6?1 Summarize the aesthetic significance and cultural content of jade in ancient Chinese culture as? [Study aid]

Jade occupies a very important position in traditional Chinese culture. Han jade is renowned for its skillful and exquisite workmanship, and is used in ceremonies, rituals, funerals, decorations, and household items. The shape and decoration of Han jade are vivid, peculiar and beautiful, forming a unique artistic characteristic.

The art of jade carving is a dazzling treasure in Chinese traditional history and culture, and it is also unique in the world of art, with distinctive national characteristics. The Han Dynasty was a glorious period in the development of jade in China, and Han jade was renowned for its skillful and exquisite workmanship, which was used in ceremonies, rituals, funerals, decorations and daily necessities.

In the minds of ancient people, jade is the essence of heaven and earth, and the essence of the sun and the moon, and has the beautiful natural attributes of being warm and clean, crystal clear, refined and heavy. In the long process of human life practice, jade and "human nature" are integrated, and it becomes the object of the gentleman's "virtue in jade" and the symbol of power, status and wealth.

China is the earliest and most experienced country in the world in the use of jade, with a history of more than 10,000 years, judging from the archaeological results to date. From an aesthetic point of view, a large number of scholars believe that the development of ancient Chinese jade can be roughly divided into three historical stages.

The first stage is from the Middle and Late Paleolithic to the Late Shang Dynasty. During this period, influenced by the way of perceiving the world, jade works were condensed with the cultural factors of witchcraft, such as nature worship, totem worship, ancestor worship and ghost worship, and mainly became the magical tools for people to communicate with heaven and earth and to honor the gods and pray for blessings, presenting a mysterious and simple aesthetic characteristic in the shape of the jade objects, their decorations as well as the conception of using jade.

From the Zhou to the Han Dynasty is the second stage in the development of ancient Chinese jade. This period was the formation and development of feudal society in China, and Confucianism dominated the hundred schools of thought. As a gentleman "compares virtue with jade", jade not only continued to carry the functions of sacrificing to heaven and earth and honoring the gods and praying for blessings, but also contained a rich content of Confucian cultural thought, becoming a special object with social and moral meanings, and an important material carrier expressing the concepts of ethical indoctrination and discerning the norms of human relationships. At the same time, the understanding and grasp of the world gradually matured and systematized, and jade production during this period became more and more rationalized and standardized. As a result of the deep and heavy rational content, jade wares embodied the aesthetic characteristics of sacredness and neatness in their aesthetic tendency.

From the Wei and Jin Dynasties to the end of the Qing Dynasty is the third period of ancient Chinese jade development. During the Wei and Jin eras, the jade industry entered a low ebb, but it still had its significance. The Wei and Jin eras were a period of great transformation in the history of Chinese culture and thought, which conceptually and practically broke the long history of ceremonial jade traditions, while the Sui and Tang eras, in which Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism were emphasized side by side, opened up and established the direction of jade as a living object. With the continuous improvement of productivity, the development of the commodity economy and urban economy in the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing eras, and the expansion of the civic class, whose aesthetic interests became more and more dominant, the jade wares of this period showed the aesthetic tendency of popularization and secularization, and were characterized by the aesthetics of sensibility, secularism and naturalness.

The beauty of jade is "the beauty of splendor that returns to blandness". The natural beauty of jade is even more beautiful when it is recreated artificially. Ancient people not only showed great skill in creating jade, but also demonstrated exquisite artistic conception and ideals of beauty. The jade objects of each era reveal a particular aesthetic style and are the crystallization of a particular aesthetic sense.

The Han Dynasty was a powerful era in the history of our feudal society. From the point of view of the jade objects unearthed from the Han tombs, the early and middle period of the Western Han Dynasty was characterized by high quantity, good quality and high artistic value. In the late Western Han Dynasty to the late Eastern Han Dynasty, the quantity is less and the quality is poorer. Ceremonial jades of the Han Dynasty mainly consisted of biks and congs, which were partly inherited from the Qin Dynasty and the pre-Qin Dynasty, and tended to be simplified in terms of types of vessels, with juan and amber being more decorative, and congs and jangs being almost invisible. The Han dynasty jade jade bibs developed from the Warring States jade bibs and represented the highest achievement of ancient Chinese jade bibs in terms of their regularity of form, fine workmanship, and exquisite ornamentation. On both sides of the jade jade bib, it is relatively common to find a dense carving of bushels and valleys, with netting and cloud patterns; some of them, on this basis, have a week's worth of intertwined, balanced and symmetrical dragons, phoenixes, chi dragons and tigers carved in relief at the outer edges. From the styling and decoration point of view, from the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods onwards, the production characteristics of jade jade bik changed significantly, the new jade era of jade bik more light vein without lines, the type is relatively simple. During the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, the thicknesses of the jade bibs were uneven, and the shapes of the jade bibs were not regular, and most of the jade bibs were not round enough inside and outside. Since the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods, the jades are quite regular and have silkworm, grain, bushel and animal patterns.

Jade dancers, a kind of jade pendant commonly seen in the Han Dynasty, have realistic forms and are extremely dynamic. Han dynasty jade shows high artistic achievement, small ornaments carving good at catching the typical characteristics of animals and a particular situation of the demeanor, a few cuts, will be interesting. Jade is mostly carved with knives, commonly known as "Han eight knife".

Influenced by the Yellow Emperor's teachings, the Han people, especially the ruling class, showed the pursuit of immortality, so there was a greater development of burial jade in the Han Dynasty. From the archaeological data, the Han Dynasty jade clothing production of the tedious degree almost to the point of no return, the current excavation of jade clothing has more than 20 sets. From the results of the excavation, the use of jade clothes has a strict hierarchy.

The Han Dynasty jade artifacts are the result of the fusion of the Central Plains culture and the Chu culture. Chu is a country of witch wind blazing, they come from the primitive society, less rational immersion, more preserved the clan society's legacy and customs. They imagined rich, peculiar, strange, self-contained regional culture, with a fresh, free and romantic style. Most of the rulers in Han Dynasty were Chu people, who inherited the culture of the Central Plains with reverence on the one hand, and inevitably colored the culture of the Central Plains with the characteristics of the Chu culture and integrated the culture of the Central Plains with the Chu culture on the other. This is fully embodied in the Han Dynasty jade jade annulus, engraved with bushel pattern, valley pattern of the shape of the regular jade annulus carved on the beautiful flying dragon and phoenix image, the regularity and rigor of the outside but also a flying flow of whimsy, reflecting the Han Dynasty to the deep spirit of rationality and bold romantic imagination combined with the spirit of the art. The openwork and translucent carving techniques of the Han Dynasty are more decorative, showing the romantic style of the Chu culture and a unique sense of aesthetics. The most prominent jade works of the Chu culture are the Jade Immortal Prancing Horse of the Han Dynasty, and the imagery of the flying horse treading on white clouds reflects the desire of the Han people, who were y influenced by the thought of the Yellow Emperor, to get rid of the realities and ascend to immortality. The simplicity, exaggeration and neatness of the style reflect the soaring and flowing artistic style of Han Dynasty art. In addition, the strange shapes of jade evil spirits and jade beasts also reflect the rich imagination and romantic feelings of the Chu people. It can be seen that, on the one hand, Han jade inherited the tradition of the previous generation of jade, on the other hand, under the influence of the imaginative Chu culture, its modeling and ornamentation are more vivid, peculiar and beautiful, forming a majestic and peculiar, grand and magnificent artistic characteristics.

The spirit condensed by jade is a precious treasure of traditional thought. Over the past thousands of years, it has subtly impregnated and influenced people's ideology and behavior, injected positive vitality into the formation and solidity of the traditional outstanding national psychology and national character, and cultivated the noble sentiments of the children of the Yellow Emperor. Oriental elegance, subtlety, gentleness, courtesy of the image of the qualities of a certain extent is the reproduction of the virtues of jade material, has a unique charm.

In short, the long history, far-reaching connotations and influence on all aspects of society have ultimately laid down the lofty status of jade in the minds of the Chinese nation, won the cherishing and love of generations, and become one of the important symbols of ancient Chinese culture, flashing an everlasting brilliant light.