The Beauty Of Shan-shui In The Chinese Classical Garden

The landscape beauty of Chinese classic gardens which is mainly embodied by piled up mountains and waters is characterized by the man-made natural beauty. It is regarded as the second nature created by mankind. The author collected and reviewed volumes of literature on Chinese classical art and architecture. Using comparative method, case studies were made on the aesthetical philosophy of Chinese classical gardens.There're 4 chapters in the paper. Chapter 1 summarizes characteristics of the unique Chinese Shan-shui culture, the underlying element explaining the beauty of classical gardens. Chinese Shan-shui culture takes forms of painting, poetry and gardening, with the 3 of them closed intertwined. Influence of paintings and poetry on Shan-shui culture is discussed in depth in this chapter. The fundamental worldview of ancient Chinese is the unity of human and heaven, which is holistic concept of harmonious human-nature relationship. From this perspective Chapter 2 investigates the hidden drive of such aesthetic philosophy of Chinese classical gardens: man-made vs. nature. By analyzing the aesthetics in Shan-shui scenery, Chapter 3 shows all the forms embodying such beauty. The Chinese word for landscape, Shan-shui, literally means "mountains and waters" while a common phrase for making a garden means "digging ponds and piling mountains", this technique is also discussed in this part. Based on the former chapters, the last chapter employs Qian Xuesen's theory of Shan-shui city to bring the aesthetics of Shan-shui into modern cities, combining Chinese classical gardening with current urban planning.