Study Of Woodcut Art Thoughts In Yan'an Period

The thirties and forties of the last century, the new woodcut movement advocated by Lu Xun promoted the new development of Chinese printmaking from copy stage to creation stage. Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts provided powerful environment for printmaking and became the cradle of printmaking artists in Yan'an period after its establishment in 1938. This paper will study on the development and significance of woodcut in Yan'an period. The formation causes of its art ideas and painting styles will also be analyzed. The spirit of that age, traditional culture, war and revolution are important factors that we should considerate. And we can't discuss that without the art works, art ideas and art skills. Because of its unity of art and ideology, its function of propaganda, encouragement and guidance, woodcut was much popular at that time.In this paper, the works of Gu Yuan, Li Qun, Lin Jun, Yang Tingbin, Zhao Mingsheng are taken as examples. The political philosophy, artistic thought, artistic expression, painting style, and patriotism of the works will be deep analyzed. Meanwhile, the woodcut in Yan'an period will be investigated under the background of Chinese modern history and the development history of Chinese art. And its ethnic style will be demonstrated. The artists in Yan'an period went deep into life, northern farmers and soldiers against Japan. They sucked in the Loess folk culture with strong regional characteristics, and gradually formed a strong struggle, political tendency and distinctive national style of art. At the same time, the woodcut works in Yan'an period will be compared with the foreign ones to find out the differences between Chinese and Western art forms, so the art thoughts in Yan'an period will be understand better.To learn and understand the artistic thoughts of wood carving in Yan'an period, we must get to know the time background, historical reasons, typical representative etc, especially the social space and the demand of the people. Art creation needs professional art workers to go deep into the people and learn the essence of folk art. They should sum up their experience and form correct art ideas. They are guidance and soul of art creation and they determine the contents and quality of the art works. Great changes have taken place in art form and aesthetic style in late 1930 s. Imitating the west gradually transformed to emphasizing the ethnic characteristic. It has a great relationship with the hard work of the artist and the people in Yan'an period. It guided the direction of Chinese art in late twentieth Century.Through the study of woodcut thought in Yan'an period, we know that the woodcut printmaking concentrated the painter's thoughts, emotions and aesthetic requirement. In addition, it embodied the always adhere to the true, the good and the beautiful creation thought and the noble personality. The formation of the artistic thought is dependent on the cultivation of character and traditional culture. The woodcut in Yan'an period serviced the masses. The works, which are mellow and fresh, "exactly" re-appeared the life. Their spirit of devotion to art is worthy of our study and development. It is more necessary for us to study their artistic thoughts.