Tranquil, Staid, Beautiful And Unconstrained

Gong Xian, the best known of the late Ming and Early Qing painters in Nanjing, lived a poor and miserable life during this chaotic period. His compilation of poetry- the Xiang Cao Tang Ji, which is well-known for its elegant and fresh style, reflects his early life experiences and emotions. As opposed to the impulsive and carefree style of the Literati School which dominated at that time, Gong Xian’s works differed entirely from that of the other painters.Gong Xian’s style was closely related to his life experiences and free spirit, which laid a solid foundation of his surprising works. Though influenced and benefited from previous artists, for example, Dong Yuan of Five Dynasties and Dong Qichang of the Ming Dynasty, Gong Xian used the methods of ancient masters to express a new spirit. He paid more attention to brush method and ink spirit. His landscapes are far more substantial than usual in Chinese painting, and fulfilling to perfection his prescription for aesthetic success.Gong Xian spent most of his life in Nanjing and his paintings were mainly about Nanjing’s landscapes. This paper discusses his brushwork, mastery of difficult and demanding techniques. He practiced a densely textured, monumental landscape style in which he was able to suggest volume and mass by varying the density and darkness of his ink dots. His ink appears moistened and enriched; his trees are gaunt and stricken; his mountains and rocks contrast between pale ink washes and dark dots. Such houses as he does put into his pictures have a blank, tomb-like appearance; his villages look like grave-yards. He developed his own lonely and self-reliant style.Gong Xian was also interested in theory and expression. In his opinion, painting has four standards. First is brush; second is ink; third is hills-and-valleys; and fourth is spirit-resonance. Brush method should be antique; ink spirit should be rich; hills-and-valleys should be stable. When these three are attained, then spirit-resonance will be among them. Brush method needs ripeness and well as antiqueness Hills-and-valleys is a general term for positioning and arranging(composition). Compositions should be natural but they must be surprising, for naturalness in combination with the unsurprising is no better than naturalness alone. The natural and the unsurprising come from the practiced hand; the surprising and the unnatural come from the untutored hand.Gong Xian’s landscapes have profound influence on the artists of later generations, especially Huang Binhong and Li Keran. According to Jia Youfu: “Gong Xian excelled particularly in landscape and few people could penetrate his secrets. He had created a new landscape painting style: dark, stately, solemn and surprising. There was no precedent and no possible follower.”Gong Xian created a vision of a tranquil, staid, beautiful and unconstrained landscape that has no antecedent in Chinese tradition. He had a profound and lasting influence upon modern landscape paintings.