How to Appreciate Ancient Chinese Paintings

Ancient Chinese paintings have a long history and unique style.

According to the traditional categorization, ancient Chinese paintings are divided into three major categories: figure painting, landscape painting and flower and bird painting. Figure painting in ancient China matured the earliest. The Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties had been the peak period of ancient Chinese figure painting. It always used lines as the main modeling means, and took the "Transfiguration" as the most fundamental requirement for shaping the artistic image. The Pictures of the Emperors and Kings of All Ages is said to be made by Yan Liben, a famous painter in the early Tang Dynasty. It depicts the images of thirteen emperors from the Han Dynasty, the Northern and Southern Dynasties to the Sui Dynasty. This kind of emperor statue in Tang Dynasty has the function of "promoting good and suppressing evil", so the image of each emperor in this painting is full of praise and blame. And this praise and blame is mainly reflected in the character and spiritual temperament of each emperor in the portrayal.

The image of Sima Yan, the Emperor of Jin Dynasty, is so majestic and generous that it can be realized that the artist is totally affirmative and praiseworthy to this emperor. In order to emphasize the image of Emperor Wu of Jin, the artist intentionally painted the two attendants of the emperor smaller, and the movements of the characters are also more single, showing the limitations of painting ability and skills at that time.

Gu Ma-teung's Han Xizai Night Banquet depicts Han Xizai, a prominent political figure in the Southern Tang Dynasty who was suspected by the Tang rulers of the Five Dynasties, entertaining his guests at night. Gu has skillfully constructed five segments, which are both related and relatively independent, to reproduce the main activities of the banquet. The one chosen here is the second section of the painting, which depicts Han Xizai dancing and beating the drums for the kabuki. The guests are seated or standing, moving or standing still, displaying a variety of demeanors.

Han Xizai himself looks depressed and unhappy, hinting at his inner conflict and pain. The work shows that ancient Chinese painters were already adept at portraying the inner world of their characters as early as the 10th century AD.