A brief biography of Yan Zhiyang
Yan Zhiyang (1883-1962), named Daosheng, also named Ziyang and Zhiyang, and given the nickname Yuelu. A native of Yangfenggang Village, Bazhou City, Hebei Province (originally Jinghai County, Hebei Province). He studied calligraphy with his father since he was a child. At the age of 12, he went to Yangliuqing, the hometown of New Year paintings, as an apprentice. Later, he studied at the Hubei Military Academy. After graduating from school, he lived in Tianjin for a long time to paint. He also worshiped Li Cunyi of the Chinese Samurai Association as his teacher and also practiced martial arts. In 1909, he drew textbook illustrations at the Tianjin Zhili Library. In 1912, he worked as a pictorial editor for the Tianjin Minyue Newspaper. At the same time, he was engaged in the improvement of New Year pictures at the Tianjin Education Department. In 1921, he participated in the Tianjin Calligraphy and Painting Charity Association and engaged in poverty relief and disaster relief work. In 1937, he returned to his hometown as a hermit. Around 1957, he participated in many art exhibitions in Tianjin, Hebei and across the country. His works include "Calligraphy Guide", "Yan Zhiyang Painting Collection", "Yuelu Poetry Collection", etc.
Yan Zhiyang was born in a scholarly family. His father, Yan Bingxuan, was a well-known local man with high moral character and prestige. The "Jinghai County Chronicle" of the Republic of China said that he was "good at music and rhythm, and he liked Kun Yi". Yan Zhiyang "learned from home" since he was a child. Later, he studied poetry from Mr. Wang Dexiu of Anci County. At the age of 12, he learned to paint flowers from a rural painter, and he painted New Year pictures with his teacher in Yangliuqing. Later, Yan Zhiyang's painting skills mainly came from self-taught.
The young Yan Zhiyang studied at Hubei Military Academy. In the second year, he abandoned school and returned north. He traveled to famous mountains and rivers, copied and sketched from life, and accumulated a large amount of painting materials. Back in Tianjin, Yan Zhiyang still made a living by selling paintings, and worshiped Li Cunyi of the Tianjin Chinese Warriors Association as his teacher. He also practiced martial arts and compiled martial arts books for Mr. Li. After Mr. Li's death, he took on the task of co-organizing the Chinese Warriors Association. During the Republic of China, According to the published "Biographies of the North's Healthy Men in Modern and Modern Times", "The Chinese Warriors Association has stood for more than ten years, and those who have survived the calamity without a slight decline are extremely positive and powerful."
Yan Zhiyang learned martial arts from Mr. Li Cunyi and "learned Xingyi". He has been especially fond of swords for more than ten years. His favorites are Touhe sword, Erhe sword, Bagua sword, Dragon-shaped sword, Thirty-six swords and Lianlian sword. The techniques of sword, ten swords and thirteen swords are all exquisite and full of experience." Many of the close friends he made throughout his life were martial arts people, and his teacher Li Cunyi had the most profound influence.
Yan Zhiyang is versatile and is most famous for his painting. His paintings are mainly freehand brushwork, and he also uses fine brushwork. He is exquisite in figures, and is also good at landscapes, flowers, and dabbles in various themes. In the figure paintings, there are not only celebrity anecdotes, historical allusions, literary stories, mythological stories, but also stories about swordsmen, virtuous ladies, children playing, fishermen, woodcutter and common people as well as portraits of real people.
Yan Zhiyang lived in Hebei Park (today's Zhongshan Park) in Tianjin. He painted, practiced martial arts, and worked in the park. Later, when the Samurai Association moved, he lived in Tianjin Jingye Temple and Taolin Primary School. At the same time, Hua Shikui and Liu Kuiling were good friends in the field of calligraphy and painting, and they created some works together. In the early days of the establishment of Tianjin Municipal Art Museum, at the invitation of Yan Zhikai and Jiang Banruo, he held a personal exhibition in the art museum and went to Japan to exhibit. The museum specially photographed and created a biography of him, writing: "Yan Daosheng, whose courtesy name is Zhiyang, and whose nickname is Yuelu, is from Hebei. He is good at calligraphy and painting, good at swordsmanship, likes to sing, and has a quiet nature. He does not show off his ability to others. His family He was poor and self-sufficient by painting, so he was famous for his paintings. His painting style of figures and landscapes was majestic. He wanted to learn from Chen Zhanghou and then considered his own ideas. He was lofty and distant, and he hated the path of fat and powder. Therefore, Bai's painting was particularly important in the world. He pursued the learning of Yin, Zhou, Ding and Yi, and literary instruments. He attaches great importance to both and is diligent in textual research. He is forty and six years old this year, but he still strives to practice and promote Chinese traditional culture. He is very impressed by Yan Zhiyang's literary works and once asked Jiang Prajna to write a letter to him. I met with Yan Zhiyang, but failed to do so.
After 1937, Yan Zhiyang returned to his hometown, lived in seclusion in the countryside, and withdrew from the Tianjin painting circle. The turbulent social life makes Yan Zhiyang always live among floods, military disasters and bandits. In 1942, hundreds of calligraphy and painting works, a collection of precious ancient books, and family property were all burned by bandits and they were kidnapped. After his death, 200 of his masterpieces were also burned.
Yan Zhiyang is a painter with noble national integrity. Around 1940, Yan Zhiyang once lived in Jinghai County. Some Japanese officers heard about the name of Yan Zhiyang's paintings and came to ask for paintings. They were all rejected by Yan Zhiyang. The Japanese officers were very angry and took Yan Zhiyang to the Japanese army station and forced him to start painting. Draw a "Picture of a Wolf Dog", which shows a ferocious wolf dog. The Japanese officer was very happy and did not know the author's innuendo and curse. This incident became a favorite story among the people of Jinghai County.
Yan Zhiyang is generous and charitable and has been engaged in charity throughout his life. As early as 1921, Yan Zhiyang participated in the Tianjin Calligraphy and Painting Charity Association, painting for charity for the flood victims who poured into Tianjin, and continued to do so for several years. In 1924, the second Zhizhi-Fengzhi War broke out, which affected the Jinghai area of ??Tianjin. At that time, the people were living in poverty and their minds were closed-minded. In order to enlighten the people's wisdom and civilize the people's customs, he used seven spare rooms in his ancestral hall to set up the "Jiazi Newspaper Reading Club" and ordered a large number of books and newspapers for the people to read, which was well received by the people. In 1936, just as Japan was about to invade China, he cut down on food and clothing, donated paintings and raised more than 2,000 silver dollars, and used the ruins of the old Yangfenggang temple to build a new-style school with 16 buildings and bungalows, which was later expanded to 32 rooms. Generation after generation of students are born.
Yan Zhiyang was diligent and studious throughout his life, indifferent to fame and fortune, and did not like social interaction. He was simple and generous, and he was happy to live in poverty. In his later years, he admired Laozhuang even more, compared himself to Tao Qian, paid tribute to Dongli, and took pleasure in the tranquil and detached pastoral life. Although these temperaments of his have negatively affected the promotion of his artistic reputation, they have nourished his high taste in painting art.
It is a pity that most of Yan Zhiyang's fine paintings in his later years were burned in the early days of the Cultural Revolution, and only a small part has been handed down to the world, making it difficult to see the full picture.
Judging from the existing works, Yan Zhiyang not only learned from Chen Hongshou, a master in the late Ming Dynasty, but also absorbed the strengths of famous masters such as Gai Qi and Fei Danxu in the mid-Qing Dynasty and Ren Bonian in the "Shanghai School" in the late Qing Dynasty. His own calligraphy brushstrokes rich in epigraphs and martial arts are incorporated into calligraphy and painting, showing both profound traditional skills and new ideas, forming a transcendent style that is rich in emotion, vigorous and ancient. His brushwork is simple and smooth, his ink is thick and varied, his colors are bright and elegant, his characters are vivid and tall, and his scenery is natural and distant, all of which give people a rich sense of beauty.
The late famous painter Wang Xinjing commented that Yan Zhiyang is a buried painter whose late works can be compared with any of his contemporaries.
——"Bazhou Culture Chronicle"