Preliminary Studies On Sculpturing Figures Of The Prehistory Of China

As a kind of plastic arts (造型艺术), Sculpturing Figures (雕塑人像) have a long history in China. That occur and developing and the contents of the Sculpturing Figures during the prehistory of China occupy an important place. Which not only accumulated the experience to the Chinese plastic arts but also induce and help to bring out the prehistoric cultures' developing. Based on a thorough collecting detailed on the Sculpturing Figures in the Noelithic Age, this article divided the prehistory's Sculpturing Figures into 4 culture areas and 3 stages.In the south-north of Yanshan(燕山) area, Sculpturing women or pregnant women is the typical case in this area. The second is the upper reaches of the Yellow River' Ganqing(甘肃,青海) area. Figure's head or face as an appendix sculptured on the painted pottery is this area's distinctive feature. The middle-low reach of the Yellow River is an anther area. The fourth area of the prehistory's Sculpturing Figures is the middle-low reaches of the Changjiang River Neolithic settlements. Man's figures were engraved on the stone or jade materials reflect the other tradition of this area.Regarding to the process of the Sculpturing Figures' development, this article divide them into an earlier and middle and a later phases. From 8000 to 7000 years ago is the first phase. Sculpturing Figures gathered in north China and middle reach of Yellow River. The second is the flourishing-periods including 6800 to 5200 years ago. Like the first phase, north and central of China are the areas that existthe Sculpturing Figures. To the years from 5200 to 4000 this day ago, the Sculpturing Figures' producing got unprecedented development. In north area emerged a belt as the Hongshan culture's naked goddess that molded with pottery clay. The Yellow River Valley prevalented the small single figures, and the shapes with the figure's head or face as a part on the potteries. While the Shijiahe culture and the Lingjiatan sites' jade figures in the Changjiang River Valley show a great development in the prehistoric plastic arts.It is clearly that the prehistoric people in the got the happy feelings and the content in mental when they made those works. What the man who sculptured figures needed not to get the appreciation of the beautiful but to express the wishes of the produce including man's reproduction. Following the improving of the social productive forces, the society has an elaborate division of work, Archaeological Cultures' exchanging and colliding become into a sharp state. About on the age of 5000 years ago, the archaeological cultures in the middle-low reaches of Yellow and Changjiang Rivers and west Liao River entered the Civilization Age. As the same time, the Sculpturing Figures continued to transmit all the simple-direct wishes of the people, while its became the tools that served for the ruling class.