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    The Book of Plum
    The Book of Plum
    The Book of Plum
    Ebook233 pages1 hour

    The Book of Plum

    By I-Hsiung Ju

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    About this ebook

    Professor Ju introduces the versatility of the plum painting and the meaning of rhythm. He then discusses how to make the composition by doing the huge trunk first, then the smaller branches. Many open spaces are kept for the groups of flowers. But, he also presents another technique by first arranging groups of flowers, then connecting them by adding branches and trunks. Finally, he shows how to wash the background of a painting. There are four color plates of plum paintings by the author at the end of the book.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateJun 1, 2016
    ISBN9780977059881
    The Book of Plum

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      Book preview

      The Book of Plum - I-Hsiung Ju

      Introduction

      1. The Versatility of the Plum Painting

      A plum blossom painting starts with the trunks and boughs either in freestyle or in outline. Small branches and blossoms, added afterward, may also be either in freestyle or in outline. It is not necessary to have blossoms in the same style as the trunks or branches. Many artists put outline blossoms on one tree and freestyle blossoms on another in one painting. Trunks and branches can be painted in a combination of the two very different styles, and this combination has long been considered proof of the artist's excellence in skill and is never considered a mistake.

      Freestyle is also called splashing ink style or boneless style. We will discuss this with illustrations in the chapters on trunk, branches, and flowers.

      The reason we usually paint the trunk and the boughs of the plum first is the same as in a bamboo painting: the trunks and boughs are the leading elements in the composition. They are always large in size and strong in color, while plum blossoms are much smaller in size, much weaker in color. Once the trunk and branches are determined, the flowers have to be arranged accordingly. Sometimes smaller branches may be added after the flowers are completed, but the flowers should still be subordinate to the branches. In other words, a plum painting can be considered as a composition of lines which are all in the form of a calligrapher's brush strokes and the flowers are parts of texture and a form of decoration.

      Brush strokes in a plum painting have different qualities. Some are straight and some are curved, some are broad and some are fine, some are long and some are short, some are light and some are heavy, some are dark and some are pale, some are sharp and some are dull, some are subtle and some are clumsy, some are smooth and some are crumpled. But regardless of these highly contrasting qualities, these strokes all represent the plum trunk and boughs as they appear in nature. It is always true that a plum tree may have an old and crooked trunk with young and graceful branches at the same time. Therefore, the composition of a painting of plum can be a complex compound of all the different strokes mentioned above.

      For example, we may paint a painting of plum showing the atmosphere of a bright Spring morning with all the strokes light and clear-cut suggesting young branches and young flowers. But an old and ugly looking trunk made by rugged, broken strokes should still be used as back­ ground. We may paint a painting of plum showing the bitterness and hardship of Winter with boneless technique to make one heavy crooked trunk full of dark bark or with flying white technique to show snow accumulated on the dry fungus patches. But a few withered flowers held by a spear-like young branch is still needed.

      Actually, besides flowers, we will also find that broken bark, heavy moss, and thorn-like dead stems are used as texture to reinforce the composition and to make the design more interesting. It sounds almost like a mystical idea to have a tree like plum so versatile yet so traditional, but it is believed that these are the common characteristics of the Chinese plum. Since the Five Dynasties -- 907-959 A. D., then through Sung, Yuan, Ming and Ch'ing, to today -- more than one thousand years, there have been numerous artists acclaimed as experts in painting plum. They painted plum only, and they created their own plum with skillful strokes and various ink shades in endless, different compositions which became part of our heritage.

      2. Spirit and Rhythm

      Hsieh Ho, an artist and also an art historian of the Southern Ch'i (479-501 A. D.) of the Two Dynasties, wrote a book titled Ku-hua P'in Lu -- A Book of Critical, comparative Records of Ancient Paintings. In his book his famous comment, There are always good or bad art works, but nothing to do with new or old. is widely quoted. His initial discussion on the six canons of brush painting has had a tremendous impact on artists and art historians from his time on. Since the T'ang Dynasty thousands of art books have praised him for his idealistic six canons. Some emphasized only the first canon, Ch'i Yun Sheng Tung, which can be briefly translated as vitality with spirit and rhythm, meaning that any painting which does not show spirit and rhythm is not a good painting. This explains why Hsieh Ho's last canon, Chuan Yi Mo Hsieh, tracing and copying from the models of the ancients, as the most important. Ming Dynasty artists such as Tung Ch'i-ch'ang and his followers who started the movement of hsieh Yi to paint only the ideas but never the reality -- also commended the sixth canon and proclaimed that to follow the ancients is the best and only way to success in painting. It seemed that they all believed in the past and the ancients were adored to the point of idolatry.

      Let us list the six canons here in their original order:

      1. Vitality with spirit and rhythm

      2. Structure with proper brush strokes

      3. Likeness according to the subject matter

      4. Right colors and shades

      5. Well pondered composition

      6. Tracing and copying the ancients

      Logically, the six canons represent different aspects and are not necessary listed in order of importance.

      Vitality with spirit and rhythm is very vaguely talking about a painting's appearance in general, while strokes and colors are related to the technique of painting. Composition actually is the concrete evidence of the vitality, and likeness of the subject matter has never been important to any brush painter in the past. Tracing and copying the ancients are ways of learning and should not be listed as important as the others.

      Since we have already discussed a great number of strokes in the Book of Bamboo, the Book of Orchid, and the Book of Chrysanthemum, we shall study more the right shades and the right colors in this book. Since tracing and copying were primary ways of learning for particular schools in the past, we will not take time to elaborate.

      We will study deeper on the subject of vitality and its relationship with well pondered composition in my Book of Plum.

      First of all, we have to recognize that the strokes (second canon) and the colors and shades (fourth canon) are elements of a composition (fifth canon), and only the composition of a painting can reveal the vitality with spirit and rhythm. The definition of composition given by Hsieh Ho is: a rhythmic rendering of the subjects in order to depict the feeling, or the spirit of the artist.

      Let us go back to the original text, the Chinese written words. I believe that they may help us to understand more what Hsieh Ho really tried to say. His first canon contains four characters.

      . According to our dictionaries, the Ch'i in Yuan Ch'i is the mystic origin of the universe, which contains the dual powers: Yin and Yang, from where all things come into existence; the Ch'i in Sheng Ch'i is life and any living force; the Ch'i in Ling Ch'i is gods, spirits and anything metaphysical; the Ch'i in Ku Ch'i or Ao Ch'i is a person's ideals or morality; the Ch'i in P'i Ch'i is emotion, disposition. In the field of art, the Ch'i is very similar to the English word air, which means atmosphere, and its extensions could be: attitude, bearing, manner, style, strength, spirit, and so forth. And by the way, Ch'i is also the word for breath, air, steam, gas, and even smell.

      . In our dictionaries, this word has a very limited meaning: aria, melody or rhythm. This word is simply a combination of two symbols: one is music and the other is circulation.

      So when these two words Ch'i and Yun, combine as one term, it means: elegant atmosphere, music-like arrangement, or spiritual refinement.

      . Sheng is a verb which means to produce, to bring forth, to beget, to be born, to live, and to grow up . When it is used as a noun, it is life; when it is used as an adjective, it is raw, young, innocent, and natural.

      . Tung is also a verb which means to move, to take action. When it is used as a noun, it is energy, force, movement; when it

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