Mi Fei is one of the four great writers in the Northern Song Dynasty. He is as famous as Cai Xiang, Su Shi and Huang Tingjian. He is not only accomplished in calligraphy, but also a painter and theorist. In calligraphy, Mi Fei is good at seal script, official script, regular script, running script and cursive script. And he is good at copying ancient calligraphy, reaching a chaotic level. His famous works include Poems of Multi-Scenery Buildings, Poems of Hongxian County, Inscription of Mountain Research, Poems of Chongzhong Yuetie and so on.
Mifei was born in Xiangyang. When he was seven or eight years old, he began to learn calligraphy. The first teacher was Xiangyang calligrapher Luo Rang. After five years in Jiayou, Song Renzong, Mi Fei began to write inscriptions. When he read Zhou Yue's and Su Shi's copybooks, people said that he had Li Yong's brushwork. After such practice, his calligraphy has made rapid progress.
Later, Mi Fei was appointed secretary of provincial studies by Song Shenzong, and Mi Fei visited Su Shi in Yuanfeng for five years. This year, he became fascinated with the book style of Wei and Jin Dynasties and visited many Jin people's calligraphy posts. Even his study was named "Bao Jin Zhai".
Mifei has reached the realm of selflessness in calligraphy and is practicing hard every day. According to historical records, "if you don't write a book for a day, you will feel sleepy, thinking that the ancients never wasted a moment." Mi Fei took the diligence of the ancients as a mirror, and he felt green when he didn't practice calligraphy for a day. It is this selfless diligence that makes Mi Fei's calligraphy famous all over the world.
Mi Fei spent the most time in his life, and his greatest achievement was running script. Mi Fei's running script was engraved in most popular posters after the Southern Song Dynasty, which spread widely and had great influence. However, when Mi Fei practiced calligraphy, he claimed to "accept ancient Chinese characters", which meant to integrate the fonts of ancient calligraphers. Although this is regarded as a laughing stock by some people, it is more about praising his achievements.
Before visiting Su Shi to learn the calligraphy style of Wei and Jin Dynasties, Mi Fei took Yan Zhenqing, Chu Suiliang, Duan as the copying objects. Mi Fei founded many special brushstrokes after he got married, such as the turning of the right corner of the word "door", the steep rise of the vertical hook and the crab claw hook.
Mifei practices calligraphy seriously, which is not what people think. There is always a tendency to tilt in his calligraphy. He wants to go left first and then right, and he wants to rise first and then suppress, all in order to increase the ups and downs and the fast-flying air. Based on the solid foundation of collecting ancient Chinese characters for decades, he is naive and natural, and never pretends.