What are the basic aesthetic forms in ancient China

Under the guidance of the principle of learning from nature, Chinese gardeners through the ages have created countless beautiful gardens with thousands of mountains, rivers, forests and springs as their origin, forming a gardening style with landscape as the backbone of the landscape. In this process, neutralization, chiaroscuro and mood are the three more representative basic aesthetic forms. These traditional aesthetic forms will surely show their far-reaching influence in the development of modern landscape gardening.

China has maintained a unified and continuous cultural form for thousands of years, creating a beautiful material civilization and a rare spiritual civilization, as well as a beauty with eternal charm in human history. Classical Chinese gardens are the living realm of beauty created by the Chinese nation, which is "in a limited space. It is "in the limited space. Create a visual endless, with a high degree of natural spiritual realm of the environment", is the essence and core of traditional Chinese architecture, is the traditional architecture of the extremely moving music, which permeates the traditional Chinese aesthetic philosophy. This paper analyzes the aesthetic forms hidden in the classical Chinese gardens and y affecting their development, hoping to light a small lamp for exploring the beauty of the ancient gardens.

I. Traditional Chinese Aesthetic Thought and Gardening Philosophy

The starting point of Chinese aesthetics is the aesthetics of Laozi. For thousands of years, a large number of philosophers, aestheticians and artists have continuously explored this field, thus forming a system of Chinese aesthetics that is unique and profound. This system contains the traditional essence of Chinese culture, which influences the people of China implicitly from thought to behavior. Summarizing and summarizing in this vast scope is obviously an arduous work, therefore, this paper can only argue on the most representative and influential propositions of classical Chinese aesthetics from the perspective of design aesthetics.

For the traditional aesthetics, "the idea of peace, from Plato onwards, Western culture has always been about the subject-object dichotomy, and so in the Western aesthetic tradition is characterized by the individual as the beauty", emphasizing on the image, vividness and novelty, which is considered to be an important attribute of what makes beauty beautiful. In other words, what Western aesthetics appreciates is 'the individual' and 'the localized.' In contrast to this Western aesthetic interest, traditional Chinese aesthetics emphasizes more on the "sense of wholeness", which is expressed in the idea of "harmony as beauty.

This sense of wholeness in Chinese aesthetics is based on the philosophical concept of wholeness. According to this holistic view, the world is an "all-embracing, covering all of the vast and complete system, in which everything, each suitable for its own nature, each in its own place, and never override any other existence. It is also a system of interactions and intermingling. In it, all existence and nature are in need of each other and are intertwined; there is no such thing as a single, naked being that can exist completely alone. To be beautiful with "harmony" means to have a holistic sense of aesthetic creation and evaluation, to be "harmonious" but not "divided". For example, the ancient pursuit of the unity of heaven and man, knowledge and behavior, the scene of unity, is the embodiment of the overall consciousness.

Under the guidance of the principle of the law of nature, Chinese gardeners have created countless beautiful gardens by taking the mountains, rivers, forests and springs of thousands of forms as the source, forming a gardening style with landscape as the backbone of the landscape. This kind of garden is aimed at expressing the interest of nature; it excludes the rule, symmetry, and avoids the atmosphere of manpower creation, which is fundamentally different from the western gardens with symmetrical axes, geometrical shapes, rows and columns, and emphasis on manpower. Which contains a deep and broad Chinese aesthetic philosophy, the ancient Chinese aesthetic form with the development of classical garden evolution, there is ~ a continuous process of emergence, development and maturity, in the process, neutralization, rhyme and mood is more representative of the three basic aesthetic form.

The analysis of several aesthetic forms in classical Chinese gardens

1. The embodiment of "neutral" aesthetic form

Neutralization is the spirit of traditional Chinese aesthetics is the fundamental, but also the most original aesthetic form, this idea has been throughout the development of the ancient Chinese aesthetic form of the development process, embodied in the garden is the Chinese garden of the development of aesthetic form, the Chinese garden of the development of the aesthetic form of the development process. This idea has been throughout the development of the ancient Chinese aesthetic form, reflected in the garden is the principle of Chinese garden gardening - mastery of nature, as the so-called heaven and earth and, all things sprouting. The process of building gardens is, after all, a process of human creation, and at this time, the gardeners tried to make their creations, i.e., gardens, and nature to achieve a kind of neutral, and "relationship. Its typical representative is the Tang style garden.

Mountains, water, plants, architects constitute the four basic elements of the garden, the four main means of gardening is also corresponding to: building mountains, water, plant configuration, the construction of garden buildings, and these several divisions of labor between the virtual reality, near and far, the size of the garden, how much of the overall feel of the very important impact. "In is the unity of opposites;" and is the fusion of two or more opposing factors. Therefore, in the neutral and the dominant idea of gardening in the "sense of proportion is particularly important, in what kind of occasions, the need for a large volume of buildings, how large an area of water, how many kinds of plants in what place how to distribute, etc., the sense of proportion embodied in these designs are to make the whole garden to achieve a pleasant, quiet, comfortable feeling of interest. At this point in the neutralization, both quantitative compromise, balance, and qualitative convergence, integration, which emphasizes the opposition, there are differences between the various factors and forces to seek common ground, equal *** birth, mutual penetration, integration and coherence. Neutralization in the garden embodies a scale, a standard, so that the whole looks more harmonious, more heavenly.

The Tang Dynasty Xingqing Palace, for example, in the northeast of the outer citadel of Chang'an, southeast of the Imperial City of Xingqing Square, occupying a square and a half of the land. From the plan we can see the natural shape and geometric shape equally and harmonious **** integration, the north of the palace area layout rigorous and regular, a water canal through the palace and the Dragon Pond, the southern Dragon Pond as well as its northeastern part of the small rockery is softened the hardness of the entire palace, the traditional Chinese built environment symmetrical and even layout is largely a product of feudal rites, Confucian ethical concepts materialized. And the garden as the antithesis of such a strict built environment, but long-term harmony with it **** exist, reflecting the philosophy of Taoism and neutralization of nature. This is also from a side of the Confucianism and Taoism, these two kinds of bondage and liberation of thought in the field of cultural life in our country's intermingling, but also can be glimpsed in the classical gardens tumbled to reveal the people at that time longing to get rid of the feudal rites of passage of the bondage, the desire to return to the natural life of the good wishes.　　The most fundamental and highest level of neutralization is characterized by the unity of heaven and man, which is the soul of Chinese aesthetic culture. In the garden as the purpose of gardening, that is, aimed at guiding people to a feeling: people and the world, the landscape has a sensory relationship, can influence each other, interact with each other. As Bai Juyi's poem "Why wash my ears? The head of the house flying down the spring; how to purify my eyes, the white lotus under the masonry.

2, "rhyme" aesthetic form of the embodiment

Chinese gardens can always leave a lot of associations and infinite room for reflection, reflecting the human life aspired to the fullness of the state of the full and active, dynamic characteristics, which is the embodiment of the aesthetic form of rhyme. Its typical representative is the Suzhou Garden.

Chinese gardens emphasize writing, Western gardens emphasize writing. Charm is often inscrutable, unquantifiable; while the Western classical gardens have been born to be quantified and determined; it is the uncertainty of the Chinese garden, giving people a mysterious, ineffable feeling, the great sound, the elephant is invisible," is the reason.

As the bamboos hold reflections of the Suzhou Garden, elegant charm, such as ink painting generally swaying in spring, fall, winter and summer, Jiangnan private garden is to break the artificial things, but not completely disregard for the scale and proportion, but a higher level of control over them, so that it seems to do as you wish, free to do as you like, but in fact there are in line with the perfect internal rules. Full of unique tension and vitality, it is this kind of chiaroscuro that exists in private gardens that gives each garden its own character and life, presenting a colorful and unique charm under the urban texture of the grand unification.

The unspoken words of chiaroscuro, just like the bubbling undercurrent, will be in the garden of the people and the landscape in the garden subtle connection, so that the two produce internal communication, so that people will linger on and forget to come back. Zhuangzi Zhi Beiyou" said: "Heaven and earth have great beauty without words", this traditional thought that the most ideal, the most perfect. Elephant is not with the shape of the most beautiful things can not be described in words, so the elephant ' "great beauty" can only be through the subjective imagination of the subject of the aesthetic to comprehend; can only rely on the garden of the "God frame" "Wonderful frame" can frame to reflect to induce. Good garden should be like our country's beautiful mountains and rivers, with the kind of attraction to imagine, can move people to think about the inner spirit.

3, "mood" the embodiment of the aesthetic form

Mind is a completely self-aware and self-sufficient aesthetic form, it is the product of the individual's spiritual activities, it is based on the form and beyond the object, to achieve the subject of the mind and the object of the form of the milk of the water, Chinese gardens pay attention to the mood, and because of the synthesis and three-dimensional space of the image of the painting and poetry. Chinese gardens emphasize on mood, and because of its synthesis with poetry and painting, and the image of three-dimensional space, the connotation of mood is more explicit than other art categories. The ultimate unification of the subject and the object in the garden is the forgetfulness of the object and the self. China's Summer Palace is a model of this aesthetic characteristic.

When as the aesthetic subject of itself and the aesthetic object of the Summer Palace landscape integration, this mood completed the conversion of time and space, so that people beyond the constraints of time and space, get the freedom of the aesthetic mind, the scene in front of them evoke the memory of the scene, evoke the thought of the scene, resulting in an illusory scene, so that people's inner liberation, and the scene in the context of the space and time to roam, experience a perfect aesthetic feeling.

"In the realm of me, I see things as I see them, so they are all colored with my colors; in the realm of no me, I see things as I see them, so I don't know what is me and what is a thing"--Wang Guowei's "Words on Earth"

Taking the Summer Palace as an example, the combination of the architecture and the garden is seamless, perfect and beautiful. The combination of architecture and gardening in the Summer Palace is seamless and perfectly harmonious, which also caters to the Taoist's attitude of "to be, but not to rely on, master, but not to slaughter" towards nature, and at the same time reflects the philosophical thought of "heaven, man and one" of the traditional Chinese aesthetic form.

Scenario integration is the mutual discovery and stimulation of "emotion" and "scenery". And the scenario to rise to the mood requires the admirer's eyes "and the garden of the" scene "sublimation of each other, the admirer's emotions projected to the scene, so that the garden of the scene also took the admirer's emotions. On the contrary, the scenery of the garden makes the original admirer's unnamable emotion to obtain the external image, this is called. Scenario blending, and then, produced a touching mood. In such a garden, the appreciator in the purely spiritual activities to obtain the free existence; thus creating for themselves a spiritual home of their own.

In short, the development of Chinese gardens has gradually matured to its peak with the infiltration of neutralization - chiaroscuro - mood, and at the same time, the embodiment of these three aesthetic forms in the gardens can be both simultaneously ****existing, but also have a history of progression, and there is a logical juxtaposition, correspondence, and logical At the same time, these three aesthetic forms in gardens can both ****exist at the same time and have historical progression, both logically juxtaposed and correspondent, but also rich and deepened in terms of connotation and extension, reflecting a high degree of unity between the history and logic of the development of Chinese garden. Nowadays, the development of landscape gardening needs to find its roots and explore its own cultural soul in order to have a foothold in the forest of the world's gardens, during which the role of the traditional aesthetic form will definitely show its more powerful role, indicating its far-reaching influence in the development of modern landscape gardening.