The Art of Chinese Painting The Culture Show

The art of Chinese painting is one of the oldest continuous artistic

traditions in history. Its unique evolution is unparalleled in the art

world. From highly colourful religious art works, to distinctive

monochrome landscapes. The painters of China have strived for centuries

to represent and reflect on the environment around them in this vast

country. In doing so, they have created an aesthetic which is truly

unique to these land Being installed here at the Victoria and Albert

Museum are a selection of Chinese paintings that so rare that none of

them were ever intended to be hung in a gallery or museum. Masterpieces

of Chinese Painting spans some 1200 years and includes over 70 rare

of Chinese Painting spans some 1200 years and includes over 70 works of

art. This tricks is a comprehensive display of an artistic tradition

that was so innovative it was centuries ahead. They are some of

the best-known examples of one of the world's greatest artistic

traditions. The art of Chinese painting. I will travel to China to

learn who the earliest painters were. Why the written word had a

huge influence on painting style. And how an artist emperor helped to

bring about the country's golden age of painting. I'm in the Gobi Desert,

some 1500 miles way of Beijing to see a highly-prized collection of

early Chinese painting which was hidden from the world for centuries.

These are the Mogao caves, the oldest and largest collection of

Buddhist art anywhere in the world. Inside this vast complex of groet

owes lie 45,000 square meters of painted murals and thousands of

sculptures. Between them they span more than a millennium of culture

history. Situated at a crucial crossroads on the ancient Silk Road,

this area was once the gate which to the Chinese empire from Central

Asia. The earliest caves date back as far as the 4th century AD. The

outside influences of passing traders on the silk route are clear

from the stunning art work on the walls ever these caves. It's the

most extraordinary thing walking in from the Gobi Desert to find a cave

this vast. This bud ya is 20 meters tall. Surrounding him are these

murals in different colours all vibrant. Even though they have been

here in the desert for hundreds of years. The secret to that vibrancy

is the earliest use of ultramarine, a pigment sourced from Lapis Lazuli,

a substance which would have travelled along the Silk Road from

Afghanistan and which wasn't seen in European painting until the Middle

Ages. Professor Peng has been resident arguologist here for 25

years. -- archaeologist. The entire complex of caves was

abandoned in the 14th century and not rediscovered for more than 500

years. This, and the unique desert conditions here, helped to preserve

the site in its current state. It's the survival of another collection

here, against all the odds, which has proved to be the most important

discovery of all. This tiny chamber is known as the Library Cave.

There's not very much to see today, but when it was discovered in 1900

by the TaoistAbbot, Wang Yuan Lu, it was crammed floor to ceiling with

tens of thousands of important manuscripts and inKay --

incomparablehorde of priceless works of art. Sealed behind a wall in this

cave was a treasure trove of art words. The collection is thought to

have been concealed during a period of the 11th century, meaning they

were hidden from sight for almost a millennium.

The discovery of thousands of manuscripts and art works dating

back as far as the 5th century was big news in the art world. At the

turn of the 20th Century, good news travelled rather quickly along the

Silk Road. Before long, western explorers arrived on the scene.

First in line in 1907 was one Aurel Stein, a British-Hungarian explorer

whose expedition was part-funded by the British Museum. Steyn saw at

once the value of what the Abbot had discovered and and set about trying

to acquire the collection. He walked away with a huge haul which included

hundreds of documents and manual vipts not least the Diamond Sutra,

now known as the world's oldest printed book. The it may seem

astonishing to us today, Stein convinced the Abbot to part with a

huge number of priceless art works, including a beautiful collection of

painted silk banners. They were perfectly preserved in these dry

conditions, making them the earliest examples of their kind anywhere in

the world. Had they not been hidden, these rare silk banners would almost

certainly have been destroyed. Such pieces were made for worship and

were regularly disposed of. The original banners have been in the

possession of major European museums ever since their discovery in 1900.

The V exhibition will provide an exceptional opportunity to see this

astonishing selection together with 12 of them on display in one room.

The sealing of the library cave preserved countless treasures for

future generations. These unique banners are over 1,000 years old.

That they survived at all is very markable, but they exist in such

astonishing condition is truly a wonder of history. We know very

little about the mysterious artists who painted these stunning works of

art as early works such as these were never signed. Up until around

the time that the Library Cave was sealed at Mogao at the turn of the

11th cent, painting was considered just another lowly artisan trade

comparable to pottery or carpentry. Within two centuries painters would

have earned them selfs selves a position among the very elite of

society. They would shun colour and, what's more, they would be working

in a very different style. Monochrome depictions of landscapes

are perhaps the most familiar form of Chinese paintings. What changed?

How did we get from this to this? Why was paint superseded by ink? How

did colourful Buddhas give way to mountains and streams? And lowly

artisan painters go up in the world to become highly educated scholars?

For centuries now monochrome depictions of landscape and nature

have become considered the apotheosis of Chinese classical

Chinese painting. The style, so unique to this region, faced a long

road in becoming accepted as a high art form and the reasons for that

are due to those age old standards of class and politics. It was an

established practice for the Imperial Court to recruit the most

talented artisan painters in society to work in the Palace workshops. The

best court painters were often highly talented, but they were

clearly seen as hired hands with low status. Court painters, we would

have to say, they are artists who are drafted, possibly from

provincial workshops because they have ex-compelled and they have been

drafted into service at court. Essentially, a number of tasks would

await them there. Sometimes this would be the making of objects that

are clearly art works, such as hangs scrolls or hand scrolls orphans or

album leaves.s sometimes their function might be more in the line

of interior decorations. Court paintings were colourful and tended

to have a message. Very often the aim would be to improve moral

standards at court. This painting, the Admonitions scroll is amongst

the most famous remaining examples of this early style and attacks the

excessive behaviour of an Empress. This graphic style dominated court

painting for centuries. A shift was on the horizon that would change

Chinese painting forever. The the man responsible was the artist

behind this stunning work. This work was painted by one Emperor Huizong

of the 12th century Song Dynasty. He was both artist and ruler and used

his power to change how art was perceived. Emperor Huizong was very

elegant Skolar and accomplished artist himself. He was a great art

historian. It's an almost unique moment that you have an artist who

was an emperor or an emperor who is at the same time an artist. It's

exceptional. This stunning hand scroll will be the start attraction

of the V exhibition. It's among the most important early

Masterpieces of Chinese Painting in existence. It follows the 8th

century tradition with the heavy colouring, the very bright colours

and the brushwork itself is elegant and fluent. The talented Emperor

left an astonishing artistic legacy far beyond the inheritance of his

own masterpieces. In the year 1104, Emperor Huizong made a decision that

would help to bring about the end of an era. He opened the National

School of Painting and selected 30 students from across the country.

Not only did they receive technical fine art training, but the academy

also provided a well-rounded general education. The Emperor's decision to

educate his proteges all those years ago helped to change the course of

Chinese art history. Through him he raised the status of painter from

mere artisan to artists. He set up the first... The first person who

set up the school in the court. The School of Painting, which, on the

same level as the Emperor School for Poetry and for Classics. He regarded

the painting as high art. The The Song Dynasty also saw a shift in

style and subject matter. It has come down to us as the golden age of

Chinese painting. We regard the Song Dynasty paintings as peak of the art

of painting because the first is realism. The second is the ideal

beauty it conveys and the design as well as the depiction of what the

artists see. It's a dream for many later Chinese painters to achieve

this ideal beauty. Under Emperor Huizong direction the newly educated

court painters of the day began to produce works depicting highly

detailed scenes from nature. The The emphasis was now firmly on realism

one quintessential work of the time, attributed to the Emperor himsel is

a work entitled Auspicious Cranes. It's supposed to be a record of a

real happening of 20 cranes suddenly descending to the sky above the

Forbidden City. The record says many people in the capital saw that. They

all saw this as an auspicious sign. He said he would record this

auspicious sight. The artist Emperor's school of painting had

changed the status of painters in Chinese society. Painters were now

seen as individuals and artists began to sign their names on their

paintings. A new type of artist began to emerge. Unlike the artisans

of the past, they had power and status. They were known as the

scholar painters. Painters. There is this group of Skolars who feel that

they want to distinguish themselves from the court painters and what is

going on in the court. Often they paint for their own amusement. They

consider painting or writing itself is the self cultivation. There was

one feature of Skolar painting which was radically different from what

had gone before. Their paintings used almost no colour. There's an

idea that colour, sort of, fascinates the eye and not the mind.

The so they focus on painting with ink only. They very proudly used the

tools of the Skolar as if they were sitting down to write. In fact, they

sometimes even used the term Xie, to write. To write paintings. To become

a member of the Skolar class it was essential to pass a strict exam set

by the Emperor. There was one skill which was v ah aunted above all

others and had a huge influence on the scholarly painting style, the

art of calligraphy. The perfect line, drawn with the perfect brush,

held at the perfect angle has been central to the fact of Chinese

painting throughout its history. According to the elite, to be a

painter, you must first become an accomplished calligrapher. If you

had a steady hand and could master the art of calligraphy, it made it

possible to join the upper echelons of society, that meant that actually

you were influencing the moral and aesthetic standards of the day. The

art of the written language was seen as the highest human endeavour and

was elevated to a form of high art. To this day, learning calligraphy is

a crucial part of a painter's training. Auto I've come to

Beijing's Central Academy of Fine Art to join a class of art students

practicing calligraphy. Professor Xu is the art school's calligraphy

tutor. So what is the key to being a good

calligrapher? I thought I'd try my hand. A bit of water?

Enough? OK. Copying this one? You made it look so easy. OK.

It's a lovely sensation of the ink going on the page.

What's more important when you're teaching, getting people to think

about it, or getting people to copy? The ink and brush skills the Skolar

painters mastered in the practice of calligraphy had a huge influence on

their painting style. This independent group of educated

painters could choose to paint whatever they pleased. The genre

they most commonly chose to express themselves was landscape painting.

These are not landscapes that you find when you look out the window.

So exact representations. They are landscapes that are created in your

mind. You have been wandering in the landscape and you have experienced

the landscape within and then you try to transmit that experience. A

good Skolar painting is not just a demonstration of exactly the reality

or the form likeness, but between the lines actually there's a meaning

and became more expressive of the individualism at the same time it

became a mind image. This type of landscape paint something known as

Shan Shui, which literally translates as Mountain Water.

Mountains and water are almost always the key constituents of a

classical Chinese landscape painting. The Skolars use the genre

to express their world view. In a sense, they take a longer view of

history, which is they must speak truth to power. They are not there

simply to pander or be sycophants to emperors or powerful figures who

want this or that. The influenced by their teachings in classical Chinese

philosophy, Skolar painters often removed themselves from society to

live in the mountains to reflect the world around them. I've come to the

National Museum of China to learn more about this important genre of

Chinese painting. Dr Yu is this gallery's curator.

This hand scroll painting is attributed by the museum to the 13th

century painter, Huang Gongwang, one of the great scholar painters.

The four masters of the Un, as they were known, were reveered for

generations. Because this is made as a scroll, as

you unroll it, a story emerges. How do you read a scroll like this?

The way he spread out the landscape as being a metaphor for his

feelings, that's really really interesting. The Skolar

painters set the standard for centuries. They were masters of

their art and held up as examples for others to emulate.

To this day the tradition of landscape ink painting has endured

and the techniques of those early masters are used to teach the next

generation the ways of the classical arts. The way in which this valuable

information is imparted may come as a surprise, in China in order to

become a great artist, first you have to learn the art of copying.

These students are studying classical Chinese painting at the

Central Academy of Fine Art. The Professor Chen is overseeing a class

of students copying an old master of their choice. A process which could

take as much as five weeks. To copy the old masters correctly,

the students must learn the strict rules of landscape painting.

Each student has chosen a work by one of the great masters of

landscape painting. They stretch their canvas over the top of its

outline, and using magnets to cling to the original, trace the lines of

the masterpiece with their brush. Although they are copying, the

students are encouraged to express themselves. In order to earn that

right, it's essential for them to know the basics.

The tradition of copying has allowed the distinctive techniques of

Chinese painting to be handed down. It gives us insight into how

painters worked. At the Victoria and Albert Museum the most striking

thing is the diversity of style on show. From this, one of the longest

paintings in the world, to these precious religious banners which, by

rights, should have been destroyed a millennium ago. Some of the best

examples of Skolar paintings in existence. For V curator, Hongxing

Zhang damage, sdufrp sdufrp -- Hongxing Zhang assembling this

collection has been a very long time in the making. This is really

exciting for the V for myself Askew rater. It hasn't been really

an exhibition of this kind of this scope, 1200 years survey, for many,

many decades. The last one we can think of, really of this ambitious

scope is the 1935 show at Royal Academy. This, therefore, is very,

very ambitious and we're very proud of it. These paintings remain intact

against the odds of history is truly remarkable. To have such a

collection assembled here provides a rare opportunity to see and

experience the extraordinary story of Chinese painting.