Huang Shen is a very diligent and enlightened painter. He attached great importance to the important role of cultural literacy in painting creation, and increased the study of cultural knowledge. He once said that "single crystal can't regain youth", realizing the preciousness of time to painters, cherishing time and stepping up study. His poems in Jiangnan:
Ten years of packing monks, no wonder autumn frost and rain. After experiencing many things in the Southern Dynasties, I frequently borrowed Buddhist shrines to read. (Huang Shen's "Jiaohu Poetry")
He has a deep memory of his poor study and life in his early years. Qi Baishi also had a childhood experience of "never dropping out to study Tang poetry with a high fever", so he had a strong admiration for Huang Shen's experience and art. According to Xu Qizhuo's Biography of Mountain Man, he learned to draw when he was fourteen or fifteen years old, but there was always a stork protruding from his chest. He suddenly realized that he didn't work for painting, so he didn't study. So I got angry. I took five-character poems and mid-late Tang poems of,, Shi, Han, Jin, Song, Du, and Han, and studied them carefully ..., but in ... the system of costumes and ritual vessels of past dynasties, ... my figure was poor, and ... I suddenly gained something in my heart. I should hold it in my hand, and then I can speak and draw.
It is precisely because of his profound cultural accomplishment that Huang Shen did not bury his artistic spirit in his career of selling paintings all the year round and formed a very distinctive artistic style. He has profound attainments not only in painting, but also in literature and calligraphy. Jiaohu Poetry is his personal collection of poems, which is really rare among painters. His comprehensive and profound cultural accomplishment made Huang Shen unique and established his stable position in Yangzhou Painting School in the middle of Qing Dynasty.
Huang Shen is an all-round painter who is good at landscapes, flowers, birds and figures, but his main achievement is figure painting. Mythological themes, Buddhist figures, fishermen, woodcutters and beauties have all become his frequent painting themes, which embodies the author's profound insight into the world and personal joys and sorrows. Based on the legendary story of the Eight Immortals, Huang Shen left a lot of pictures of the Eight Immortals, except a picture of the Eight Immortals created at the age of 4 11.5×161.3cm in Taizhou Museum, Jiangsu Province.
This picture was made in 1734, and it was Huang Shen's work for 48 years. The whole picture is 164.5× 148.5 cm, inscribed "June 12th year of Yongzheng, written by Huang Shen", written by Huang Shen Zhu, Gong Shoubai. The series has been printed.
Huang Shen, a native of Ninghua, Fujian, lived in Yangzhou for a long time and was one of the eight eccentrics in Yangzhou. His Eight Immortals are huge, with strong lines and different expressions, which is the best system.
This is Huang Shen's figure painting handed down from ancient times, and it is the representative work of Huang Shen's meticulous figure painting and the Eight Immortals of Taizhou Museum (Huang Shen's meticulous figure painting is completely opposite to his brushwork freehand figure painting, and they are two different styles). Huang Shen studied Shangguan Zhou's meticulous figure painting method in his early years and laid a solid foundation in brushwork. From this picture, we can fully feel the influence of Shangguan Zhou's painting style. Compared with Shangguan Zhou's rigorous and refined painting style, Huang Shen's figure painting is more elegant and agile, like a flowing note, flowing slowly in a silent picture atmosphere. There is the author's unique personality and talent in the density of lines and interspersed tapes. As a painting in the Middle Ages, this painting is skillful with pen, smooth lines and meticulous workmanship, which basically reflects the author's fine figure painting in this period and is a great masterpiece with considerable skill.
Huang Shen has a clear sense of reality, and he is not obedient to immortals and Buddhism and Taoism. He once "laughed as a fairy" and was skeptical about the concept of immortals. He created figure paintings with immortals and Buddhism as themes. In addition to being asked by the society to create auspicious and auspicious works at that time, personally, I think this kind of theme can give full play to his artistic imagination. So I have always been passionate about creating this painting theme. Many characters in his works come from reality. He put all the people of different classes observed in the society into his works, beautified and idealized them, created a very beautiful artistic image in the form of immortals, Buddhists and Taoists, and euphemistically expressed his ideals and pursuits from the side. From this point of view, Huang Shen is an artist with considerable ideological depth. Huang Shen's figure painting. Compared with other painters' works, it has an important feature, that is, it pays great attention to the arrangement of the plot of the picture, and the movements, expressions and forms of the characters are all handled around the upcoming events. Each character's actions and states have mutual echo and connection, and the author often arranges different emotional reactions according to the states of different people in the painting. Because of this, Huang Shen's figure painting is full of profound artistic appeal. We can not only feel the expressions and behaviors of the characters in the painting within a limited picture, but also lead our thoughts out of the picture. In the creation of Eight Immortals, it is like this: Zhang and Cao Guojiu are discussing the upcoming major action, and Han Zhong looks nervous, leaning on crutches, looking down, and if he is right, it will constitute the central part of the picture; He Xiangu, listen, Han Xiangzi and He Xiangu are waiting for the final decision together; Blue Cai He squatted beside the flower basket, admiring the fairy flowers in her hand. Lv Dongbin accidentally seemed to see something, suddenly turned and lowered his head, and so on. Although the eight people have different manners, they all revolve around the central event that is happening. The expressions and manners of the characters give us rich imagination. Huang Shen's figure painting can arouse people's heartfelt love when the plot is introduced into the painting, which is one of the indispensable reasons.