Wei and Jin Dynasties were a period of collision and blending between Buddhism and Confucianism. Therefore, rulers use religion to build temples, carve caves and make statues, and use intuitive plastic arts to publicize their thoughts and teachings. The representative grottoes are Dunhuang Grottoes, Yungang Grottoes, Longmen Grottoes and Maijishan Grottoes. A large number of Buddha statues are carved in the grottoes, including stone carvings, wood carvings, clay sculptures, copper castings and so on. The Buddha statue became the main body of sculpture in China at that time. In the development of these grottoes, new sculptures are constantly added, and the grottoes have been rebuilt, expanded, added and supplemented in the past dynasties. Grottoes art is very representative in China sculpture. For example, Dai Kui in the Eastern Jin Dynasty was good at carving and casting Buddha statues. His jade Buddha statue in Jiankang Crock Temple, together with Gu Kaizhi's mural "Vimalakīrti Map" and the jade Buddha statue in Lion Garden, is called "Three Wonders of Crock Temple". Sculpture in this period is characterized by paying more attention to the description of details, being more skilled in technology, and most of the sculpture images and themes are religious, so the sculpture images have the characteristics of deification and exaggeration. Religion simplifies the subject matter of sculpture art, but the internal motivation of religious spirit also promotes the birth of a large number of fine works.
During the Three Kingdoms (Wei) period, Zhong You was the first calligrapher to establish the status of regular script. His Recommended Seasons Table and Declaration Form have become the treasures handed down from generation to generation, and they are on an equal footing with Wei Ji, forming the calligraphy style of North and South.
Metaphysics was very popular in Jin Dynasty. It was the ethos of the times to talk about metaphysics and elegance and advocate elegance and quality in life. Pursuing the beauty of neutrality and calmness in art, for a time, "father and son strive for victory, and brothers strive for coolness" spread in the Southern Dynasties, among which there are many bamboo slips. The artistic taste of the two kings (Wang Xizhi and Wang Xianzhi) met the requirements of the literati. Wang Xizhi's running script "Preface to the Lanting Pavilion" is known as "the best in the world" and is good at brushwork, thinking that it is like a floating cloud and smart. His son Wang Xianzhi's Ode to the Goddess of Luo is very valuable to calligraphers, and his "Breaking the Style" and "Calligraphy with One Stroke" are great contributions in the history of calligraphy. With the joint efforts of Lu, Wei, Suo, Wang, Xie, Yu, Liang and other calligraphers, Nanpai calligraphy will remain immortal. In the Song Dynasty, Yang Xin, Qi Guo, Liang Xiaosou and Chen all followed in his footsteps.
The Northern Dynasties reburied, praised their ancestors, revealed their possessions, and carved buddhas and stones. Yu Rubei sticks to the south, travels to the south in the north, heather in the north, and Xiunan in the north are all such differences.
For example, the representative works of the North-South School include Nan Liang's Yi and the Northern Wei Dynasty's Zheng Wengong Monument, which can be described as the North-South binary star. Most of the northern writers are Shu Ren, whose books are anonymous, so the history of calligraphy calls northern Wei calligraphy folk calligraphy. In terms of names, Zheng Daozhao and his son were crowned as "the saints in the book" and Wang Youjun of the Northern School.
During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the development of social production was relatively slow, and there were not as many vivid creations and innovations in architecture as in the Han Dynasty. However, the introduction of Buddhism led to the development of Buddhist architecture in India and Central Asia, the appearance of high-rise pagodas and the development of sculpture and painting art, which not only greatly developed the grottoes, Buddha statues and murals in China, but also affected the architectural art, making the relatively simple architectural style of the Han Dynasty more mature and mellow.
Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is a comprehensive and conscious period. In the past, arts and crafts mostly reflected the mysterious world of ghosts and gods, but in this period, people look at the real world with new eyes. Show the freshness and loveliness of the human world in arts and crafts.
During the hundreds of years from the demise of Han Le to the reunification of the Sui Dynasty, social unrest and frequent wars forced people to seek spiritual refuge, so Buddhism flourished in vast areas of China and religious art came into being.
Buddhist painting came into being in the period of Emperor Han Ming in the East. During the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the creation of Buddhist art became a belief in history, and Buddhist sculpture art gradually became one of the main manifestations of ancient stone carving art in China.
Sculpture in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties also developed further on the basis of tradition. The struggle and integration between ethnic groups and the influence of foreign culture made the stone carving art at that time more colorful. First of all, the stone carvings in tombs are more common than those in the Han Dynasty, and their styles have also changed obviously.
The epitaph of the Six Dynasties directly inherited the shape since the Han and Jin Dynasties. It is a polygonal prism on the base, with a carved square at the upper end and the top of the column, and a lotus flower carved on the circular cover to ward off evil spirits. Among them, the tomb table of filial piety in the Six Dynasties is the most exquisite. Although there are many carvings, there is no feeling of re-bedding. The influence of Buddhist art on traditional stone carving can be seen from its exquisite lotus roof decoration. The outstanding achievements of stone carving art in the Northern Wei Dynasty can be seen from the existing relief group images of Yongguling.
It can be seen that in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Buddhist art had penetrated into all fields of stone carving and injected unprecedented vitality into it.
The statues of cave temples in Buddhist art and the statues offered on various occasions are all relied on by religious believers for meditation. Its extraordinary development is inseparable from the prosperity of Buddhism. It is not only a product of religion, but also a deep imprint of the times and society. There are both believers' interpretations of the true meaning of Buddhism and artists' inner monologues.
The development of Buddhist grottoes and sculpture art in the Northern Dynasties is closely related to the route of Buddhism spreading eastward, the high degree of ethnic integration and the tragic struggle. Relatively closed and stable, so Buddhist art is not as developed as the Northern Dynasties. The red sandstone statues of the Southern Dynasties unearthed in Wanfo Temple have delicate and gorgeous expressions and exquisite knife work.
In addition, the small stone carvings in the south of China have also developed to a considerable extent in hundreds of years, among which talc carving is the most striking. Most of these sculptures are funerary objects, with strong muscles, full breasts and protruding abdomen, showing the calm and powerful dynamics of the characters, vivid and freehand brushwork, which is quite inherited by Han figurines.
Talc pigs are also common funerary objects, which are placed in pairs. At first, they were mostly vivid and realistic, and then they evolved into abstract and formal styles. Emphasizing vividness and image, its usual methods are deformation, exaggeration and abstraction, which leads to the evolution of realistic form into symbolic form. On the one hand, from the exquisite stone architecture and its stone carving art, we can see the prosperity of aristocratic mansions and the luxurious life of nobles in the Northern Dynasties. On the other hand, the image of three-body stone carving art reproduces the beautiful picture of people's lives at that time.
From the scanning of stone carvings of stone chambers and statues in the Northern Wei Dynasty and eastern China, we can see houses in the form of palaces, straight windows, elegant ladies and nobles with comfortable sleeves. Their lines are rich and smooth, and the complicated and concise hook shapes vividly reflect the basic techniques and performance styles of Chinese painting at that time. Their writing style is elegant but not vulgar, cordial and lyrical.
Since the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the literati advocated natural scenery and broad-minded romance, which contributed to the development of garden scenery behind the aristocratic families. From the pictures of stone carvings, we can also see the interest of gathering stones to draw water from springs and planting trees for landscaping.
Stone carving art is not only a symbol of religious spirit, but also a symbol of various social life, so in fact, the stone carving content in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is extremely extensive. This is also the foreign cultural factor introduced by the northwest nationalities, which has gradually fundamentally changed the daily life of the people in the Central Plains and the treatment of indoor space furnishings.
The formation of the mainstream of stone carving art in this period was caused by the influence of Buddhist art, which was particularly fully reflected in the stone carving architectural art.
Architectural art is a comprehensive art, in which stone carving technology occupies an extremely important position. The stone carving art in the Northern and Southern Dynasties is unparalleled, which is fully manifested in the excavation of large grottoes and their statues, as well as the fine image processing and decorative composition.
On the one hand, on the verandah of Tianlongshan Grottoes in Taiyuan, we can see that masons have created wooden-like grottoes with superb skills. The appearance of this large stone carving building undoubtedly laid a technical foundation for the widespread implementation of stone carving buildings in later generations. At present, most of the buildings in China before the Middle Ages have disappeared, and the cave temples have left the standard architectural style at that time, which is even more valuable.
The styles and decorative components of Chinese classical architecture are rich and colorful, which are also reflected in different forms in stone carving art. For example, the image of architectural components in the Southern and Northern Dynasties is softer and more beautiful than that in the Han Dynasty. There are two forms on the base of the column: cover basin and lotus petal, and the styles of the column are also different, all of which are to enhance the visual beauty of the viewer. At the same time, through the observation of the stone carving form, we can also realize the consistency of Buddhist statues and painting performance styles at that time.
The flying theme in decorative Buddhist scriptures is the most attractive angel image, elegant and vivid, which can best reflect the spirituality of Buddhist spirit. The lintel of the niche decorated with bird patterns and lush flowers looks like a gorgeous crown. The flame pattern of Buddha's backlight forms a reflection with the sitting and powerful Buddha.
The pattern of continuous grass rolling on both sides has been used from the Han Dynasty to the Southern and Northern Dynasties, but its composition has been integrated into Persian style, such as the combination of two groups of grass rolling in pairs. With the spread of Buddhist art to the East, we can also find many influences of ancient Indian, Persian and Greek decorative arts in the caves of the Northern Dynasties.
Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is the stage of vigorous development of stone carving art in China. The influence of foreign culture has played an immeasurable role in promoting the development of culture and art in China. Even if art serves religion, the brand of social life is self-evident. The problem lies in the introduction and prevalence of Buddhist art, which has broadened the endless performance space for the development of classical art, and made China's ancient art really get rid of the fetters of symbolism art and move towards realism. In the Han Dynasty and its predecessor, China ancient sculpture lacked lyricism and narrative, and it was not until the prosperity of Buddhist sculpture art that it was fundamentally changed.