Reading Chinese Painting

Book excerpt: Applying a comparative approach to Chinese and Western art, this book examines the characteristics of traditional Chinese art and analyses the distinction between figure painting and portraiture. It examines the scenery in Chinese landscape painting and the sense of poetry within the paintings of flowers and birds so that the reader comes to understand the unique essence of Chinese art and is gradually led towards the ethereal world of spiritual abstraction displayed in Chinese painting. The author relates the development of Chinese painting to the pursuit of the conceptual sense (yijing) found in Chinese philosophy and classical literature. She describes how Confucianism determined the content of the development of painting while Daoism guided the concept of aestheticism within it. Professor Law also examines the way in which differences of method and media profoundly influenced the artistic outcome producing the western skills in the handling of color and light and shade, and in China the imaginative use of ink on paper. All this is reflected in numerous illustrations ranging from Van Gogh to the great Chinese painters of all the different dynasties from the early Jin dynasty to the Ming and Qing dynasties.After reading this book, readers will follow the author' s rich experience in Chinese painting to understand the characteristics of the different genres of Chinese painting and be able to deeply appreciate the inner meaning of Chinese painting.