The characteristics of Su Shi's calligraphy are plump ink, flat characters, low left and high right, random strokes, scattered characters, and naive meaning. Su Shi was good at writing regular script and running script. In his early years, he adopted the style of French king Xizhi, and later incorporated the styles of Yan Zhenqing, Yang Ningshi and others.
1. Use ink to plump up the body. Su Shi's calligraphy gives people the first impression of plumpness. Thin gold calligraphy is famous for its thinness, but Su Shi's calligraphy regards fatness as its beauty. Of course, everyone has different preferences in whether they are fat or thin. Some people like Su Shi's calligraphy at first sight, while others have a bad impression of Su Shi's calligraphy at first sight. Zhao Mengfu once commented on Su Shi's calligraphy as "a black bear is in power, and it is terrifying." Huang Tingjian also believed that Su Shi's calligraphy used too much ink. Because of this, in Su Shi's calligraphy, it is rare to see dry brushes and white flies, but the words are plump and plump. All of Su Shi's works have this characteristic. Such as "Teacher Biancai's Post" and "Tie with Mr. Dong".
2. The knot is flat. Contrary to the slender shape of the Ou style, the knotted characters in Su Shi's calligraphy are mostly flat. This feature is prominently reflected in his works such as "Red Cliff Ode" and "Dongting Spring Ode".
3. Light horizontally and heavy vertically. This fully shows that Su Shi's calligraphy was obviously influenced by Yan style. This feature of calligraphy is clearly reflected in his work "Returning to Lai Xi Ci".
4. The strokes are stretched. Anyone who has studied Huang Tingjian's calligraphy has a deep understanding of the stretching of the brushstrokes in his calligraphy. Huang Tingjian was once a student of Su Shi and was known as one of the "Four Scholars of the Su School". The two had a close personal relationship, and many of Su Shi's rumors and interesting stories were related to Huang Tingjian. Therefore, Su Shi's calligraphy should have an influence on Huang Tingjian. Where is this impact reflected? Studying Su Shi's calligraphy and Huang Tingjian's calligraphy, it is not difficult to find that there is one thing in common in the writing of the strokes and even the knots, that is, they are both stretched.
5. The importance is scattered. Staggered light and heavy mainly refers to Su Shi's calligraphy, especially running script, where the strokes often appear to be light and heavy between characters, resulting in a rhythmic arrangement of large and small fonts. For example, in "Wuchang Xishan Poems", the sentence "But the setting sun is low and the yellow dust is low" is one large and one small, well-proportioned. Sometimes a few words are heavy, a few words are light, and the combination of light and heavy also gives people a strong sense of rhythm. For example, in "A Reply to Qian Mufu's Poems", "I borrow your wise words to write about your beauty, but I can't play the organ by myself." The word "borrow" is heavy and the word "miao" is light; the word "yu write spring" is three words and the word "rongzi" is light; the word "gu feng" is two words heavy and the word "qinbucheng" is light and the word "nong" is light The words become heavier again.
6. Great disparity in size. The weight of the pen and the size of the font are almost a major feature of many famous calligraphy. However, in the same work, Su Shi's calligraphy can be said to be unique in that there is a huge difference in font size. For example, in "Han Shi Tie", there are three words: "cry Tu Qiong". These three characters occupy a larger proportion than the five characters in the previous line. This disparity in the size of the fonts gives people a strong visual impact, and actually expresses a strong emotion during the writing process at that time. This situation is also reflected in "Wuchang Xishan Poems".
7. Charming and innocent. Huang Tingjian said in "Books with Jingdao Shijun" that "Hanlin Su Zizhan's calligraphy is beautiful, although the ink used is too rich, but there is more than enough rhyme". This kind of graceful charm makes people look natural and frank, even innocent and sincere, without any crazy or artificial meaning. Coupled with the plump ink and flat knots, it is like looking at a noble lady who is honest and virtuous. She does not feel unfamiliar when looking at her, but instead feels a sense of closeness and warmth. When I was 13 years old, I was in junior high school. The school issued a copybook for middle school students, with partial appreciation of some famous works attached at the end. Among them are several lines of Su Shi's "Red Cliff Ode". Among the works of many famous artists, Su Shi's works alone give me such a unique feeling. I still remember the sentence in his poem: "The guest said that the moon and stars are sparse, and the black magpie flies south. Isn't this a poem by Cao Mengde?" It left a deep impression on me of being charming and innocent, kind-hearted and sincere, but I can no longer remember which other work is included in the appendix.