A Brief Comment on Yang Xian's Calligraphy Art
Liu Yang
Yang Xian (18 19- 1896), a native of Gui 'an, Zhejiang Province, was a calligrapher, engraver and poet in Qing Dynasty. His calligraphy belongs to Beibei School, and he is an outstanding official calligrapher in the late Qing Dynasty.
Yang was an influential calligrapher in the late Qing Dynasty. He was a juren in Xianfeng five years (1855), so he should have failed the exam. He once assisted military affairs with Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang. After the age of 50, he was in charge of shipping, from an official to a salt transport ambassador, and served as the magistrate of Songjiang, Jiangsu. During his tenure as an official, he was upright and honest, and he was quite prestigious. After he abandoned his post, he lived in Suzhou, studied and wrote books, and made a living by researching and writing calligraphy.
Yang Xian once worshipped the calligrapher Zang Shougong as a teacher and worked hard all his life. Although he is famous for his official script, his running script is also distinctive in style, light and fixed in painting, undulating in shape, slender, square and flat, tight in knot, or discrete and changeable, in order to avoid dullness. His boldness and elegance are reflected in the official script of Qi Fei.
? Yang Xian's works are very popular and distinctive, especially the style of official script has brought a fair atmosphere to the book circle in the late Qing Dynasty, which is well-known at home and abroad and as far away as Japan. In addition to studying calligraphy, Yang Xian also focused on ancient poetry and prose, and wrote Collected Works of Zhai Yong and Chi Hongxuan Shi Chao. The seventy-third volume of The Complete Works of China's Calligraphy published by Rong Baozhai contains the life and artistic achievements of Yang Xian.
Yang Xian is the teacher of Wu Changshuo, a master of calligraphy and painting. Wu Changshuo once met Yang Xian in Gusu with Yu Yue (Qu Yuan) and studied poetry and calligraphy with him. According to Wu Changye's Chronology of Mr. Wu Changshuo, yang xian and Wu Changshuo were engaged in Guangxu for six years (1880), Wu Changshuo (1844- 1927) was thirty-six, and yang xian was sixty-one. Wu Changshuo wrote a letter with a student's post and threw it at Yang Xian's door. However, Yang Xian's reply doesn't want to be commonly known as the love between teachers and students, just want to have a blind date with his brother. It can be seen that this reserved young man with a high heart is only cold and arrogant to people with bad hearts, but after learning, he is a modest gentleman and willing to support him. Later, between teachers and friends, the two feelings corresponded and understood each other at the same time, which is rare in the history of art. Wu Changshuo once asked Yang Xian to write an inscription for his old collection "Qi Yi Kuan Zhi Shu", and the two expressed their opinions, which was quite interesting. Many of Wu Changshuo's notes were written by yang xian, and even Wu Changshuo's touches were inscribed by yang xian himself, which shows his careful cultivation of later generations' knowledge. The use of many seals in Yang Xian's calligraphy works is governed by Wu Changshuo, which is also a witness to the friendship between teachers and students.
According to textual research, Master Hongyi studied Yang Xian's official script in his early years. 1On September 25th, 899, Shanghai China and Foreign Daily published an example of Master Hongyi's calligraphy seal cutting, saying, "Li Shutong is also a famous person in Danghu. 13 years, Mo became famous in his hometown with calligraphy and seal cutting. At the same time, the book is good at four aspects: the method of seal script is perfect, the method of copying sees the mountain, the way of writing "Su Huang" and the way of writing "Sui and Wei". This kind of polishing clearly shows that Master Hongyi's early goal of obtaining Buddhism was to "see the mountains", that is, to cultivate immortals. When he was 19 years old (Guangxu Jihai), he had a work of Tongbai Temple Monument in Han Dynasty, which was made by the heartbroken poet Li Xishuang. His calligraphy style was in tune with Yang Xian's, for example.
Wang Renshou, a great calligrapher in the late Qing Dynasty, studied under Yang Xian and "spread in less than a year". His book "Han Li's Rich Seal Characters" is smart, famous in Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou, and widely spread in Beijing, Tianjin, Japan and Southeast Asia. Editor-in-chief of China's first epigraphy dictionary. According to the records in Volume 73 of The Complete Works of China Calligraphy published by Rong Baozhai, the context of Yang Xian's learning official script is clear. In his early years, he learned from Han Li's inscriptions, and later learned from Zheng Zhi, Jin Nong, Deng, Yi Bingshou, Chen Hongshou and other sages before the Qing Dynasty. After that, he turned to the inscriptions, which got rid of the influence of the official script of the Qing Dynasty and directly adopted the ancient Chinese inscriptions and meteorology.
Yang Li uses both a pen and Fiona Fang. Fang Bi's pen blade is sharp, the round pen is light and thin, the horizontal pen is thick and the vertical pen is thin, and the pen is fierce, leaving a slender tail, a square blade and a long foot. In the indulgence of skimming, pinching and crossing, the turning point is difficult, just like a sword and a heavy pen. Yang Xian's strokes are long and horizontal, with twists and turns, strong sense of rhythm and vivid charm, which are also very different and harmonious with other strokes. In brushwork, we often use the techniques of illness, astringency and vibration, and pay attention to the subtle changes of lifting and falling. The lines are ups and downs, dignified and dull.
The structure of "Li Yang" is tight and stretched, with flat shape, neat border and symmetrical density, and its shape is wide and tight. The strokes are dense and scattered, and echo up and down. Its structural modeling not only emphasizes the elegance of appearance, but also strives for the richness of connotation.
? For more than a century, "Li Yang" has gradually attracted the attention and research of calligraphy circles at home and abroad. The Dictionary of Zhuanli in Qing Dynasty, published by Kumayama Pavilion in Japan and compiled by Bobang in Beichuan, is a masterpiece with 220 famous calligraphers, among which the word "Li Yang" has 786 words.
Yang Xian's works handed down from generation to generation are rich. Judging from his works in Han Li in his later years, his writing is quite different from the early calligraphers' consistent style of being horizontal and vertical, and there is a feeling of "chatting with an old man about teenagers". The ink is thick, the pen is strong, the pen is dry, the thickness and size naturally change, as if it is handy, but it is ingenious. The most interesting thing is that, in addition to depression, there are also techniques of shaking the pen and twisting the tube, which makes some fine pens more Gu Zhuo and crude, in sharp contrast with plump and thick fat pens. This seemingly straightforward approach actually lies in the comparative relationship, which is easily accepted today and has been widely used, but it was questioned at that time. Some people think that the books in his later years are "decadent", but little do they know that this is exactly the "twilight reform" that Yang Xian deliberately made.
? 20 17 July Xiangyang
(Originally published by Hubei Fine Arts Publishing House in 2065438+published in February 2009, "Four Positive Lines in Han Li")