Early Chinese Texts on Painting 9789888139736, 9888139738

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1BJOUJOH Susan Bush and Hsio-yen Shih

Early Chinese Texts on Painting

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“A Breath of Spring,” dated to 1360, Yüan Dynasty. Plum blossom painting flourished at the end of the Southern Sung Dynasty, and during the Yüan Dynasty it served as a form of cultural protest against the Mongol regime. This is the only known work by the Taoist hermit Tsou Fu-lei, whose purity of character was thought to be reflected in his subject. Handscroll (detail), ink on paper, 34.1 x 223.4 cm. Courtesy of the Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

Early Chinese Texts on Painting

Susan Bush and Hsio-yen Shih

Hong Kong University Press The University of Hong Kong Pokfulam Road Hong Kong www.hkupress.org © Hong Kong University Press 2012 First edition published for Harvard-Yenching Institute by Harvard University Press, 1985 ISBN 978-988-8139-73-6   All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed and bound by Goodrich Int’l Printing Co. Ltd., Hong Kong, China

To our teachers

Contents Preface to the Second Edition  ix Preface to the First Edition  xi Abbreviations  xiii

Introduction 1 1 Pre-T’ang Interpretation and Criticism 18 Problems of Representation  24   Optical Illusion  25  Didactic Subject Matter  25   Definition, Animation, and Expression  28 Training  32  Technique  32   The Significance of Landscape  36   Criteria for Appreciation and Criticism  39 Social Status and Creative Activity  42

2 T’ang Criticism and Art History 45 The Significance of Painting  48   Origins of Painting  49  Period and Regional Styles  52   Definition, Animation, and Expression  53  Training  59  Brushwork  60  Landscape  66 Appreciation and Connoisseurship  71  Classification  75 Criticism  78   Social Status and Creative Activity  85

3 Sung Art History 89 The Significance of Figure Painting  93  Critical Standards  94   Expressive Style and Quality  95 Brushwork  97   Appreciation and Connoisseurship  98 Classification in Grades by Qualities  100   Classification in Subject Categories  103   Buddhist and Taoist Subjects  105  Figure Painting  109   Architectural Subjects  111  Barbarians  113 Dragons and Fishes  114  Landscape  116   Different Models for Landscapists  120   Domestic and Wild Animals  123

viii Contents Flowers and Birds  125   Ink Bamboo, Vegetables, and Fruit  128 Classification by Social Status  129   Scholars’ Painting  132 The Emperor as Connoisseur and Artist  134   The Academy of Painting  137   Southern Sung Monks and Academicians  138

4 The Landscape Texts 141 The Significance of Old Pines  145   The Significance of Landscape  150   Figures in Landscape  154  On Creativity  156   Tradition and Models  159  Landscape Formations  164   Atmosphere and Spatial Recession  168 Technical Secrets  170   Faults of Landscape Painting  180 Connoisseurship of Landscape Painting  184   Kuo Hsi as Court Artist  187

5 Sung Literati Theory and Connoisseurship 191 The Painter as Artisan or Scholar  196   Character and Style  201   Poetry and Painting  203   Calligraphy and Painting  205   The Tao and Painting  206   Naturalness in Painting  212   Spontaneity in Painting  217   Form and Principle  220   Definition, Animation, and Expression  224 Mood in Painting  230  Connoisseurship  233

6 Yüan Criticism and Writings on Special Subjects 241 Spirit Resonance and Quality  245   On the Subject Categories of Painting  247   On Artists’ Styles  249   Scholars’ Painting and the Spirit of Antiquity  254   Yüan Literati Artists and Critics  255 On Mounting and Collecting  256  Connoisseurship  258 Landscape  262   Figure Painting  270  Bamboo  272 Prunus  280

Biographies of Painters, Critics, and Calligraphers  Glossary of Chinese Terms 

352

Glossary of Chinese Names and Titles  Bibliography  Index 

363

379

Illustrations follow p. 146

355

291

Preface to the Second Edition

This volume of translations has been out of print now for more than a dozen years and I am extremely grateful to Hong Kong University Press for reissuing it, and trust that it will continue to find an audience. Recently I heard a professor of Chinese art history call this book his bible, and I do know that in the past students and teachers have found it a useful tool as it was designed to be. That it succeeded so well was largely due to two prime movers, Professor James Cahill and my co-editor Hsio-yen Shih. James Cahill’s contributions to Chinese art history cannot be overestimated, and his chief virtue for students at all levels must be his accessibility and interest in their work. This volume was the outcome of his translation project started at the University of California, Berkeley, and eventually funded by the American Council of Learned Societies. After Hsio-yen Shih and I were chosen as editors, James Cahill continued as always to offer advice and support. As for Hsio-yen Shih, better known as Yen, I still regret her death in 2001. She made contributions in all areas of Chinese art history while working overtime in different positions. In the early 1980s she was chosen as an editor for this book because of her research on Sung painters’ biographies and her translation of the second part of the Li-tai ming-hua chi of ca. 847, a text that supplies much of the material in the first two chapters of this book. I was no doubt chosen because of my dissertation on literati art theory and because I could work with Yen. We made a good team. She outlined the chapters and devised the approach of presenting excerpts under subject headings so that the material was more accessible to students. She also suggested that we each edit chapters in which we had not translated most of the texts. I thought that chapter introductions would be a helpful overview and that a general discussion of the Six Laws of painting was necessary in

x  Preface to the Second Edition

the general introduction. Yen always listened to my suggestions and acted on them, cutting or inserting excerpts if necessary. The topic of the Six Laws was a thorny issue at the time. James Cahill thought that I should come up with an official translation of these socalled laws, one piece of advice I did not follow. A Chinese review of the anthology also criticized my position or lack of one. It is hard to find a fixed translation for such a fluid entity as the First Law. Moreover, I did and do believe that the Six Laws changed over time and in different contexts. Hence I accepted and defended William Acker’s punctuation of the Six Laws as a sixth-century version, a reading of the grammar arrived at independently by both a Chinese and a Japanese scholar. Misinterpretations on my part in this matter and others are no doubt likely. They can be starting points for future translations and discussions, and serve as examples for those who wish to carry an anthology project forward into present times. Susan Bush

Preface to the First Edition

xii  Preface to the First Edition

The editors would like to thank the authors and publishers who have granted permission for the use of excerpts of published translations: E. J. Brill for material from Some Tang and Pre-Tang Texts on Chinese Painting (Vol. I); Professor James Cahill for his translation of the "Six Laws" of Hsieh Ho; Professor Herbert Franke for an excerpt from Wang fs Hsieh-hsiang pi-chiieh; the Harvard University Press for excerpts from The Chinese Literati on Painting; Professor Robert Maeda and Garland Publishers for excerpts from Two Sung Texts on Chinese Painting and the Landscape Styles of the 11th and 12th Centuries; Professor Kiyohiko Munakata and Artibus Asiae Publishers for material from Ching Hao's Pifa chi: A Note on the Art of the Brush; Professor Alexander Soper and the American Council of Learned Societies for material in Kuo Jo-hsil's Experiences in Painting; Professor Soper also for excerpts from Chu Ching-hsuan's T'ang-ch'ao rning-hoo lu and Li Ch'ih's Hua-p'in; Professor Michael Sullivan and the University of California Press for the Fu Tsai excerpt in Chinese Landscape Painting: The Sui and Tang Dynasties; Professor Ssu-yu Teng and E. J. Brill for an excerpt from Family Instructions for the Yen Clan. We would also like to thank Professor Tseng Yu-ho Ecke and Dr. Arthur Mu-sen Kao for material translated in their Ph.D. dissertations, available in University Microfilms International editions. These translations have been slightly modified in the interests of meaning, accuracy, and style. In addition, the editors have made use of unpublished translations, most of which were commissioned in the early stages of the translation project. We are extremely grateful to these contributors: Professor Richard Barnhart, Professor john Hay, Dr. Sarah Handler, Professor Ellen Laing, Nancy Price, and Dr. Roderick Whitfield, who translated certain texts excerpted in chapters 3-5; Professor Chu-tsing Li and his students-Karen Brock, Dr. Arthur Mu-sen Kao, and William Lew-who compiled material for chapter 6. An unpublished translation of the Li-tai ming-hua chi biographies by Professor Hsio-yen Shih was a major source for the excerpts in chapters 1 and 2. Specific credit is given to each translator in the introductions to the chapters.

Abbreviations Chinese Texts CKHC]M1TT CKHLLP CKJMTIT CKKSHL CKWHCTIT ESSS HC HCPI HHHP HHP HLTK HP HS HSTS ICMHL KCHP KHPL LCKCC LTMHC MCPT MSTS PFC PWCSHP SCMHP

Chung-kuo hua-chia jen-ming w-tz'u-tien, comp. Sun Takung, 1934. Chung-kuo hua-lun lei-pien, ed. Yii Chien-hua, 1957. Chung-kuo jen-ming ta-tz'u-tien, comp. Fang I et al., 1921. Chen-kuan kung-ssu hua-lu, by P'ei Hsiao-yiian, ca. 639. Chung-kuo wen-hsiieh-chia ta-tz'u-tien, comp. Tan Cheng-pi, 1934. Erh-shih-ssu shih (Dynastic Histories, Chung-hua ed., 1957- ). Hua-chi, by Teng Ch'un, ca. 1167. Hua-chi pu-i, by Chuang Su, ca. 1298. Hsilan-ho hua-p'u (Catalogue of Hui-tsung's Collection), ca. ll20. Hsii hua-p'in, by Yao Tsui, ca. 552. Hua-lun ts'ung-k'an, ed. Yii An-Ian, 1963. Hua-p'in, by Li Ch'ih, ca. 1098. Hua-shih, by Mi Fu, ca. 1103. Hua-shih ts'ung-shu, comp. Yti An-Ian, 1962. /-chou ming-hua lu, by Huang Hsiu-fu, ca. 1006. Kuang-ch'uan hua-pa, by Tung Yu, ca. 1120. Ku hua-p'in lu, by Hsieh Ho, ca. 535. Lin-ch'iian kao-chih (chi), by Kuo Hsi, ed. Kuo Ssu, ca. 11101117. Li-tai ming-hua chi, by Chang Yen-yuan, ca. 847. Meng-ch'i pi-t'an, by Shen Kua, ca. 1086-1093. Mei-shu ts'ung-shu, comp. Huang Pin-hung and Teng Shih, 1911-1936. Pi{a chi, by Ching Hao, ca. 925. P'ei-wen-chai shu-hua p'u, comp. Sun Yiieh-pan et al., ca. 1708. Sheng-ch'ao ming-hua p'ing, by Liu Tao-shun, ca. 1050.

xzv

Abbreviations

SHSLCT SKCS SKTSHHK

ssccc

SSHY TCHC]lHTT TCA1HL THCWC THPC TSHG'JA1TT TTCLC WSSHY WTMHPI

Shu-hua shu-lu chieh-t'i, comp. Yti Shao-sung, 1932. Ssu-k'u ch'iian-shu, cornp. 1773-1785 (in manuscript copy). Shih-ku-t'ang shu-hun hui-k'ao, comp. Pien Yung-yti, ca. 1682. Shan-shui Ch'un-ch 'uan chi, by Han Cho, ca. 1121. Shih-shuo hsin-yil, by Liu 1-ch'ing, ca. 430. Tang chien hua-chia jen-ming tz'u-tien, comp. Chu Chu-yti, 1961. Tang-ch'ao ming-hua lu, by Chu Ching-hsiian, ca. 840. T'u-hua chien-wen chih, by Kuo Jo-hsti, ca. 1080. T'u-hui pao-chien, by Hsia Wen-yen, ca. 1365. Tang Sung hua-chia 1en-ming tz'u-tien, comp. Chu Chu-yti et al., 1958. Tung-t'ien ch'ing-lu chi, by Chao Hsi-ku, ca. 1240. Wang-shih shu-hu.a yuan, comp. Wang Shih-chen et al., ca. 1590. Wu-tai ming-hua pu-i, by Liu Tao-shun, ca. 1059.

Western Dictionaries, Periodicals, and Institutions ACASA ACLS BD Blv1FEA DMB IsMEO JAOS OA RAA

Archives of the Chinese Art Society of America. American Council of Learned Societies. A Chinese Biographical Dictionary, ed. H. A. Giles. Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities. Dictionary of lvling Biography, ed. L C. Goodrich. lstituto italiano peril medio ed estremo oriente. Journal of the American Oriental Society. Oriental Art. Revue des Arts Asiatiques.

Shortened References in the Text and Biographies Acker Bush Cahill, Hills Cahill Index Li, Autumn Colors

Loehr, Great Painters Siren Sung Biog. Sung Index Yuan Index Yilan Masters

William Acker, Some Tang and Pre-Tang Texts on Chinese Painting. Susan Bush, The Chinese Literati on Painting. James Cahill, Hills Beyond a River. An Index of Early Chinese Painters and Paintings, ed. James Cahill. Chu-tsing Li, Autumn Colors on the Ch'iao and Hua Mountains. Max Loehr, The Great Painters of China. Osvald Siren, Chinese Painting. Sung Biographies (2 vols.), ed Herbert Franke. Index to Biographit'al Materials of Sung Figures, comp. Ch'ang Pi-te. Index to Biographical Materials of Yuan Figures, comp. Wang Te-i. Chang Kuang-pin, Yilan ssu-ta-chia (The Four Great Masters of the Yi.ian).

Introduction of Chinese literature on painting is quite substantial, and the continuity of its development allowed for considerable contributions to art history and to the history of ideas in general. Although the earliest printed editions of painting texts that we know of dated from the sixteenth century, quotations in other forms of literature with earlier imprints give evidence that transmission of such works was steady. The Chinese emphasis on literary learning and China's early invention of printing meant that texts on painting were often a source of knowledge for those concerned with this art, even though

THE VOLUME

the early paintings themselves no longer existed or were inaccessible.

For example, ideas current in the third century B.c. were available to scholars of the fourteenth century A.D. Indeed, in China, writings about art became an impetus to further creative activity. Because the

literature on painting, and indeed on all the arts, was so early established and expanded upon, the philosophy of art in China soon achieved a high degree of complexity and sophistication. The selections made for this compilation are intended to help the reader form a general view of this philosophy and of the development of the written history of Chinese art. Over thirty texts are included in the anthology, some translated in their entirety and others only in part. They begin with the first discussion of pictorial images recorded during the foundation of imperial China in the Han Dynasty. The latest works included come from the period of Mongol occupation in the fourteenth-century Ytian Dynasty. The texts translated in this volume, then, span the development of painting in China to its full maturity. The sequence of chapters is chronological, but within chapters selections from texts are grouped under different subject headings. This

2

Early Chinese Texts on Painting

ordering will facilitate the reader's focus on subject matter of special interest. It also will identify a variety of themes that emerge in the theoretical concerns of successive generations of thinkers and writers. There are, of course, innumerable difficulties involved in understanding an ancient language, especially when the meanings of terms have evolved over a thousand years of use. Furthermore, since texts on painting not only record or report events and phenomena but also analyze, assess, and classify, understanding these writings is not merely a question of language. Chinese systems of thought and interpretations of perception, founded upon cultural bases quite dissimilar to those assumed in the West, must also be taken into consideration. Various approain tiao-lung, 7, 23 Wen-hsiian, 26, 27 Wen Tung, 128, 194, 196, 201, 207, 208, 209, 212, 214, 220, 224, 243, 244. 253, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279, 280, 285, 345; style of, 253 Wen Yen-po, 154-155 Weng-yu hsien-p'ing, 230 Whitfield, Roderick, 92 "wind" (/eng) and "bone" (ku), 7-8 writing, invention of, 50-51. See also literature and painting Wu Chen, 244, 245, 256, 279, 285, 345; biography of. 256; on bamboo painting, 279; on ink plum blossoms, 285286 Wu Chien, 30, 105, 345 Wu Chung-fu, 187 Wu Ch'ung, 187 Wu decoration, 106, 250, 263 Wn Huai, 222-223, 345 Wu Jung, 265 Wu-tai ming-hua pu-i, 90, 116, 367 Wu T'ai-su, 245, 286, 345-346 Wu Tao-tzu, 45, 48, 55-56, 60, 61-62, 64-65, 66, 67-68, 76, 94, 106, 107, 115, 122, 131, 133, 159, 199,201, 203, 213,214,218,221, 226,234, 237, 247, 249-250, 252, 260, 346; and Six Elements, 55; and creative process, 61-62; and landscape painting, 66, 67-68; style of, 159-160, 166,234, 249-250; school of, 226 Wu Tsung-yilan, 226, 346-347 Wu Yil, 123 Wu-yileh-kuan (Temple of Five Sacred Peaks), 134, 245 yang, 3, 4, 39, 62, 79, 119, 127, 222, 280

Yang Yang Yang Yang

Ch'i-tan, 60, 66, 75, 83, 347 Chu, 96 Hsiung, 96, 103, 205, 218 Hui-chih, 122. 347

Index 391 Y