Why the portrait of the ancients and the modern gap is large

The technical concepts in painting have changed considerably. Western oil painting should be more realistic, of course, there may be a lot of embellishment. Chinese painting figures may start out favoring God over form.

Purely from a technical point of view, Chinese painting has been able to "paint like" for a long time. And the period of maturity of portrait painting may be much earlier than we think.

As far back as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, China already had early portrait paintings. These paintings were still relatively simple, with the figures mostly in profile and resembling silhouettes. However, in the silk paintings unearthed from ancient tombs of the Warring States and Han Dynasties, there are also quite detailed and realistic portraits of people.

Portrait painting continued to develop in the Wei and Jin dynasties. According to the Shishu Xinyi (New Sayings of the World), Xun Castor, a painter of the Wei and Jin dynasties, painted a portrait of Zhong Yao, the father of Zhong Hui, on the wall of the lobby of Zhong Hui's residence, with his "clothes, crown, and appearance as if he were a commoner". When he saw his father's portrait, he wept and wept, and eventually refused to live in the house.

In the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the great painter Gu Kaizhi put forward the idea of "viewing God in form". And with the rise and spread of scholarly tastes in the Wei and Jin dynasties, many dignitaries and literati were keen to ask others to paint their own portraits or paint themselves, and the famous calligrapher Wang Xizhi was one of them.

However, the portraits of historical figures that have survived from ancient times until the Tang Dynasty are still a disappointment to modern people who want to see their exact faces.

Arguably the best-known early portrait, Yan Liben's Tang Dynasty Pictures of Emperors and Kings Through the Ages contains portraits of thirteen pre-Tang emperors, ranging from Emperor Zhao of the Western Han Dynasty to Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty. It still offers emperors whose faces are too similar, and who are often nearly twice the height and size of their attendants, to be considered realistic.

Of course, this can be explained by the fact that Yan Liben painted this picture without any reference, relying purely on his imagination. Although he created this painting is by the Tang Emperor Taizong's approval, the painting also said that he had seen Taizong himself, as well as the Tubo emissary Ludongzan, but the painting still exists in the character facial depiction of a simple, disproportionate figure, etc., as for the painting of the two parties involved in the appearance, it can only be "roughly so".

Why Yan Liben's skills, or these problems? This should be his intention: in traditional Chinese painting theory, the so-called "realistic" meaning, not only refers to the "shape", more "God-like" requirements.

For example, the emperors in The Emperors of All Ages, although the image is similar, but the demeanor is different: the founding monarchs gleaming, the fallen king's face is disheveled, the tyrant Sui Yang Emperor is a weak color. Although the depiction of the face in the emperor's carriage is simple, it effectively shows the temperament of Emperor Tang Taizong as a wise ruler. As for the disproportionate figure of the characters, it is also to emphasize the kingly demeanor of the emperor in the painting. From the point of view of all to meet the needs of the emperor, Yan Liben so pen not only no problem, on the contrary, is quite "know how".

When will there be portraits that modern people will find "real"? Thanks to the missionaries.

While there are many records praising the high standard of the artists' work before the Song Dynasty, it was only after the Song Dynasty that portrait painting became a separate genre and was further developed.

The Emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty, Emperor Song Huizong, was arguably one of the most obsessed artists of ancient China. He painted landscapes, figures, flowers and birds, and was especially known for his realistic paintings. Legend has it that Emperor Huizong once asked his artists to paint a peacock taking a walk, and he was not satisfied with the painting because "the peacock ascends to the pier, lifting the left leg first", and everyone painted it as lifting the right leg first.

Similarly, after the Song Dynasty, ancient Chinese portraits paid great attention to the "real person" this standard. Since the Southern Song Dynasty, portrait painting has been further separated from scholar painting, and portrait painters have become increasingly specialized, becoming a new occupational category.

And as the best quality portraits of the period, the style of royal portraits has tended to be more realistic rather than the once "evocative".

The reason for this change is that: since the Song and Yuan dynasties, survived in the world's portrait is mostly used within the court to show the standard portrait of the descendants, its role is mainly hanging in the chamber for future generations of descendants of the rituals to observe, out of the court hanging in the street public is extremely rare. Therefore, the royal portrait is often in the "like" above the great effort, after all, the vast majority of people are not willing to let future generations to worship and look up to a person who does not look the same as himself.

The most common is from the Imperial Palace Nanxun Hall of the successive emperors and queens, as well as stored in the Qing dynasty court and the temple in the Qing dynasty emperor and consort portrait.

The Nanfen Hall was built in the Ming Dynasty, and became a place dedicated to images of emperors, queens and wise ministers during the Qing Dynasty. Inside the hall, there are two Song Dynasty emperors and queens enshrined in various palaces and pavilions in the Song Dynasty, Yuan Dynasty emperors and queens copied by the Ming Dynasty according to the old Yuan Dynasty albums, as well as portraits of saints and ministers of the past dynasties, *** totaling 121 copies of 583 portraits of all sizes.

Among the 63 portraits of emperors and queens in the Nanxun Hall, most emperors had one portrait each, with three for Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty and four for Emperor Tazu of the Song Dynasty. The most numerous portrait is that of Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of the Ming dynasty: 13 portraits of him alone.

After the mid- to late-Ming dynasty, Western missionaries entered China, and the realism of Chinese portraits began to soar. During the Qing Dynasty, Western missionaries became court painters, introducing modern Western painting techniques and applying them to everyday court portraits.

On the other hand, with the arrival of European missionaries in the East, Western painting techniques were gradually absorbed and mastered by Chinese painters, and portraits began to show a new mix of styles. Zeng Whale (曾鲸), who was active in Nanjing at the end of the Ming and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, was a representative figure of this style of painting, and created the "Pochen School of Painting", which combined traditional Chinese painting methods with modern Western painting methods.

Whether it was the various Yongzheng emperor's costume drawings, which were once popular, or a series of emperor and queen portraits and pleasure drawings created during the Qianlong period, they were all independently painted or participated in by western missionaries such as Lang Shining. Many of the Qianlong period of "national painting" portrait, in fact, are often painted by foreign artists first face, and then find Chinese painters to fill in the body of the dress and background.

And the Qing emperors' acceptance of Western painting was not without problems. Today we agree with the Western painting on the face of the effect of light and shadow depiction, especially in the face of the Lord like a shadow effect and highlights on the practice, in the eyes of the Chinese at the time is completely unacceptable: to the emperor's face, "black", what is the intention.

The Western painters who entered China at that time, therefore, preserved the anatomical structure of the face, while at the same time taking care of Oriental aesthetics, toned down the original strong contrasts between light and dark, and made the face clear and soft.

This combination of Chinese and Western painting techniques of the Bochen School was greatly admired at the time, and its influence has been so great that it continues to this day, with contemporary schools of Chinese painting still improving on the basis of this set of techniques. For example, the portrait of Du Fu created by Mr. Jiang Zhaohe after the founding of New China belongs to the continuation of this style of work.