Finger firmness: refers to that all fingers need to be firmly pressed on the pen tube, and the grip is stable.
Guilty hand: refers to the palm of your hand that is not too tight, but moderate and flexible enough to write.
Round back of hand: describes that when writing, the palm is bent and upright. (You don't need to round your arms hard, just moderately to make your fingers flexible. )
Palm upright: refers to the palm upright, which can make the pen hold straight.
Emperor Taizong said: "In fact, the muscle strength is even, and the palm is weak and easy to use." The part that needs attention is roughly the same, and the rest of the details depend on the reader's own experience.
Pen transportation method:
Pillow wrist: that is, the wrist is placed on the table to write, and the pen is only lifted by the palm of your hand. The scope is small and it is not suitable for writing big characters.
Wrist-lifting: Put your elbow on the desk to write, the scope will be widened, and it is suitable to write Chinese characters.
Hanging the wrist: the whole arm is lifted, the elbow posture is fixed, and the pen is lifted on the palm and shoulder, which has a wide range of activities and is suitable for writing big characters. It is the most difficult of the three methods.
In addition, when writing, you need to be steady, support, assist in raising your pen, get used to the activity place, keep your posture beautiful, stand on your back and face up, remember!
Tightness of pen:
Since ancient times, there have been many theories about the tightness of pens. Those who want to hold it tightly can hold it firmly because they hold it tightly when writing, and those who want to hold it loosely because they hold the pen too tightly, and the words are bare and have no edges and corners. In fact, the two meanings are similar, but the focus is different.
The pen is too loose, it is easy to take off the pen when carrying, and the hand is weak, of course it is unstable; Holding the pen too tightly will hinder the operation, just as bad. Moderate tightness is the right way.
Brush is the foundation of calligraphy, and it is useless to write without the essentials. That's why calligraphy is important. There are three ways to raise a pen: first, it refers to the method of raising a pen; Second, it refers to the method of carrying a pen with your wrist; The third refers to the elbow pen-lifting method. Small print should be sharp, Chinese characters should be wrist, big characters should be elbow, …
Refers to the mode of transportation:
Fingering is one of the ways to hold a pen, that is, the left hand is placed under the right hand. Commonly known as pillow-wrist posture. You can also put a heavy object under the right wrist instead, so that the wrist is fixed and only the fingers of the palm can move, so you can only write short strokes, which is suitable for fine print. However, it is not appropriate to use the pillow wrist body when writing small characters in cursive script. Because this method is not flexible, there will be a lack of flowing spirit when writing, and its spirit cannot be expressed. In short, fingering is the most stable and firm way to write, and it can be used as the first step to practice writing, and it is much easier to improve it to lifting or hanging the wrist. So beginners should practice more.
Wrist transportation method:
Wrist movement is to fix the elbow and lift the wrist, which is generally called wrist lifting. This method is to raise the wrist, the movement range is larger than that of the pillow wrist, and you can write larger Chinese characters. But it is also not suitable for writing big characters, because the elbow is still on the ground and the range of activities is still limited.
Elbow transportation method:
Elbow method is to hang elbows together and use elbows to carry pens, which is generally called wrist-hanging style. However, this method is the most flexible, with the largest range of activities and easy to express brushwork, with the shoulder as the center and the wrist and elbow not on the case. Suitable for block letters, cursive scripts, etc. In a word, hanging wrist posture is the ultimate usage of calligraphy. To be perfect, this method must be skillful, otherwise Chinese characters can't show their dominance and cursive script can't escape.
Writing skills:
The way of writing brush has been discussed before, and the next step is to give full play to its essentials, how to make various strokes when writing, how to show different writing styles, and there are many changes during the period, as well as the way of writing brush and pen, the priority of writing brush, the connection and disconnection between strokes or words, the way of turning, the use of nib and so on. , all need to pay attention. But although there are many, there are still some statutes to be found. The following is divided into seven points, which are roughly classified and described:
Start and close pen:
Fiona Fang should be clear, perfect and clean about writing. Bao said, "when you start writing, there is no peak in the right direction, and there is no ink increase in the wrong direction." If there were no peaks, the shape would be perfect. Without ink, the strokes are clean. When you start writing, you will enter a square and then reverse into a circle. When closing the pen, it is necessary to pause or fold the pen to form a square and return to the front to form a circle. The above points are the first principles, so we should practice more.
Pen and pen:
When you are writing, the process of completing a word is formed by the interaction of starting and stopping. "Pause" means putting pressure on the pen and bending the pen to apply force to the paper. "Lift" means to lift or half lift the pen to continue writing. Generally speaking, you need to pick up a pen to write, and then you need to pick up a pen to shape a stroke or connect the next stroke. Finally shape the word. This is why calligraphy writing is an alternating process of raising and raising. Among them, there are more subtle changes, for example, there are points that are all mentioned and half mentioned, and there are also points that are light and heavy. This requires readers to experience it themselves.
Rotating pen and folding pen:
Besides the above, we also need to pay attention to the transfer of the pen and the pause of the pen. "Turn" is the method of circular strokes, and "Fold" is the method of drawing. Zhang Tingxiang once said, "Real books are shaped by stippling, so that we can see the nature at a turning point." . Among them, subdividing what you can see in ancient books can also be called flipping. It is expressed by the phrase "dragging on it", which means that the pen stops moving in the pen and the direction of the nib changes slightly into a U-turn. Make the outer corner square and get its brushwork. As for the rotation method, it is also called twisting method. The meaning of "moving down" in strokes is almost the same as that of "up", but it keeps turning forward and turning down with the trend, and its shape is the same as that of ㄟ, except that the outer corner is drawn into a circle, and the rotation range is greater. Jiang Menglin used a picture to illustrate it, and attached a poem: "Turn it over, bend it at right angles, twist it, and roll like a circle." This example is obvious.
Fang Bi and the round pen;
This part is more complicated, emphasizing the overall effect. Start, close, lift, stop, turn and fold as mentioned above, and slow down a little when writing to make the strokes more stable. With proper skills, at the beginning, end and corner, the strokes are moderate, which highlights the curvature and makes the whole structure look round and elegant. Fang Bi, on the other hand, highlighted the backbone of strokes in the above points, making the overall structure clear, straight, light, concise and powerful. Zhang Longyan said: "The square is straight and precise, and the round pen is strange." Very commendable.
Tibetan front and exposed front:
When it comes to a stroke, we can extend the methods of oblique, positive, overlapping, folding and returning. It is very important to know the usage of a stroke. The center of the calligraphy pen remains the same, which is the way to die. Tibetan front and exposed front are the most important. Hidden front is to hide the brush stroke in the strokes without revealing traces; Exposing the front is the natural exposure of the pen. Xu: "When using a pen, it is especially necessary to hide the front. If you don't hide in front, the words will be sick. " This sentence is very clear. If you don't hide your pen, you will lack the deep rhyme of the meaning, you can't be partial, and you will be sick if you don't get to the middle. The two should cooperate, hiding the front to cover its qi, revealing the front to longitudinal its qi, so that the words are vigorous and natural, that is, the Tao.