Conscious Change - Transformation Of The Late Qing Dynasty Chinese Landscape Painting Dynasty

Chinese landscape painting has been developing independently and perfecting itself in its own way for a thousand years, the process of which found its expression in the changing of styles. However, in early20th century, the survival crisis of the nation resulted in the Salvation Movement not only in politics but also in culture, which had its effect on the art circle. The new generation of Chinese painters began to explore a new path for Chinese painting. They had two choices:one is to stick to the tradition and the other is to open up and learn from the west. By choosing the latter, Chinese landscape painting brought itself close to the society, instead of remaining a pure aesthetic practice both in terms of function and subject matter, as a result, accelerated its modernizing process. The paper focuses on the influences of varied trends of thoughts between late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China that have transformed Chinese painting, and emphasizes on the analysis of the new artistic concepts and techniques. Thus by setting the transformation of Chinese landscape painting in the context of historical and cultural back-ground, the paper has outlined the process of the transformation of Chinese landscape painting in the early20th century.