Basic Techniques of Figure Painting in Chinese Painting

Basic Techniques of Figure Painting In the early history of painting, both Chinese and foreigners, figure painting was the mainstay of painting, and all of them served religious or political purposes. From the ancient silk paintings or murals excavated in recent years, we can see the faces of ancient emperors, ministers, sages or literati, with strong political and religious functions, as well as figures of Buddhism, Bodhisattva, Lohan and other Buddhism and Taoism figures believed by the ancients, and even earlier myths and legends, full of mysterious religious colors, and we can also see custom paintings depicting the realities of life, paintings of ladies expressing the aesthetic taste of the palace, and paintings of characters in operas, etc. There are various forms and subjects of figure painting. All kinds of different forms and themes of figure paintings have detailed emotional depiction, and exquisite image portrayal, bringing a profound sense of beauty to the viewer.

An overview of ancient Chinese figure painting, in the performance of the technique can be roughly divided into three categories, one for the white drawing method. The first is the white drawing method. Three for the writing method (simple brush painting method), which are briefly described as follows

White painting method

White painting method is the earliest, the most concise form of painting expression of mankind, China's ancient known as the "white painting", some people also known as the "line drawing", such as the warring states of China's two earliest tomb unearthed in China's first painting, that is, to the performance of the white painting method, the early white paintings, the line-drawing technique to the main uniform and smooth lines, to the Tang dynasty Wu Daozi, who was the most important figure of the Chinese people in ancient times. In the early days of white painting, the line drawing technique was based on even and smooth lines, and it was only in the Tang Dynasty that Wu Daozi could develop the white drawing lines to the point where there were changes in thickness and weight, which vividly expressed the movement and thickness of the folds of the garments. In the Northern Song Dynasty, the artist Li Gonglin is a representative of the white drawing method. The picture below is Li's "Vi Membrane", which brings the characteristics of the line to the most perfect state.

During the Jiaqing period of the Ming Dynasty, Zou Dezhong summarized the rich creative experience of his predecessors, and in his book, "Painting and Enlightenment," he introduced the term "eighteen strokes," which refers to: 1. the strokes of running clouds and flowing water, 2. the strokes of ancient silk, 3. the strokes of iron wire, 4. the strokes of willow leaves, 5. the strokes of zither strings, 6. the strokes of ants and locusts, 7. the strokes of mingling, 8. the strokes of chunks of nails, 9. the strokes of cao yi, 10. the strokes of the nails and rats 11. the strokes of folding reeds, 12. the strokes of reducing strokes, 13. the strokes of war strokes and water lines. 13. Battle Brush 14. Bamboo Leaf 15. Olive 16. Earthworm 17. Date Kernel 18. Withered Faggot

The above eighteen techniques were developed by the ancients according to the clothing of the time (most of which had wide robes and big sleeves), some of which could be seen before the Tang Dynasty, while others were added gradually later. However, the eighteen depictions are not exhaustive, and some advocate simplifying them into five, or merging them into three categories. Mr. Dong Mengmei, a contemporary painter who specializes in white characters, pointed out that the eighteen strokes are named after the shape of the line strokes, which is not appropriate.

Brushwork and heavy color painting

Brushwork and heavy color painting is a kind of neat and detailed modeling, colorful and slightly decorative painting method, the following picture is a typical work of the late Tang Zhou's hairpin ladies Painting Brushwork and heavy color painting is suitable for the use of cooked paper or silk, usually can be divided into six steps:

(a) Drafting: first, the figure with a pencil or charcoal on the paper to draw the correct modeling, corrected and perfect, then the paper covered with the top of the drawing. After perfecting the drawing, the paper will be covered with overdrawing.

(2) hook line: hook line there are two ways, one is called the hook method, that is, first hooked out the outline line with light ink, and then after coloring with heavy ink or heavy color to the main lines of the main line to repeat the hook once, this method is not afraid of coloring the original line cover, draw more convenient Another is called the hook method, that is, the outline of the line hooked in thick or light ink, not the color of the line covered with ink, this method is smooth, but not the color of the hook, this method is a good idea. hook out of the lines smooth, but fill in the color more work.

(3) dyeing base color: In order to show the face and folds of the bumpy changes in the dark place first dyeing a heavy color, the face can be used ochre dyeing, the method is to bead a pen dipped in ochre, a pen dipped in water, the first part of the dyeing with the color pen, that is, with the water pen to push away the cheeks of the maiden can be used to magenta dyeing first.

(4) Coloring: The traditional coloring method of the ladies is similar to the make-up of the Peking Opera characters, which is called the three-white method, i.e., the forehead, nose, and the three parts of the lower jaw are haloed in white powder, the eye orbitals and the cheeks are more exaggerated in color, and the magenta is used to make the red and vinegar, with a little powder. The men's faces are made of ochre, vinegar, and vinegar, with a little powder.

(5) Overlay: After rendering and coloring, in order to unify the tone or remedy some inconsistencies, such as the face, it is common to use light ochre to paint one or two times.

(6) color enhancement: before the final completion of the key parts of the processing, such as the eyes, mouth, corners or nose, etc., so that it is more prominent Painting the face of the ladies in the three white part of the white powder, and sometimes from the back of the paper dyeing the white powder, in order to strengthen the powder of the face of the powder of the powder effect, the general commonly used in the painting of the heavy-colored figures of the dyeing method are: cover (flat color) Narrow dyeing (narrow range of the dyeing of a narrow range of sub-dyeing) Wide dyeing and dyeing overlaying dyeing hollowing dyeing (dyeing the background color and leaving the background color). (dyeing the background color and leave the front figure) dye (dyeing children or women's cheeks, coloring rotating brush, so that the color gradually fade into nothing, but does not leave brush marks).

The following plate is a demonstration of Mr. Dong Mengmei's steps to set the color of the picture of the mother of Mercy First, the draft hook line to complete the white (hair must be rendered through a number of light ink), and then take two sheep-hair brushes to dye color, with the color of flowers and green Zhu fat pink and yellow and other colors to dye the clothes Drying and then dyeing the clothes, and ochre to dye the face, grass-green hook clothes lines Lastly, then magenta to dye the face, and to distinguish the intensity of the yin and yang After that, the lips of the white powder crochet line magenta dye stone green dyeing hair, clothes, accessories, etc., to complete the painting in general, many of the many many different colors, such as the color of the background, the color of the background, the color of the background, the color of the background of the painting. In short, many colors are not dyed at once, but need to be rendered many times to achieve the desired depth and uniformity before stopping.

Oriography

In the Fifth Dynasty, Shi Ke's "Two Ancestors" painted works of Zen with a wildly cursive brushwork, and in the Southern Song Dynasty, Liang Kai developed reduced-brush figure painting, pioneered a new style, and created the method of splashing ink with a large brush, which made him a representative painter of realistic figure painting. His works, such as "Immortals in Splash Ink" and "Li Taibai Singing", use bold and simple ink and brushwork to vividly express the charisma of the figures. In recent times, since the Eight Monsters of Yangzhou, there have been many painters who specialize in ink and wash figure painting, which has gradually formed a major trend in Chinese figure painting.

Drawing figures should use raw paper, usually start with a charcoal pencil on the paper gently hooked outline (if you are already skilled, it is not necessary to hook the outline with a charcoal pencil), and then dipped in ink to draw the main line, painted on the large ink color surface gradually aggravated, and then draw the secondary line and color surface, and try to avoid the use of trivial ink and ink, so as not to undermine the unity of the whole.

When drawing on raw paper, it is difficult to modify once you have failed, so when you use the brush and ink, you must consider the overall harmony and the emphasized places (such as the eyes) must be drawn in a vivid manner. Ink painting, and then on the production of color, color prairie should be careful, based on the structure of the character, the relationship between light and dark to express the color, in order to increase the color changes, live to reflect the spirit and expression of the character.

The following plate is a demonstration of Mr. Li's painting "Qu Zi Xing Yin". His painting method is to put on the color first, and then outline the ink lines. First, he dipped a sheep-hair brush in ochre to draw the face, thick ink to draw the hair, and blue and white to draw the robe. Then he used a small wolf-hair brush to outline the lines of the face and the robe, and then used ochre ink to differentiate between the yin and yang sides, and finally added the scene and the signature to complete the painting.