The biggest difference between Chinese and Western painting is: the East prefers freehand brushwork, while the West prefers realism.
In terms of painting concepts: Western painting focuses on thinking, while Eastern painting pays more attention to emotion. Therefore, Western paintings are highly reproducible, lifelike images, and have higher cognitive value; while Chinese paintings are highly expressive, lyrical, and pay more attention to the unity of emotion and reason, and the combination of poetry and painting.
Perspective in painting: This is the most fundamental. Chinese painting attaches great importance to conception in creation, stresses the intention of writing first and image thinking, and pays attention to the subjective and objective unity of artistic images; while Western painting focuses on focus perspective, It reflects the appearance of an object more objectively and scientifically, and is true and objective as its main feature.
Painting tools: The differences in painting tools also create differences between Chinese and Western painting. The brushes, paper, and painting pigments are unique and vividly reflect the wisdom of the ancient Chinese people. Of course, the level of craftsmanship in the entire Western society at that time was also very high.
Both Chinese and Western paintings reflect the reality of life, but in different ways. Western painting, like drama and movies, expresses the reality of the inner nature of life through realistic external images; Eastern painting, like Chinese drama, expresses the reality of the inner nature of life through approximate external images.
Chinese and Western painting art are like two mountain peaks with different shapes. Although they also have endless evocative artistic appeal, they are each integrated. In this specific historical period of global integration, the exchanges between Chinese painting art and Western painting art have become increasingly close.
The different ways of thinking between China and the West determine the inherent differences between Chinese and Western art. Perhaps it is the different attitudes towards nature between China and the West that make Chinese and Western paintings so different.
Although they are very different, in today's society everyone gets what he needs. Different people have different aesthetics and hobbies, so the painting styles they choose are also different.
Extended information:
The difference between Western painting and modern painting is also reflected in the different attitudes towards so-called representation. For traditional painting, representation is its fundamental, and it can also be said to be the basic goal of traditional Western painting.
Although compared with modern painting, traditional Western painting has "reproduction" as its main feature, but this kind of reproduction is by no means an immutable description of nature. This kind of realism has strong stylistic characteristics: era, nationality, and the artist’s personal style and characteristics.
In the view of modern painters who are committed to the pursuit of pure art, traditional paintings are mixed with too many "non-artistic impurities". In fact, traditional Western painting does not pay attention to art, but it pays attention to artistry while taking into account many non-artistic aspects. This is probably an important sign that distinguishes traditional painting from modern painting.
The artistic impurity of traditional painting is mainly reflected in its utilitarian and descriptive aspects.
Reference: Baidu Encyclopedia--Western Painting