Su Shi (1037 AD - 1101 AD), courtesy name Zizhan, also known as Dongpo Jushi, was a native of Meizhou (now part of Sichuan). He was a famous poet in the Northern Song Dynasty (960 AD - 1127 AD) in China. Writer, calligrapher and painter. He once held official positions such as Jiayou Jinshi. Together with his father Su Xun and younger brother Su Zhe, he was collectively known as the "Three Sus" and was very famous in the literary and art circles.
He is good at painting bamboo and studying Wen Tong. He was an early advocate of literati painting and founded the Huzhou School of Painting. His works include "Pictures of Dead Trees and Strange Rocks", "Pictures of Bamboo and Stone", etc. He is one of the four great calligraphers "Su, Huang, Mi and Cai". He is good at running script and regular script. His calligraphy draws on the nutrients of Yan Zhenqing, Liu Gongquan, Chu Suiliang, Xu Hao, Li Beihai and Yang Ningshi, and strives to innovate on the basis of inheriting the tradition. He creates based on a deep understanding of the art of calligraphy, rather than simply mechanically learning from the ancients. He used a special method of holding a pen that was different from ordinary people, and paid attention to the reform of writing tools. I studied Lanting for a few days, so his calligraphy is as charming as Xu Hao's. When I get drunk and lethargic, I forget about my craftsmanship. My handwriting is very thin and strong, like Liu Gongquan. When I was middle-aged, I liked to learn Yan Zhenqing's and Yang Ning's calligraphy. Their similarities are not inferior to Li Yong's. The Song Dynasty's good calligraphy should be ranked first. When discussing calligraphy with Ziyou, he said: "Although I am not good at calligraphy, there is no better calligrapher than me. If you can only understand its meaning, it is often said that you cannot learn." One day, I was sitting idle in the academy, and suddenly I was ordered to take paper and pen to write "Pingchou Jiaoyuanfeng" "Good seedlings also embrace the new" two sentences. The big book and small regular script are written in cursive script, usually written on seven or eight pages. Throwing the pen and sighing, he said: "Okay." He scattered the papers around him and gave them something to do. During the Chongguan period, Bian was employed in the capital, and Shi was detained as a party member, and his writing and writing were banned and destroyed. During the Zhenghe period, the ban was suddenly relaxed, and Qiu Shi's ink was very sharp. When Huizong came in person, Daoliu bowed to the emperor and said, "Kui Su is Su Shi of this dynasty." The emperor was shocked and wanted to play with his poems. He also worked on painting, making ink bamboo from the ground to the top. Mi Fu asked: "Why not divide it section by section?" He said: "When bamboo is growing, how can it be grown section by section?" The clear thinking comes from Wen Tong. He said that he picked up a petal of incense with Wen, and used the darker ink as the face and the lighter ink as the back. The bamboo trees are made very finely. The branches of the dead wood are twisted and twisted without any reason, and the stones are hard and cracked, and they are also strange and strange, just like the depression in the chest. Huizong tried to promote the Jade Bureau concept in his dynasty, so it was passed down as the "Jade Bureau Method" to later generations. It is made of withered trees, clumps and broken mountains, and the power of writing is ups and downs, in a windy and uninhabited place. He wrote to Wang Dingguo in a book and said: "I have recently painted a cold forest, which is of a divine quality." The crabs painted by General Hu Shi of Lanling were collected, with trivial hairs and awns, and everything was ready. Try painting the ugly stone and wind bamboo on the wall of the pavilion, and use it to change the stone on the spiritual wall in Liu's garden. He also painted the body of Maitreya as a message to the Qin Dynasty, and his writing style is very ancient. In the picture of saving the sun, a dot turns into the moon, and a touch turns into a snake, which is extremely wonderful. He is the author of "Dongpo Ci", "Dongpo Poems" and "Dongpo Complete Works" handed down to the world. He died at the age of sixty-six. In the history of painting, Su Shi's greatest contribution was his profound influence on the development of Chinese literati painting.