Aspects of Chen Dingkun’s Paintings:

Zhu Liuxin

Mr. Chen Dingkun’s paintings have been very well received in the art circles. His different painting languages with very unique traits give expressions to landscapes of different regions. Despite their different themes and styles, their aesthetic purport and value orientation are consistent. The differences in his painting languages and styles represent his reflections and explorations through different methods from several different perspectives in the course of inheriting and developing the Chinese art of painting. The final visual effects have also fully illustrated that his purposes and results are consistent whatever perspective he takes as the starting point for artistic explorations. The merits of his artistic creations are reflected in the following few aspects:

I. Equal attention to painting expressions in brush and ink and to life experience is his artistic value orientation, and to transform painting in brush and ink from traditional expressions to contemporary expressions is his artistic pursuit.

Painting, as a special kind of social consciousness activity, reflects an artist’s individual way of living experience and his understanding of and feeling for the society generated in such experience, as well as his reflection and comprehension transcending reality. Mr. Chen’s paintings are not only vivid portraits of the beautiful landscape of China but also expressions of his own emotions and aspirations, featuring not only the life prototypes of the objects represented but also the wonderful imagination and perception of the creative subject, embodying the emanation of the spirit to carry on the tradition in an all-round way and the individualistic creative activities, and combining noble aesthetic taste and superb expression. The characteristics of his paintings are reflected in the following four aspects: 1. The landscapes represented are refined from reality but is absolutely not photocopy of the natural landscape, as they come from life but rise above it. 2. The realm in the paintings is the reflection of the artist’s mind and is his ideal spiritual home and virtual ecology, which cannot be specifically located in the natural world, but is also the true artistic re-presentation of nature. Such artistic truthfulness is especially genial to us, leaving us a feeling of déjà vu. Such art is higher than life but is not divorced from it. 3. While representing his feelings for landscape, the artist pays close attention to the expressions of the brush and ink, revealing both fine style and rich contents, reflecting the beauty of art with the re-presentation by the brush and pen as well as the good and the true in the heart through deep understanding of life contained in the brush and pen. 4. Though the re-presentation of the brush and pen reflects the profound attainments and superb techniques of the artist, these are not the objectives that the artist truly wants to represent, while to endow his works with vivid artistic image, pure aesthetic purport, noble spiritual realm, and enthusiasm in life are the artist’s ultimate value orientation.    

Mr. Chen pays equal attention to the representation by the brush and pen and life experience, and the inevitable results from such artistic pursuit are fresh feelings and brand new works of art.

In terms of artistic conception, what he expresses is a modern man’s care and understanding of natural structure, natural ecology and natural environment as well as his ideals and aspirations after reflections. Beyond the landscape sceneries are presenting the spiritual essences of the times and people’s life quality and wishes. Seen from the representation by the drawing pattern, the moving tempo of points and lines resonates with the tempo of advancement of the times. Amidst the vivacious rhythm are resounding the surging events of the age. Such techniques completely different from the framework paradigm of the ancients are a kind of re-creation on the basis of tradition, expressing very distinctive individuality and reflecting the contemporary spirit.

The transition of traditional painting expressions in brush and ink to conptemporary expressions is the goal he has been striving to attain.

Painting in brush and ink, a valuable artistic legacy passed down from history which embodies the creative experiences, expressive techniques and aesthetic tastes of ancient people, is not only the crystallization of historical culture but also the starting point of contemporary art. If practitioners in the art of painting do not learn from their predecessors and inherit the tradition, a disjunction will occur in art and the cultural continuum will not be passed on. As far as an individual is concerned, only when he learn from the creative experience of the predecessors, fully draw upon the fruitful results achieved in the past, and stand on the peak of history can he excel as an artist. The fundamental significance of inheritance is to continue and develop. The numerous classical works in the history of painting art are exemplary, and while successors learn and draw upon these works, a tradition comes into being, a tradition that is the standard, style and individuality of the national painting art, which connects various links between history and the contemporary times, between the past and the future, and between individuals and collectivity, and prescribes the direction of advancement and development of art. Excellent works of each person in every age are all included into the tradition.

Inherited, historical and constant, yet also realistic, variable and extensible, tradition is a dynamic spiritual entity oriented to the future. Therefore, while learning the cultural heritage of the ancients, we should not only draw upon its essence but also discard its dross, carrying out constant innovation according to new aesthetic views. Today’s innovation is tomorrow’s tradition. This kind of constant inheritance and innovation in history has created a mighty cultural continuum that keeps renewing itself. Outstanding contributors to this advancement and development of this cultural continuum are not only master artists in the ancient times such as Jing, Guan, Dong, Ju, Liu, Li, Ma and Xia but also modern master artists such as Qi Baishi, Fu Baoshi, Huang Binhong and Li Keran. Yet now when these masters have passed away and a new age is arriving, how can the cultural continuum they have endeavored to initiate make progress in a healthy and orderly manner? This is a problem that the art circles are anxious about and a problem that requires urgent solution. Undoubtedly, the contemporary situation of the world of art does not allow optimistic estimation. Various artistic trends clash with each other, and different forms of expression grow and develop unnoticed. Rigidly sticking to the tradition or negating the tradition, being confined to life or being divorced from life, various such phenomena grow and multiply. Indeed, free artistic expressions can engender the flourishing of art; however, if such expressions are not rectified and guided so as to connect them to the historical sources, and if they are allowed to be divorced from the cultural continuum, a disorder will emerge, and our successors will diverge from the right path of art. As far as painting is concerned, to express what thoughts and feelings with what patterns and styles is entirely out of an individual artist’s free creation. It is a problem concerning independent individuals. However, whether we can integrate individual creative works into the artistic trend of the time so that the cultural continuum of our nation can be carried on into the future and we can leave valuable spiritual wealth to our posterity is a major social problem of profound significance. After all, we cannot pass on the cultural heritage passed down from the past to the next generation in its original shape without any creative efforts, nor can we break our excellent historical cultural heritage into pieces and then throw them to our successors. Therefore, to integrate the new painting languages in brush and ink is a difficult task that history has placed on our shoulder.  

 

Comrade Hu Jintao has pointed out, “Inheritance and innovation are two wheels for the lasting continuity of the national culture, and innovation on the base of inheritance is often the best inheritance.” Inheritance is to search for roots and trace the origin, while innovation is to pioneer a new cultural context. The combination of the two is also an important course for understanding, grasping, applying and creating national culture. In Chen Dingkun’s works of art, the tension bursting out from the strokes and the resulting artistic vitality have set him apart from the application of tradition. Such a new interpretation of the painting language in brush and ink is a breakthrough from and development on the old foundation. The elevation of the artistic realm results from new reflections on the portraits of landscape in ancient China. In one word, the traits of the times are salient in his paintings. While enthusiastically eulogizing the theme of the times, he has also composed his own powerful music. The objects of expression and feelings expressed in his works of art are all what are well received and urgently needed in our times, and are the progressive artistic tempo in concert with the advancement of the times.  

 

As we all know, only when an artist expresses the temporal spirits in the art of painting can the features and styles of the times in progress be fully represented, can the artist create valuable spiritual wealth for the society and create a brilliant landmark for himself in the path of artistic development.

From Mr. Chen’s paintings, we can see his defense and development of the extensive and profound national culture. He is among the people creating the national spirits. From his ebullient enthusiasm, vivacious strokes, fresh and touching artistic images, harmonious and fair artistic conceptions as well as profound and broad expressive contents, we can discover his sincere patriotism. His works reflect his personal achievements and are also part of the artistic achievements of the whole society, being fresh flood of the entire national spirits and eternally shining waves in the long river of history.  

 

II. To represent the harmonious society with harmonious brush strokes is his aesthetic pursuit and to integrate the harmony of painting, the harmony of artistic conception and the harmony of society is his life consciousness.

Some of Mr. Chen’s paintings are vigorous, extensive and profound, with a solemn atmosphere but without affected strokes in making up a momentum or extending the size. Some are visionary and haunting, which look unrestrained, yet measured in opening and closing, and arranged with proper techniques, out of expectation yet within reason. Some feature dense strokes, yet living openings are present where it appears airtight, and ingenious changes can be found in rigorous adherence to rules; in sparsely populated space, there are dimly discernable sceneries. Some are uninhibited works with untrammeled expression of individuality, majestic and spirited. Yet the vitality accords with the law of nature, as if accomplished by nature itself. Though lofty signs emerge from the solitary exposure of truth, phenomena are discussed outside phenomena, without intention to set rules and knowing not where to stop in the depth of meaning.      

The harmony of paintings is attributed to the harmony in using the brush. His strokes sometimes seem simple and clumsy yet without producing rigid works, powerful yet without being inflexible; sometimes his strokes are ethereal, delicate, deft and elegant yet not weak, relaxing yet rhythmical; some are unrestrained yet not willful, with distinctive beginning and end and in good order. In Mr. Chen’s paintings, middle strokes constitute the bones of the images to be painted, side strokes polish the appearance of the images, dispersed strokes add artistic delight to the images, and reversed strokes enhance the depth of the images. Various painting techniques are employed intermittently and layers of strokes are engendered according to the occasion, which break each other yet also support each other, exceedingly effective in harmonious blending. In movement, the strokes are powerful enough to stand great pressure; while fine strokes are as delicate as hair. In all, the strokes vary in direction of movement and shapes, either long or short, fine or rough, deft or clumsy, round or flat, all are harmoniously blended, bringing off the best of each other, uniting two contradictory aspects within a harmonious realm, which is the underlying reason for the beauty in the paintings.     

The harmony of painting is reflected in style and the loftiness of style is manifested in the lucid rhythm of ink. Mr. Chen’s landscape paintings are all consummate in the use of ink, which is heavy yet not rigid, dry yet not desiccate, wet yet not swelling. Heavy ink is like pouring storm from sky; light ink is like solitary smoke in the desert, rising straight up fleetingly; dry ink is like a dried up river in June in waterless traces; wet ink is like dewdrops in spring, nourishing all things silently. The seven techniques of using ink have produced luxuriant grass and trees, portrayed dense mist over rivers and mountains, enhancing the delight of nature and strengthening the spirit of culture.    

The style of painting is determined by an artist’s character. A person of lofty character cannot but produce paintings of lofty style. The cosmos of Mr. Chen’s landscape painting is the cosmos of the mind after comprehending the spirit of nature. Therefore, the harmony of his paintings, in the final analysis, can be attributed to the harmony of his frame of mind. He has discovered harmonious painting languages in brush and ink and the artistic conception of painting from traditional aesthetics and modern social life, and on this basis, carefully reflect on the value and role of traditional Chinese aesthetics and the humanistic concerns in the new age in building a harmonious society. Starting from the primary, genuine and natural state, that “the high and the low depend on each other, the large and the small support each other, and the strong and the weak supplement each other” as Daoists hold it, that “man is an integral part of nature and everything in the world is of one unity” as Confucians hold it, and that “every living thing is equal” as Buddhist hold it, he has been exploring the path to cultivating selfhood and elevating moral standing. In the course of self cultivation over a long period of time, he has held an attitude of loving, esteeming, protecting and appreciating nature, and kept drawing nourishment from nature to continuously enrich and broaden his mind and finally attained a mindset in which “he is not pleased with personal gains and not sad with personal losses”. Rising out of his mind is a cosmos of boundless harmonious landscape. When drawing with his brush, the harmonious mind picture inevitably turns into harmonious ink paintings. Therefore, the harmony in his paintings reflects his frame of mind, thoughts and consciousness.  

III. Chen Dingkun’s individualistic brush-ink painting language and expressive mode and unique artistic perception have created a unique spiritual realm with the synthesis of the spirit of nature and life. He has pioneered a spiritual home with his personal ideals in addition to an aesthetic field accepted by the public, and formed his own variant styles in his artistic practice over the long time, which can be summarized as follows:  

(1) His painting captures the boundless expanses of mountains and rivers with simplicity and power and lends expression to his unique aestheticism, life philosophy and metaphysical reflections. The plain and upright world of mountains and rivers and pure and solemn ink-brush painting language is his aesthetic orientation, which also represents one of his paths in artistic exploration. His art of painting symbolizes an ever-renewing and boundless cultural continuum springing out of the long river of history, along which he has been racing forward. The vigor bursting out of ink strokes and patterns represent his broad mind and upright character. Reading his paintings, we can sense morals in images, which are profound, extensive and lofty, with great significance. The reflections on the unity of opposites such as techniques and morals contained therein are stirring to people, who will then be touched, feel their mind being clarified, and finally attain some understanding.

(2) Chen Dingkun has combined the traditional language of the art of painting with his experience in life, and formed his own unique ink-brush painting language through reflections, exploration and integration. What his paintings express is the new landscape and new atmosphere in his ideals and understanding. What his patterns constitute are not what one may get when painting from scenery but a kind of feeling and understanding after traveling ten thousand miles. In his works, trees stand strong and straight, upright and uncompromising; mountains are rigorous and rivers limpid, full of vitality; meandering brooks flow at a high speed, never returning despite many turnings; huts with tile roofs are neatly arranged, half hidden among luxuriant woods. Appreciating his paintings, one seems as if meeting the artist himself, deeply moved by his heroic spirit as well as his genuine feelings, as one can sense that there is profound meaning and concealed significance in the simplicity and lucidity of the paintings. To bring out what is difficult to understand in an easy painting language is his aesthetic purport. His artistic language is concise yet comprehensive, and the contents of his works are saturated with feelings, which are created by his pristine and unconfined brush, producing sharp strokes pointing towards all directions, horizontal or slanting, in brief and resolute tempo, rushing forward like whirlwind and storm and coming to a stop all of a sudden. Sometimes, images seeming disorderly, not observing any set rules, are put together as he likes. The style is the man. Chen Dingkun himself is diligent and practical, not confined by ceremony, candid but also honest and sincere, valuing friendship with people of a congenial temper, concerned at sufferings in the world and crying against injustice. He is a man of feeling.      

(3) Chen Dingkun has synthesized his solemn observation and care of all things and explorations in the origin of life into a clear and ethereal artistic realm. He expresses his mental transcendence with the transcendence of his ink images, and expresses the Mahayana Buddhist tenets with his individualistic artistic language. In his paintings, the utmost tranquility contains the utmost mobility, and vice versa. Stillness prevails yet everything is reflected through wisdom; everything is under reflection yet the mind remains undisturbed. The artistic realm resembles that in Wang Wei’ poetry yet is suffused with modern aura. His style is like that of Bada Shanren, yet without any inkling of coldness and rigidity. Such is the reflection of the artist’s frame of mind. His paintings have drawn upon the essences of ethereal emptiness. As to his use of ink, he mainly resorts to light color. Though he uses his ink sparingly like it is gold, every touch is properly drawn, clear, bright, elegant and beautiful, resembling the fineness of clouds hovering at the horizon.

(4) He has transformed, through diligent studies, luxuriant and lofty mountains into vast mental images in which thousands of mountains and millions of rivers vie with each other in their sublimity and beauty, endowed them with fully-fledged sensibility and elegant individuality, and artistically re-presented them as very poetical stones and mountains with intelligence, fine woods and limpid brooks. As a result, his paintings feature not only local individuality but also the common characteristics of things Chinese, with not only his unique personal ink-brush painting language but also the synthesis of traditional art of painting and communication with the artistic language of the times. By exploring his unique structure of artistic conception and through the rich contents of his paintings, we can see the enthusiasm and sublimity as well as the meticulous philosophical reflections in the artist’s mind. As far as the expressions of his patterns are concerned, the artist pursues the aesthetic purport of describing the void with solid contents. Though images are arranged in close proximity with each other, the lucid and ethereal rhyme reverberates. Compactness is their surface appearance, while lucidity and ethereality are their essence. As far as the feelings represented are concerned, the artist portrays the harmony of landscape with his tender and live brush, expresses his placid mentality, his modesty in treating others and his aloofness from the strife of the world, and presents his wishes for the harmony between nature and living entities and in social structure. Reading his paintings, we can know his personal character, cultivation and the spiritual realm he has attained. Thereby, we can comprehend the relationship between form and content in the five-thousand-year Chinese civilization; thoroughly understand the ever-renewing, expansive and irresistible fountainhead and motive force for the national culture of China. The essence of painting is to draw techniques close to morals. Chen Dingkun’s paintings are significant for the morals contained therein.

An analysis of Chen Dingkun’s ink-brush painting language and the artistic conception reflected and feelings expressed in his painting patterns is of some value for understanding the contemporary movements in artistic creation. In today’s art circles, various cultures clash with each other, and to express multi-layer meanings with various styles has become a popular practice. Myriad schools of art have been flourishing. Chen Dingkun’s art is undoubtedly a wonderful flower in the garden of art. Through his achievements, he has proven that his way of thinking is clear, the path he has taken is correct and the theme he expresses meets the objective requirements of cultural development. The beauty in his works not only reflects the spiritual life of the times but also can be integrated into the construction of the collective spirit of the times, ultimately to become an indispensable part in the collective spiritual system of the times. His ink-brush painting language can serve as a standard for the emulation of people studying landscape painting, who can draw artistic nourishments and inspirations in the explorations for new ideas. His unique artistic creation and the blueprints he has painted for life will encourage more people to strengthen their confidence in striving forward and to be whole-heartedly devoted to the construction of the advanced socialist culture.

Chen Dingkun’s consummate artistic styles, also an independent link in the course of artistic development since the foundation of New China, are of landmark significance, and can serve as excellent reference materials for people to study contemporary painting in the future. His contributions are a comfort to the older generation of artists and also an inspiration for young students of art. From his works, we can see eternal philosophy transcending time and space as well as reality, and see that brilliant artistic achievements can be made by taking any region as the object of artistic expressions. His various reflections on and explorations in art have proven that art has universality and unity in reflection. From the information fed back by readers, we can see that the artistic appeal, orientation and transmissibility of his paintings are inestimable. His fruitful artistic results are of unique significance in the society and have also provided extremely valuable historical data for the study of the mental journey of explorers in art.

Consciously following the objective requirements of social development, Chen Dingkun carries out artistic creation among the great creative activities of the people, takes it his own sacred social responsibility and career pursuit to influence and promote social progress with beautiful forms of art, and exert subtle influence on people’s thoughts through the teaching of artistic works, and takes it his own solemn mission to create art forms loved by the people and integrate and create the artistic languages needed by the people. His observation and experience of social life, design of artistic scenes, and the course of his transformation of artistic images into images in ink all profoundly reflect people’s aesthetic purport and value orientation. The life blueprints he has portrayed have integrated not only the artist’s personal breath and life, reflecting his own fresh discoveries of the meaning of life and his unique understanding of aesthetics but also the people’s breath and life, reflecting the people’s aspiration for a good life and pursuit and yearning after beauty. His works are close to reality, to life and to the mass, and are individualistic labor difficult to accomplish. He is an artist excelling in both morality and art, and his art is the people’s art.