This unit brings me the opportunity to get in touch with the people who do not only study in oil painting but in the different area. According to my current paintings. My interest is to focus on the things that related to me. And I used lots of photographs which are taken by myself support to make my painting subjects. These photographs become a kind of reference to me. I do not want to paint as realism. I found I am more interested in how to make my picture differently. I am more interested in the texture of the image and the color of itself when I am painting. The various possibilities of color-changes, brush-makings and empty spaces are really important to my painting. Sometimes I will use the skill of Chinese painting to approach my pictures. As a different system from that in oil painting. I decided to research in Chinese painting.

 

I studied traditional painting when I was still in primary school. This 1-year-study had a great effect on my point of view on aesthetic. Then I get in touch with oil painting 6 years ago. I think both Chinese painting and oil painting are interesting. They both have their unique elements to express the ideas and objects. From the beginning of this academic year, I have been planning to reach the balance between Chinese painting and oil painting. This means I want to, at some point, combine Chinese painting and oil painting together then make my own painting language. Then, first of all, I should understand how Chinese painting works.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I always had the idea that, Chinese painting and oil painting are different. Not only in visual but also in the theories that behind two of the painting systems. I interviewed my teacher who taught me when I was in secondary school. His name is Zhou ZhenWei. He is also a famous Chinese painter in my city. He gives me a lot of advice. And there are two things which he mentioned interested me. He said that ‘ Everything comes from ‘chaos’, and Chinese painting comes from ‘chaos’.’ This chaos which he said means ‘wuji’ (WUJI, philosophy in China, originally means ‘ boundless, ultimate.’ )  The other thing which he mentioned is ‘Chinese painting is like ‘playing chess’. Connecting painting with chess, this point impressed me. And it leads me to think about the rule of playing chess. How do people play chess? I am never a good chess-player. From what I understand, playing chess needs the ability which is used to solve problems. When people play chess, in most of the time they can hardly expect what is the next step of their rival. But I did not say that every step of chess-playing is unexpected, because a good chess player will, in some case, takes the whole situation into account, and what’s more lead their rival to follow the path which they build for them. So talking about chess will remind us more about strategy. And actually, the traditional chess-playing do reflect some points of the art of war. Chinese painting shares the similar process with chess-playing. I studied Chinese painting when I was young myself. What I always remember that my teacher told me ‘Do whatever you want, even that certain step is out of your original through -- there is no incorrect step in Chinese painting. Every step which you made will become useful and lead your image to the different result.’ During that period, I could not completely understand what does that mean. But now I realized, strategy, is the thing can solve problem. Chinese painting, in some case, teaches people how to solve the accident. And what’s more, using the knowledge which we already have to recognize the ‘accident’. Now comparing with Chinese painting and Oil painting, in my point of view, I think that oil painting is more ‘planned’ than Chinese painting. And it is also more realism. Throughout the history, oil painting used to have the function to record things, people. It is more figurative. And for myself, before I start the process of oil painting, I will, at least, think of the sketch. And make sure that every thing is probably all right.  But Chinese painting is quite unplanned. ‘The balance between figurative and non-figurative’ is what it pursue. ‘ I do whatever I want when I paint the image.’ -- these words which come from my teacher. I think it does mean that he can totally lose control when he makes that work. It is more about the process. The process of thinking and using strategy. The process which can improve the ability to detect the opportunity. It becomes not only a process of making art work, but also a kind of human behavior.  

So, then I started to think is any philosophy text behind Chinese painting. The answer is ‘yes’. Actually, every form art and behavior is the result of the culture.And philosophy always plays an important part in any forms of culture. I read few essays on the internet. I found that actually both Daoism and Confucianism have the effect on Chinese painting. I reminded  the ‘chaos’ and ‘figurative’ in the previous chapters. The ‘chaos’ corresponding to ‘the doctrine of the mean.’ in Confucianism. And this words also can be explained as moderation. One of the important idea of the Confucianism is ‘ following the rule of nature, people should know how to forgive someone. Then they can enrich their humanity. And they will take advantage of the power of the humanity.’ And that is what I mentioned as moderation. And the ‘figurative’ is about object and subject. And sometimes theory and practice. It is an attitude which will be used in human behavior. One of my favorite painting is Ink wash painting. ‘Ink wash painting, also known as literati painting is an East Asian type of brush painting of Chinese origin that uses black ink—the same as used in East Asian calligraphy,’(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ink_wash_painting). Black and white, are the spirit of Ink wash painting. And ‘black and white’ also represent the symbol of ‘Tai Ji” in Chinese culture. At the same time, ‘Tai Ji’ means the origin of the nature. And at the other point, the soul of everything. The theory behind ‘Tai Ji’ tends to lead people to find the rule of nature and understand the spirit of a thing instead of only the appearance. To find the discipline behind the living thing. And I think, that is why Chinese painting will works like the chess-playing. It is like the process to understand the rule and the way to deal with the picture.  

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There are still a lot of questions which I can not understand now yet. The relationship between philosophy and painting is complicated and interesting. I think I will keep going and learning, making it helpful to my painting.