What is commonly used in ancient Chinese paintings to describe the proportions of the human face

An important feature of ancient Chinese painting is the focus on line.

Chinese painting, also known as "Chinese painting", is a traditional painting in China (different from "Western painting"). The tools and materials include brushes, ink, pigments, rice paper, silk, etc. The subject matter can be divided into figures, landscapes, flowers and birds, etc. The techniques can be divided into brushwork and writing, and its spiritual core is "ink and brush".

Difference between Chinese painting and Western painting

Eastern and Western cultures are fundamentally different. Therefore, the expression of art is also different. Probably Eastern art emphasizes subjectivity, while Western art emphasizes objectivity. Eastern art is poetic, Western art is dramatic. Therefore, in painting, Chinese painting emphasizes charm, Western painting emphasizes resemblance. Comparing the two, there are the following five differences:

(1) Chinese paintings are full of lines, Western paintings are not significant lines.

Most of the lines are not original to the object, but are used by the artist to represent the realm of the two objects. For example, in Chinese paintings, an egg-shaped line represents the human face, but in fact there is no such line around the human face, and this line is the boundary between the face and the background. Another example is to draw a curved line to represent the nose of a person, in fact, there is no such line on the nose, and this line is the boundary between the nose and the face. Another example is landscapes and flowers, where there are no lines on the real thing, but the artist uses lines. Landscape in the line specially named "chapped (chapped & lt; cūn & gt; method: one of the techniques of Chinese painting, used to show the texture of rocks and bark.)". )". Character lines in the special name "folds". It is all a difficult research work. Western painting is not, only the boundary of each object, the boundary does not depict the line. So Western painting is very much like a physical object, and Chinese painting is not like a physical object, a look at its painting. Chinese painting and calligraphy have the same origin, and painting is the same as writing, which can be done at will, disclosing one's mind. But the Western painting before the late Impressionism, are not significant lines.

(2) Chinese painting focuses on mood, Western painting focuses on perspective.

Perspective is the expression of three-dimensional objects on a flat surface. Western paintings strive to resemble the real thing, it is very concerned about perspective. Try to look at the Western painting of the city streets, houses, furniture, artifacts, etc., the shape is very correct, even with the same as the real thing. If it is depicted in the corridor of the light, even in a few inches of the table out of the distance of several feet to. If you depict the railroad in the front (standing in the middle of the railroad and looking out), you can show the distance of several miles in several inches. Chinese painting is not, do not like to paint the city streets, houses, furniture, artifacts and other three-dimensional phase is very significant things, but like to write clouds, mountains, trees, waterfalls and other things from a distance, such as the natural plane things. Occasionally, when depicting houses and artifacts, he did not pay attention to the perspective method, but expressed himself arbitrarily. For example, the painting of the courtyard deep light, the corridors and caves, all the rows of representation, as if flying into mid-air when seen; and not a time to see, but flying back and forth, flying up and down, several times to see. Therefore, in the hand scroll of Chinese painting, the landscape stretches for several zhang, as if it is seen in the train. In the standing scroll of a Chinese painting, the landscapes are overlapping, as if they were seen in an airplane. Because the Chinese paintings are the same as poems, wherever they think of, they paint wherever they want, and they can't be constrained by perspective. Therefore, sometimes the perspective in Chinese paintings can be wrong, but this mistake is not a big problem, we can not use the laws of Western painting to criticize Chinese paintings.

(3) Chinese painting does not emphasize anatomy, while Western figure painting emphasizes anatomy.

Anatomy is the study of the shape of the human skeleton and muscles. Westerners for figure painting, must first study anatomy. The name of this anatomy is: anatomy for art students, that is, art anatomy. So it is different from physiological anatomy, physiological anatomy of the human body and the role of the structure of the ministries, art anatomy is specialized in the performance of the shape. But also need to memorize the name of the bones, muscles and flesh, and its shape of all kinds of perversion, is a kind of hard learning. But Western painters must learn. Because Western painting focus on realism, must be depicted with the real human body. But Chinese figure painters never need this kind of learning. Chinese painting figures, the purpose is only in the character of the table out of the characteristics of the posture, but do not speak of the character of the size of the ministries and proportions. Therefore, the men in Chinese paintings have a strange and ancient appearance, and their bodies and heads are not proportional to each other. The women, on the other hand, have moth-eyebrows and cherry lips, and slender shoulders and waists. If you take off the clothes of these figures, their shape is terrible. But this is the advantage of Chinese painting. Chinese painting wants a strong impression, so it expands the characteristics of the characters to make the men more majestic, the women more delicate, and fully express their character. Therefore, they do not use the realistic method but the symbolic method. Instead of seeking resemblance, they seek divine resemblance.

(4) Chinese painting does not emphasize the background, Western painting is very heavy background.

Chinese paintings do not emphasize the background, for example, to write plum blossoms, a hanging in the air, surrounded by white paper. For example, when writing a plum blossom, one hangs in the air, surrounded by white paper. When writing a character, one hangs in the air, as if riding on clouds. Therefore, Chinese painting paper, leaving a lot of blank space. A very long piece of paper, the lower part of the depiction of a vegetable or a piece of stone, it becomes a vertical scroll. Western painting is not, everything must have a background, such as fruit, the background for the table. In the case of figures, the background is indoor or outdoor. Therefore, the whole picture is filled with paint, leaving no blank space. This difference between Chinese painting and Western painting is also due to the difference between realism and visualization. Western painting emphasizes realism, so the background must be painted. Chinese paintings emphasize on the spirit of the painting, so it must delete the trivial and specialize in the subject, in order to achieve a strong impression.

(5) The subject matter of oriental paintings is mainly nature, and the subject matter of western paintings is mainly people.

Before the Han Dynasty, Chinese paintings also used figures as the main subject matter. But in the Tang Dynasty, landscape painting was independent. Until today, landscape has always been the main theme of Chinese painting. In the Western world, figures have been the main subject since the Greek era. The religious paintings of the Middle Ages were mostly about the masses. For example, the Last Judgment, the victory of death, etc., a painting of countless figures.