The Chinese Literati Painting Tradition :: Art History Papers

The Chinese Literati Painting Tradition 1 can not help but marvel at the steady of the Chinese landscapes, the vast space, the intricacies, the imaginative structures, the subtle colorations. To a western marrow they are beautiful but to the Chinese they are far more. The motion pictures exist or portray all aspects of Tao. The caligraphy and imagery in each painting take on spiritual significance. The nontextual matterist-scholar can spend years search for understanding in each go away. This understanding he seeks is not respectable of the scene he sees but of universal structure and himself within it. In turn, his discoveries surface in his brushwork, composition, and the spirit of his mountains, trees, water, and sky. It is no wonder, that the cannon for Chinese art remained among the literati painters over so many centuries. finished and through painting, one could reach a further understanding of Tao or rather repossess his ancestors knowledge of Tao.The Tao, with its as sociated notions of coalition of spirit and matter, the external flux of all things, the resolution of opposites, and the significance of the nonexhistant, was the foundation garment on which Chinese based theirpainting and their theories of paintingIt is the search for understanding that drives the workman-scholar to paint. Shen Chou, an artist from the Ming Dynasty tells of his new found knowledge and cleansed mind which he has reached through solely experiencing nature. His words are translated from the calligraphy in Night Vigil (above, center).Through mental abstinence and by sitting alone by the clear(p) of the flickering candle long into the night, I must pursue two the outer principals of things and the wondorous inner workings of the mind. By using this method for self-cultivation and responding to things, I shall posess understanding.The Literati were generaly of the beurocracy. They were salutary mannered in Confucian traditions, well educated, and well off. They we re first scholars before they were painters. In fact painting was generally concidered an outlet for scholars. Scholar-painters were greatly respected, their work was part of high culture. The great artist-scholars wrote at length, advising techniques for painting and calligraphy. They formed divers(prenominal) schools of thinking across China. Their names and spirits were remembered through vast literary productions and in the paintings themselves. Every succeeding generation of artist scholars rekindled the spirit of their ancsestors through their own works of art and literature. And so it continued until the fall of dynastic China.Unfortunately though, literati remains difficult for Westerners to fully comprehend and appreciate.