It seems that the techniques, compositions and sword techniques of stone seal carving all came from the traditional way, but when combined together, they give birth to the novel and strange atmosphere like in Li He's poems , this "ghost spirit" is fresh, moving, and full of artistic life. I carved a seal a few years ago. The text on the seal was "It is easy to draw ghosts, but it is difficult to draw people." The margin of the seal was engraved. Nowadays, there are many "surprise and winning" works in the book world, which either distort the fonts or twist the brush strokes, which is uncharacteristic and dazzling. . We are all smart people in this generation, and they know how to draw ghosts easily but difficult to draw people...Here, "people" are regarded as the artistic rules and expressions of traditional calligraphy, and the subtitle is a satire on those who one-sidedly emphasize the lyricism of calligraphy and abandon it. Excellent tradition, using the pen as the body and gathering ink to form the ghost painting talisman. This spring I went through old works and read this one: I suddenly thought that if I analyze this seal from a new angle and a higher level, it will have new ideas, so I made a supplement on the other side of the seal. Said: "The human form is fixed, so it is difficult to draw, but you can do it if you practice hard skills. The ghost's form is not fixed, so it is easy to draw. However, the ghost spirit is also difficult to find. It cannot be obtained by those who are not talented and highly educated... "It is said here that it is difficult to draw "people". Although you can draw images with enough effort, but to draw "ghosts" to make them alive, you must draw "people" well. The "ghost" mentioned here is an unprecedented artistic creation, which requires a keen sensitivity and creative ability to art forms. Don't you see, the ghosts in Pu Songling's paintings are all human and have the ghostly feel of a superman. Therefore, it is indeed more difficult to paint ghosts, who are originated from humans and are higher than humans, than to paint humans. The "ghost spirit" in the stone seal is the soul of its style, and it is the spirit that is difficult to obtain by those who paint "people". A ghost is different from a human being.
So Shi Kai said: Regarding the future development of seal cutting art, I think there is no need to predict but to practice. If we grasp the two laws of "shape variation" in seal character structure and "line variation" in knife skills, there will be no end to the innovation of seal styles, and new styles and new schools will continue to emerge. Shi Kai grasped the core part of the artistic language of seal cutting, that is, calligraphy and knife skills, and it is necessary to make new contributions on this. As far as "Shikai Yincun" is concerned, the characteristics of its calligraphy have basically formed the "Shikai style", and although its line characteristics allow for exploration that is different from others, it has not yet been cultivated into a "ghost". It can break through the ancients and contemporary people and form its own style.
In recent years, Shi Kai seems to have a deep understanding of this and is committed to the creation of new seal cutting lines. From the publication of his works, obvious changes have taken place. The lines of some white seals, such as those on stele rubbings, are not very clear, which is different from the mottled rotten copper seals and are thick and hazy; the lines of red seals are like leakage marks in a house, and sometimes fly out, which is different from the smoothness of sealing mud. But it does mean that it has achieved unprecedented newness. Let it be whatever people say about this new world. Anyway, Shi Kai did this.
In pursuit of unprecedented line texture, he also made a lot of explorations in engraving techniques. Simple punching, cutting and other traditional knife techniques are no longer enough to create the lines in Ishikai's recent works. I have never seen how Ishikai engraves. But looking at his imprints, it can be inferred that he used many other techniques in addition to knife carving, and it can be said that he used any means to achieve his ideal line beauty. Shi Kai focused on seal writing and knife skills but did not talk about other things. In fact, Shi Kai also put great effort into the composition or the form that extended further from the composition. Earlier, when he carved red seals, he occasionally had small rivet-like dots in each of the four corners of the frame, or carved a small right angle similar to the geometric symbol of a ninety-degree angle (this type of form is also found in ancient artifacts), in order to achieve the goal. The beauty of decoration is rarely seen nowadays. However, we can also see new structures. For example, the background of the red seal was not clean when it was engraved. There are hazy red traces in the large blank space after the seal is printed (this form is seen in sealing mud and other rubbings). The lines of the white seal have broken through the line boundaries and will Lines and surfaces are blended together to construct the overall sealing surface, which is sometimes thick and sometimes thin, sometimes refreshing and sometimes blurry. The large areas of the white text sealing surface are left red, and sometimes there is a hazy whiteness that appears if the rubbing is unclear, which further increases the overall integrity of the lines. Blocky texture. The mottled red on the red seal and the hazy white on the white seal pushed seal cutting from a simple calligraphy-style line construction art to an art-style flat composition art. It can be said to be a qualitative breakthrough for the predecessors.