«——【Preamble】】 ——»
If the development of painting in the Northern Song Dynasty was bounded by the Shenzong Dynasty, then the latter stage gradually changed the inheritance of the painting system in the early Northern Song Dynasty to the Sui and Tang dynasties and the Five Dynasties, and the political and religious propaganda and utilitarian colors in painting began to gradually dissipate. What role did Guo Xi play in this?
«——【Specific Temporal and Spatial Background·】——»
In the late Northern Song Dynasty, the officials and scholars generally cultivated the good landscape of "not going to the banquet, sitting on the poor springs", and to a certain extent, Guo Xi's great achievements seem to be the inevitable result of "Shenzong's good Xi pen".
Zhao's unique preference for landscape is directly related to the formation of Guo Xi's status. However, in the process of the formation of this historical phenomenon of painting, he was the first person to introduce landscape painting with the spirit of literati into the academy.
His creations must not only meet the needs of the royal family, but also cannot completely deviate from the aesthetic tastes of the scholars. Therefore, this requires the creator not only to take into account the talent and cultivation of the literati and the production method in the academy, but also to make a choice between the majestic and the parasitic and allegorical painting orientation.
Guo Xi followed Li Cheng's method, and his pioneering point was that he was able to let go of painting in the "high hall plain wall", that is, the large-scale pattern to which his landscape painting turned. However, it is worth thinking about the landscape in the painting academy that produces its own face.
Guo Xi almost single-handedly made landscape painting bloom in Beijing. However, as an art creator and theoretical contributor in this era of "sitting in poverty", he has different interests from his contemporaries Wang Shu and others.
The creation and development of figure Taoist paintings have been greatly inferior, and even the painted walls in the temple and palace rooms have been replaced by landscapes, flowers and birds. In the early Northern Song Dynasty, the achievements of landscape painting were not in the courtyard.
On the other hand, although the focus of the creation of flowers and birds has always been in the courtyard, since the early Song Dynasty, the excessive attention to Taoist figures has made the development of flowers and birds no less inhibited than that of landscapes. However, when the Taoist figure painter can no longer dominate the painting affairs of the Jingshi.
Instead, it was a landscape painter who lived outside the courtyard for a long time, although "Cui Wu declension" was prominent in the history of painting in later generations, but the Shenzong dynasty had not really ushered in the golden period of flower and bird creation. This cannot be ignored.
«——【·Changes in the Creative Environment·】——»
The creative environment and the appreciation of the times often determined whether painters of different genres of painting could make a difference, and in the case of court painters, the emperor's personal preferences played a decisive role. The court painters of the Northern Song Dynasty could reach such a powerful position, and only Gao Wenjin and Huang Ju'an in the Taizong period were the only ones.
However, just as the development of flower and bird painting in the early Song Dynasty was not due to the Huang family and his son, the Huang family was able to flourish in Beijing, and the actual status and influence of Huang Ju in the Taizong Academy were not as good as Gao Wenjin.
The foil of the landscape era of "sitting on the poor springs", Cui Bai's embarrassing situation has both a similar side to the Huang Ju case in Taizong's time, and also has its specific back factors. It should be noted that the creation of the academy served the royal family, and therefore the intention of the ruling class.
In particular, the personal likes and dislikes of the emperor are directly related to the role and role of some painters in the academy, as well as the content and tendency of the academy's creation. But in any case, in terms of the status and influence of the painter, I am afraid that no one can compare with Guo Xi in the Shenzong Dynasty.
The fame and achievements of landscape painters can reach such a level, which is unimaginable among the Beijing teachers in the early Northern Song Dynasty. However, for Guo Xi's historical positioning, it is still necessary to limit it to the specific scope of time and space and the historical background.
Grace was given to the edict shortly after Xining gave the Goryeo Kingdom pictures in the seventh year, and with this as a turning point, Guo Xi gradually became the hottest painter in the palace. In fact, after Taizong, it was not until the time of Shenzong that the intimate relationship between the emperor and the painter was regained.
However, in the early Song Dynasty, the importance attached to painters and paintings was mostly due to the above considerations, and the development of landscape and flower and bird painting was suppressed for a long time.
«——[The right time, the right place, and the right people]——»
We can never ignore the special role played by Emperor Shenzong at this time, as a reformer of the "Law of the Ancestors", but he pushed the development of the Northern Song Dynasty Painting Academy to another peak. Then, Guo Xi and Cui Bai both appeared on the painting stage of Jingshi at the right time.
Under their influence and inspiration, the other hospitals gradually lost their old ways and brought the hospital back to life. Guo Xi's luck is not only that he ushered in a golden age that truly belongs to landscape creation, and the supporter behind this is Emperor Shenzong himself.
Zhao's unique preference for landscape is directly related to the formation of Guo Xi's status. Mi Fu Ji Song Yongchen saw his collection of Li Cheng painting fan when the clouds, "Ci Shengguang dedicated the Queen Mother to the upper Wen Qing Xiao, buy Li Cheng painting paste into a screen." All of the above is easy to play.
This reflects that from the Five Dynasties to the beginning of the Song Dynasty, most of the famous people with landscapes were mountain and forest priests with sparse temperaments, so even if Li Cheng met an emperor who liked mountains and rivers like Zhao Ji, he would not be able to use it.
Unlike figure and flower and bird paintings, which are more elaborate and more easily learned by painters, the dissipation of wilderness revealed in landscape painting is often difficult for court painters to grasp in the confinement of the court, and the limitations of their own cultural accomplishment and creative constraints.
In addition to the composition of Li Cheng's landscapes, his creations should be mostly small. Guo Xi's proposal that "mountains have three distances" also derives the methods of "lofty" and "far-reaching" in addition to "plain and far-reaching", which reflects the large-scale pattern to which his landscape painting has turned.
Then, Guo Xi took Li Cheng's method, and his pioneering point was to be able to let go of painting in the "high hall plain wall", and "get stronger and stronger when you are old", and finally "stand alone for a while". Compared with Li Cheng's landscape structure, this transformation is in line with the painting needs of decorative landscapes in the court.
It is closely related to his large number of mural paintings in Beijing. The fact is that Guo Xi and Li Cheng's identities start from the perspective of the functional theory of landscape painting, and "do not go to the banquet, sit in the poor springs" effectively reconciles the contradiction between "retreat" and "entering the office".
As the carrier of the literati spirit, the "elegance of forests and springs" contained in landscape painting was widely recognized by the imperial relatives and scholars at that time. According to Guo Si, when he was in politics and politics, he called his father, "Twenty years of encountering the Divine Sect, with favor, grace and favor, incomparable in the generations."
Huizong said, "The divine examination is very happy, and so far the forbidden middle hall is full of paintings by Qing's father, and all the paintings are Li Cheng." To a certain extent, Guo Xi's great achievements seem to be the inevitable result of "Shenzong's good Xi pen", and it is not an exaggeration to say that there is no Guo Xi without Zhao Ji.
The establishment of Guo Xi's status in the painting world was closely linked to the royal painting's turn to landscapes. However, in the process of the formation of this historical phenomenon of painting, he was the first person to introduce landscape painting with humanistic spirit into the academy.
His creations must not only meet the needs of the royal family, but also cannot completely deviate from the aesthetic tastes of literati and doctors. Therefore, this requires the creator not only to take into account the talent and cultivation of the literati and the production method in the academy, but also to reconcile the neat realism with the painting orientation of parasitic allegorical feelings.
Guo Xi's landscapes have reached a balance between this. Then, in the creation of landscapes, not only the painting of mural screens was abandoned by the literati, but also the panoramic landscape pictures with large vertical scrolls were also cut.
Mi Fu Ji Wang Xu, "as a small scene, but also ink for Pingyuan, are Li Chengfa also". Xiang Guoxi and Wang Shu both took Li Chengzong as their ancestors, but there were differences in their respective hair, and Wang Shu was undoubtedly more inclined to return to Li Chengping's elegant style of distant landscapes.
And this is just as Su Zhe described in the three poems of "The Landscape Scroll Painted by the Title Wang Xuduwei": "The five-foot small horizontal scroll in the hand, the end of the day is a millimeter", "The window unfolds the scroll and talks about self-comfort, and the coil is not back to the crown and clothes", "The short scroll in the sleeve is still wet, and the people laugh at me and refer to my idiot".
«——【·Conclusion·】——»
The landscapes of the Northern Song Dynasty began to shift from the large vertical scrolls that Guo Xi was good at decorating the walls of halls and houses to the horizontal scrolls of landscapes that could be enjoyed by literati on their desks.
Of course, this visual conflict is also closely related to the identities and experiences of the two men, and Guo Xi, as the imperial painter of Emperor Shenzong, still cannot hide the imperial atmosphere and majestic style of his landscapes.
Information sources:
"History of Chinese Painting"