Yan Zhenqing’s regular script is an outstanding family in the Tang Dynasty. He is an innovator in calligraphy style after Tang Ou, Yu, Chu and Xue. It has a great influence on future generations, especially making it easier for future generations to learn regular script. It can be said that, besides Wang Xi, Yan Zhenqing had the greatest influence.
Although Yan Zhenqing is a master of regular script, there are also disapproving comments from later generations. For example, Empress Li of the Southern Tang Dynasty and Mi Fu of the Song Dynasty criticized it, calling it "Tianshe Khan" and "ugly and evil." As for Yan Zhenqing's running script, there has been no disdain from ancient times to the present. Mi Fu spoke highly of his running calligraphy. Speaking of "Zheng Zheng Tie", he believed that "it has the spirit of seal script and is the best in Yan calligraphy" ("History of Calligraphy"). For other calligraphy calligraphy, some may call them "strange actions, obtained by accident"; some may admire them as "the intention is not written, but the innocence is exposed";
Yan Zhenqing is good at regular script and cursive script. He broke with the previous delicate and elegant Erwang calligraphy style, which puzzled Mi Fu, the great calligrapher of the Song Dynasty. Mi Fu studied Wang Xizhi's calligraphy style, and then incorporated the brushwork of painting into it to form a font with beautiful pictures. Mi Fu also mentioned in his calligraphy theory that Yan Zhenqing was the ancestor of ugly calligraphy, and Liu Gongquan took ugly calligraphy to the extreme.
The essence of Mi Fu's calligraphy is Er Wang. His unique brush strokes (attacking from all sides) make running writing very visual. At first glance, his calligraphy is one-sided, but upon closer inspection, the words lean to one side and have emphasis on the other. It looks like a dangerous building, like a weathered stone on a cliff. However, in his later years, Mi Fu changed his views on the calligraphy of the Tang Dynasty, believing that no one could surpass Liu Gongquan's calligraphy.
Mi Fu thinks that Yan Zhenqing’s regular script is not enough to be tried and the cursive calligraphy is admirable. Personally, I think this is a problem of the historical background and the trend of calligraphy view of the times. It can be analyzed from the following aspects:
First, although the Tang Dynasty to the Song Dynasty experienced a great change of dynasties, in terms of culture and art, due to historical reasons, the culture of the Song Dynasty was not as good as that of the Tang Dynasty. North Korea's culture and art are prosperous and prosperous. This is a fact that can be seen. In terms of calligraphy, few people have been found to be talented in regular script writing since the Song Dynasty. Including the Song Dynasty emperor Zhao Zhe and Xianggong Mi Fu, their main development targets were cursive calligraphy. It's no wonder Mi Fu said this.
Second, whether Mi Fu has always admired the calligraphy style of the Wei and Jin Dynasties, there are some historical basis and reasons for this. Mi Fu inherited the style of Wang Xizhi's cursive calligraphy. And on this basis, it has been developed and expanded to form a personal calligraphy style.
Thirdly, the calligraphy of the Song Dynasty is not widely spread today. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties and the Republic of China, the calligraphy style gradually returned to the calligraphy style of the Jin and Tang Dynasties. Especially after the founding of the People's Republic of China, the practice of learning calligraphy from the Jin and Tang dynasties became a common practice, which was much larger than at any other period in history.