the difference between these two types of rice using the artist's brushwork.This article is nothing more than a fabricated legend.

If he wanted to practice calligraphy, he could go to Lin Tie.

If you have to say that this article contains some great truth, then you have to ask the teacher for advice.

After reading it so many times, Cao Xuan didn't see much benefit in opening the book.

The teacher is listening to the class attentively.

The other party just glanced at his closed disciple from the stage in the courtyard, tapped Cao Xuan on the back of the head with his fan, and said two words casually.

"Painful."

He just waved his hand and told his beloved disciple to go away and not to disturb him while he was listening to the show.

This is the traditional master-disciple relationship in the Eastern Xia feudal era.

The master leads the door, and the practice is personal.

The master will only remind you at key points. The most critical layer of window paper must be understood and pierced by yourself.

Education that is chewed up and fed through cramming is far less profound than enlightenment through study.What the teacher says is just the truth in the ears. What you want to understand is the knowledge that is firmly in your mind.

Many years later, Cao Xuan traveled around and saw many paintings and met many people.

One evening when I was returning home from Paris by ship, I was standing on the side of the ship eating a sweet-scented osmanthus rice cake facing the rolling waves. Occasionally, the sun broke through the sea of ​​clouds.

It seems that the light of Buddha shines on the sea.

At that moment, he happened to look down and saw the wrapping paper of the rice cake.

During the Taisho era in Japan, businessmen came up with the idea of ​​using Japanese ukiyo-e to decorate and package Japanese lacquerware, tea, and screens, which not only looked good but also promoted Japanese culture.

For a time, Ukiyokai art became popular in Europe and America.

During the Japanese invasion of China, in order to boycott Japanese goods and to rectify the origins and change the prejudice of many Westerners that Japanese culture is a representative of Asian culture, national and patriotic entrepreneurs also began to use exquisite Chinese paintings as products. Trademark and outer packaging.

Most of the items displayed and sold on the boat were themed "water", including the portion of Yao Shengji's sweet-scented osmanthus rice cake he was eating.

Engraved on the wrapping paper is Yuan Mei's silk picture "Layered Waves of the Sea".It is said that Yuan Mei's brushwork is majestic and majestic, and also has the characteristics of delicate and elegant brushwork of court painters.Due to the technological problems of industrial printing at that time, only [-]-[-]% of the complicated pen and ink lines on the oil paper package were deleted, and the rest were dark and greasy together.

What I'm talking about is a painting, basically just a rough outline.

However, Cao Xuan was very familiar with Yuan Mei. Even his teacher knew Yuan Zuzhi, the editor-in-chief of "Xinbao" and Yuan Mei's grandson. He had seen the original painting of "Layered Waves in the Sea" and was very familiar with it.

Yuan Mei's painting is good, but this painting is a bit weird. The rhythm of the waves is disordered, and the length of the lines is intertwined. It is clearly a mistake to use the "crusting method" with a flexible center that is used to draw mountains in Chinese paintings. It’s time to draw water.

It's just a mistake. What's more, many of the lines are flickering in light and dark, clear and chaotic, and they don't match the technique of the entire painting.

however.

The momentum of the whole painting is therefore more majestic and puzzling.

But now, the tide rises and falls, the sun and moon shine together.

The sea between heaven and earth is like an ink painting scroll leaning towards the human world. The waves are like mountains and the scene of uncertain mountain light comes into view. It is really like the scene in the silk painting.

Cao Xuan threw the finished rice cake paper into the sea.

At that moment, he suddenly understood that when the teacher hit him on the head with the word "fan", the word "fastidious" was in his mouth.

How should we solve it.

The technique is not important, the important thing is to make the painting "alive".

Rice can represent many things, it can be the rice itself, it can also be the audience's emotions when reading the painting, and the artistic conception contained in the painter's pen and ink.

In the article, Su Shi was looking at a painting. There was one rice in the south and one in the north. Two kinds of rice that should not appear together came together in one picture, so Su Shi felt that the painting was incoherent.

Don't pay attention.

Yuan Mei painted with great effort and captured the scenery of the sea.

It doesn't matter whether he uses the mountain method to paint water or the water method to paint mountains. It doesn't matter whether the wavy lines respect the laws and regulations.

All the momentum and all the brushwork are coherent, so the brushwork and ink are connected together by a consistent spirit like a vertical and horizontal loom, and they complement each other on the scroll.

This is the emphasis.

The audience seemed to hear the sound of the tide.

Whether this story was made up by Xu Wei or not is completely irrelevant. Even if it is really made up, it is also integrated into the summary of the essence of the entire Eastern art by the layman Qingteng. It is so profound that it can be written in a vast volume and devote a lifetime to it. Research cannot touch the boundaries of this knowledge.

But to condense it down, it’s just two words: "pay attention to".

When Cao Xuan understood this truth on the ship, he seemed to feel the tapping of the sandalwood fan bone on the back of his head. He turned his head subconsciously and was shocked to realize that the teacher had been dead for many years.

Another sixty years later.

When Cao Xuan picked up Gu Weijing's paintings, the brush and ink techniques had both bright spots and shortcomings. For a young man, they deserve encouragement.

Only the flower tree itself interested him.

"The flowers and trees are copied extremely well, the selections are very strong, and the paintings are very vivid."

Cao Xuan nodded slowly and said three words in a row.

(End of this chapter)