History of Chinese art

Chinese jade ornament with dragon and phoenix design, late Spring and Autumn Period (722 B.C.E.-

481 B.C.E.).

Chinese art traditions are the oldest continuous art traditions in the world. Early so-called
"stone age art" in China, consisting mostly of simple pottery and sculptures, dates back to
10,000 B.C.E.. This early period was followed by a series of dynasties, most of which lasted
several hundred years.

Historical development to 221 B.C.E.

Neolithic pottery

Black eggshell pottery of the Longshan culture (c. 3000–2000 B.C.E.)

Early forms of art in China are found in the Neolithic Yangshao culture (Chinese: 仰韶文
化; pinyin: Yǎngsháo Wénhuà), which dates back to the sixth
millennium B.C.E. Archeological findings such as those at the Banpo have revealed that
the Yangshao made pottery; early ceramics were unpainted and most often ornamented
by with marks made by pressing cords into the wet clay. The first pictorial decorations
were fish and human faces, which eventually evolved into symmetrical-geometric
abstract designs, some painted.

Jade culture

Jade bi from the Liangzhu culture. The ritual object is a symbol of wealth and military power.

Tools such as hammer heads, ax heads and knives were made of jade nephrite during
the Neolithic period (c. 12,000 – c. 2,000 B.C.E.). The Liangzhu culture, the last Neolithic
jade culture in the Yangtze River delta, lasted for a period of about 1300 years from
3400 - 2250 B.C.E. The jade from this culture is characterized by finely worked, large
ritual jades such as Cong cylinders, Bi discs, Yue axes, pendants and decorations in the
form of chiseled open-work plaques, plates and representations of
small birds, turtles and fish. Liangzhu jade has a white, milky bone-like aspect due to its
origin as Tremolite rock and the influence of water-based fluids at the burial sites.

Bronze Casting
Shang Dynasty (Yin) bronze ritual wine vessel, dating to the thirteenth century B.C.E.

The Bronze Age in China began with the Xia Dynasty (ca. 2100 – 1600 B.C.E.). Examples
from this period have been recovered from ruins of the Erlitou culture, in Shanxi, and
include complex but unadorned utilitarian objects. In the following Shang Dynasty (商
朝) or Yin Dynasty (殷代) (ca. 1600 - ca. 1100 B.C.E.), more elaborate objects, including
many ritual vessels, were crafted. The Shang are recognized for their bronze casting,
noted for its clarity of detail. Excavations show that Shang bronzesmiths usually worked
in foundries outside the cities and made ritual vessels, weapons and sometimes chariot
fittings. The bronze vessels were receptacles for storing or serving various solids and
liquids used in the performance of sacred ceremonies. Some forms such as
the ku and jue can be very graceful, but the most powerful pieces are
the ding, sometimes described as having an "air of ferocious majesty."

Early Chinese music

The origins of Chinese music and poetry can be found in the Book of Songs, containing

poems composed between 1000 B.C.E. and 600 B.C.E.. The text, preserved among the
canon of early Chinese literature, contains folk songs, religious hymns and stately songs.

Early Chinese music was based on percussion instruments such as the bronze bell.
Chinese bells were sounded by being struck from the outside, usually with a piece of
wood. Sets of bells were suspended on wooden racks. Inside excavated bells are
grooves, scrape marks and scratches made as the bells were tuned to the right pitch by
removing small amounts of metal. Percussion instruments gradually gave way to string
and reed instruments toward the Warring States period.

Chinese pu vessel with interlaced dragon design, Spring and Autumn Period (722 B.C.E.-481 B.C.E.).

Significantly, the Chinese character for the word music (yue) was the same as that
for joy (le). Confucians believed music had the power to make people harmonious and
well balanced, or to cause them to be quarrelsome and depraved. According to Xun Zi,
music was as important as the li (rites, etiquette) stressed in Confucianism. Mozi,
philosophically opposed to Confucianism, dismissed music as useless and wasteful,
having no practical purpose.

Early Chinese poetry

In addition to the Book of Songs (Shi Jing), a second early and influential poetic

anthology was the Songs of Chu (Simplified Chinese: 楚辞; Traditional Chinese: 楚
辭; pinyin: Chǔ Cí), made up primarily of poems ascribed to the semilegendary Qu
Yuan (c. 340–278 B.C.E.) and his follower Song Yu (fourth century B.C.E.). The songs in
this collection are more lyrical and romantic and represent a different tradition from the
earlier Classic of Poetry (Shi Jing).

Chu and Southern culture

A rich source of art in early China was the state of Chu (722 – 481 B.C.E.), which
developed in the Yangtze River valley. Painted wooden sculptures, jade
disks, glass beads, musical instruments, and an assortment of lacquerware have been
found in excavations of Chu tombs. Many of the lacquer objects are finely painted, red
on black or black on red. The world's oldest painting on silk discovered to date was
found at a site in Changsha, Hunan province. It shows a woman accompanied by
a phoenix and a dragon, two mythological animals that feature prominently in Chinese
art.

Early Imperial China (221 B.C.E.– 220 C.E.)

Qin sculpture

crossbow men from the Terracotta Army, interred by 210 B.C.E., Qin Dynasty

A gilded bronze lamp with a shutter, in the shape of a maidservant, from the Western Han Dynasty,
2nd century B.C.E.
Two gentlemen engrossed in conversation while two others look on, a painting on a
ceramic tile from a tomb near Luoyang, Henan province, dated to the Eastern Han Dynasty (25–
220 C.E.)

The Terracotta Army, inside the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, consists of more
than seven thousand life-size tomb terra-cotta figures of warriors and horses buried
with the self-proclaimed first Emperor of Qin (Qin Shi Huang) in 210–209 B.C.E..

The figures were painted before being placed into the vault. The original colors were
visible when the pieces were first unearthed, but exposure to air caused the pigments to
fade. The figures are in several poses including standing infantry and kneeling archers,
as well as charioteers with horses. The head of each figure appears to be unique; the
figures exhibit a variety of facial features and expressions as well as hair styles.

Pottery

Porcelain is made from a hard paste comprised of the clay kaolin and a feldspar called

petuntse, which cements the vessel and seals any pores. The word china (chinaware) has
become synonymous with high-quality porcelain. Most china comes from the city of
Jingdezhen in China's Jiangxi province. Jingdezhen, under a variety of names, has been
central to porcelain production in China since at least the early Han Dynasty (206 B.C.E.–
220 C.E.).

TLV Mirrors

Bronze mirrors, called TLV mirrors because symbols resembling the letters T, L, and V are
engraved into them, became popular during the Han Dynasty. They were produced from
around the second century B.C.E. until the second century C.E.. The dragon was an
important symbol on early TLV mirrors, appearing as arabesques on early mirrors and
later as fully-fledged figures.[1] In the later part of the Western Han period, the dragons
were replaced by winged figures, monsters and immortals.
Han poetry

During, the Han Dynasty, Chu lyrics evolved into the fu (賦), a poem usually in rhymed
verse except for introductory and concluding passages that are in prose, often in the
form of questions and answers.

From the Han Dynasty onwards, a process similar to the official compilation of the Shi
Jing produced yue fu (Traditional Chinese: 樂府; Simplified Chinese: 乐府; Hanyu Pinyin:
yuèfǔ) poems, composed in a folk song style. “Yue fu” literally means "music bureau," a
reference to the government organization originally charged with collecting or writing
the lyrics. The lines are of uneven length, though five characters is the most common.
Each poem follows one of a series of patterns defined by the song title. Yue fu includes
original folk songs, court imitations and versions by known poets such as Li Bai).

Han paper art

The invention of paper during the Han dynasty[4] spawned two new Chinese arts.
Chinese paper cutting originated as a pastime among the nobles in royal palaces [5].
The Song Dynasty scholar Chou Mi mentioned several paper cutters who cut paper
with scissors into a great variety of designs and characters in different styles, and a
young man who could even cut characters and flowers inside his sleeve [6]. The oldest
surviving paper cut out is a symmetrical circle from the sixth century found in Xinjiang,
China[6].

The art of Chinese paper folding also originated in the Han dynasty, later developing
into origami after Buddhist monks introduced paper to Japan[7].

Other Han art

The Han Dynasty was also known for jade burial suits, made of thousands of jade plates
threaded together with gold, silver or copper wire, or with silk threads. One of the
earliest known depictions of a landscape in Chinese art comes from a pair of hollow-tile
door panels from a Western Han Dynasty tomb near Zhengzhou, dated 60 B.C.E.[8] A
scene of continuous depth recession is conveyed by the zigzag of lines representing
roads and garden walls, giving the impression that one is looking down from the top of
a hill.[8] This artistic landscape scene was made by the repeated impression of standard
stamps on the clay while it was still soft and not yet fired. [8]
Period of Division (220–581)

A scene of two horseback riders from a wall painting in the tomb of Lou Rui at Taiyuan, Shanxi,
Northern Qi Dynasty (550–577)

A Chinese Northern Wei Buddha Maitreya, 443 C.E.

Buddhism arrived in China around the first century C.E. (although some traditions tell of

a monk visiting China during Asoka's reign), and for the next seven centuries China
became very active in the development of Buddhist art, particularly in the area of
statuary. Strong Chinese traits were soon incorporated in Buddhist artistic expression.
Northern Wei wall murals and painted figurines from the Yungang Grottoes, dated fifth to sixth
centuries.

Calligraphy

Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, an Eastern Jin (265-420) tomb painting from Nanjing, now located
in the Shaanxi Provincial Museum.

Strolling About in Spring, by Zhan Ziqian, artist of the Sui Dynasty (581–618).
Part of the scroll for Admonitions of the Instructress to the Palace Ladies, a Tang Dynasty duplication
of the original by Gu Kaizhi.

In ancient China, painting and calligraphy were the most highly appreciated arts in court

circles and were produced almost exclusively by amateurs, aristocrats and scholar-
officials who had the leisure to perfect the technique and sensibility necessary for great
brushwork. Calligraphy was considered the highest and purest form of painting. The
implements were the brush pen, made of animal hair, and black inks, made from pine
soot and animal glue. Writing as well as painting was done on silk until the invention of
paper in the first century. Original writings by famous calligraphers have been greatly
valued throughout China's history.

The Sui and Tang dynasties (581–960)

A Chinese Tang Dynasty tri-color glazed porcelain horse (ca. 700 C.E.), using yellow, green and white
colors.

The Tang period was considered the golden age of Chinese literature and art.

Buddhist architecture and sculpture

Following a transition under the Sui Dynasty, Buddhist sculpture of the Tang evolved

towards markedly lifelike expression. Buddhism continued to flourish during the Tang
period and was adopted by the imperial family, becoming thoroughly sinicized and a
permanent part of Chinese traditional culture. As a consequence of the Dynasty's
openness to foreign influences, and renewed exchanges with Indian culture due to the
numerous travels of Chinese Buddhist monks to India from the fourth to the eleventh
century, Tang dynasty Buddhist sculpture assumed a classical form, inspired by the
Indian art of the Gupta period. Towards the end of the Tang dynasty foreign influences
came to be negatively perceived. In the year 845, the Tang emperor Wu-Tsung outlawed
all "foreign" religions (including Christian Nestorianism, Zoroastrianism and Buddhism)
in order to support the indigenous Daoism. He confiscated Buddhist possessions and
forced the faith to go underground, affecting the further development of the religion
and its arts in China.

Seated Mahayana Buddha statue, Tang dynasty

Most wooden Tang sculptures have not survived, though representations of the Tang
international style can still be seen in Nara, Japan. Some of the finest examples of Tang
stone sculpture can be seen at Longmen, near Luoyang, Yungang near Datong, and
Bingling Temple, in Gansu.

One of the most famous Buddhist Chinese pagodas is the Giant Wild Goose Pagoda,
built in 652 C.E..

A Man Herding Horses, by Han Gan (706-783 C.E.), Tang Dynasty original.

From the second century C.E., yue fu (Chinese poems composed in the style of folk
songs) began to develop into shi—the form which was to dominate Chinese poetry until
the modern era. The writers of these poems took the five-character line of the yue
fu and used it to express more complex ideas. The shi poem was generally an expression
of the poet's personal nature rather than the adopted characters of the yue fu; many
were romantic nature poems heavily influenced by Daoism.

The Chinese term gushi ("old poems") refers either to the mostly anonymous shi poems,

or more generally to the poems written in the same form by later poets. Gushi are
distinct from jintishi (regulated verse); the writer of gushi was under no formal
constraints other than line length and rhyme (in every second line).

Jintishi, or regulated verse, developed from the 5th century onwards. By the Tang
dynasty, a series of set tonal patterns had been developed, which were intended to
ensure a balance between the four tones of classical Chinese in each couplet: the level
tone, and the three deflected tones (rising, falling and entering). The Tang dynasty was
the high point of the jintishi.

Notable poets from this era include Bai Juyi, Du Mu, Han Yu, Jia Dao, Li Qiao, Liu
Zongyuan, Luo Binwang, Meng Haoran, Wang Wei, and Zhang Jiuling.

Li Po and Du Fu

Li Po and Du Fu, regarded by many as the greatest of the Chinese poets, both lived
during the Tang Dynasty.

The Leshan Giant Buddha, 71 meters tall, construction began in 713 C.E., completed 90 years later.
Over a thousand poems are attributed to Li Po, but the authenticity of many of these is
uncertain. He is best known for his intense and imaginative yue fu poems. Li Po is
associated with Daoism, but his gufeng ("ancient airs") often adopt the perspective of
the Confucian moralist. He composed approximately 160 jueju (five- or seven-character
quatrains) on nature, friendship, and acute observations of life. Some poems,
like Changgan xing (translated by Ezra Pound as A River Merchant's Wife: A Letter),
record the hardships or emotions of common people.

Since the Song dynasty, critics have called Du Fu the "poet historian." The most directly
historical of his poems are those commenting on military tactics or the successes and
failures of the government, or the poems of advice which he wrote to the emperor.

Tang Dynasty mural painting from Dunhuang.

One of the Du Fu's earliest surviving works, The Song of the Wagons (c. 750), gives voice
to the sufferings of a conscript soldier in the imperial army, even before the beginning
of the rebellion. Du Fu mastered all the forms of Chinese poetry and used a wide range
of registers, from the direct and colloquial to the allusive and self-consciously literary.

Late Tang poetry

Li Shangyin, a Chinese poet typical of the late Tang dynasty, wrote works that were
sensuous, dense and allusive. Many of his poems have political, romantic or
philosophical implications.
Li Yu, the last ruler of the Southern Tang Kingdom, composed his best-known poems
during the years after the Song formally ended his reign in 975 and brought him back as
a captive to the Song capital, Bianjing (now Kaifeng). Li's works from this period dwell
on his regret for the lost kingdom and the pleasures it had brought him. He was finally
poisoned by the Song emperor in 978. Li Yu developed the ci by broadening its scope
from love to history and philosophy, particularly in his later works. He also introduced
the two-stanza form, and made great use of contrasts between longer lines of
nine characters and shorter ones of three and five.

Painting

Painting by Dong Yuan (c. 934–962).

During the Tang dynasty (618–907), landscape painting (shanshui) became highly

developed. These landscapes, usually monochromatic and sparse, were not intended to
reproduce exactly the appearance of nature but to evoke an emotion or atmosphere
and capture the "rhythm" of nature.

The oldest known classical Chinese landscape painting is a work by Zhan Ziqian of the
Sui Dynasty (581–618), Strolling About In Spring in which the mountains are arranged to
show perspective.

Painting in the traditional style involved essentially the same techniques as calligraphy
and was done with a brush dipped in black or colored ink on paper and silk. The finished
work was then mounted on scrolls, which could be hung or rolled up. Traditional
painting was also done in albums and on walls, lacquer work, and other media.
Song and Yuan dynasties (960–1368)

Song Dynasty ding-ware porcelain bottle with iron pigment under a transparent colorless glaze,
eleventh century.

A wooden Bodhisattva from the Song Dynasty (960-1279 C.E.)

The  Sakyamuni  Buddha, by Zhang Shengwen, 1173-1176 C.E., Song Dynasty period.

Playing Children, by Song artist Su Hanchen, c. 1150 C.E..

Beginning in the Liang Dynasty, Ci lyric poetry followed the tradition of the Shi Jing
and yue fu; lyrics from anonymous popular songs (some of Central Asian origin) were
developed into a sophisticated literary genre. The form was further developed during
the Tang Dynasty, and was most popular in the Song Dynasty.

Song painting

During the Song dynasty (960–1279), landscapes of more subtle expression appeared;

immeasurable distances were conveyed through the use of blurred outlines, mountain
contours disappearing into the mist, and impressionistic treatment of natural
phenomena. Emphasis was placed on the spiritual qualities of the painting and on the
ability of the artist to reveal the inner harmony of man and nature, as perceived
according to Daoist and Buddhist concepts.

Yuan drama

Chinese opera has its origins in the Tang dynasty. Emperor Xuanzong (712–755)

founded the "Pear Garden" (梨园), the first known opera troupe in China, to perform for
his personal enjoyment. Chinese operatic professionals are still referred to as "Disciples
of the Pear Garden" (梨园子弟). In the Yuan dynasty (1279–1368), forms like the Zaju (杂
剧, variety plays), in which dramas are based on rhyming schemes and incorporate
specialized character roles like "Dan" (旦, female), "Sheng" (生, male) and "Chou" (丑,
Clown), were introduced into the opera.

Yuan painting

Wang Meng was a Chinese painter during the Yuan dynasty. One of his well-known
works is Forest Grotto.

Zhao Mengfu, a Chinese scholar, painter and calligrapher during the Yuan Dynasty,

rejected the refined, gentle brushwork of his era in favor of the cruder style of the eighth
century and is considered to have brought about a revolution that resulted in modern
Chinese landscape painting. Qian Xuan (1235-1305), a patriot from the Song court who
refused to serve the Mongols and instead turning to painting, revived and reproduced
the vivid and detailed Tang Dynasty style.

Late imperial China (1368-1911)

Detail of Dragon Throne used by the Qianlong Emperor of China, Forbidden City, Qing Dynasty.
Artifact circulating in U.S. museums on loan from Beijing

Gao Qi (1336 – 1374) is acknowledged by many as the greatest poet of the Ming

Dynasty. His style was a radical departure from the extravagance of Yuan dynasty poetry,
and led the way for three hundred years of Ming dynasty poetry.

Ming prose

Zhang Dai (张岱; pinyin: Zhāng Dài, courtesy name: Zhongzhi (宗子), pseudonym: Tao'an
(陶庵)) (1597 - 1689) is acknowledged as the greatest essayist of the Ming dynasty.

Wen Zhenheng, (Chinese: 文震亨; pinyin: Wén Zhènhēng; Wade-Giles: Wen Chen-heng,

1585–1645) the great grandson of Wen Zhengming, a famous Ming dynasty painter,
wrote a classic on garden architecture and interior design, Zhang Wu Zhi (On
Superfluous Things).
Ming painting

Peach Festival of the Queen Mother of the West, early seventeenth century, Ming Dynasty.

Chinese painting from 1664

Chinese culture bloomed during the Ming dynasty. Narrative painting, with a wider color
range and a much busier composition than the Song paintings, became very popular. As
techniques of color printing were perfected, illustrated manuals on the art of painting
began to be published. Jieziyuan Huazhuan (Manual of the Mustard Seed Garden), a five-
volume work first published in 1679, has been in use as a technical textbook for artists
and students ever since.
 Painting by Wen Zhengming.

Qing drama

The best-known form of Chinese opera, Beijing opera, assumed its present form in the
mid-nineteenth century and was popular during the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911). It
originated in the Chinese provinces of Anhui and Hubei. Its two main
melodies, Xipi and Erhuang, come from Anhui and Hubei operas, and much of the
dialogue is carried out in an archaic dialect originating partially from those regions. It is
commonly believed that Beijing Opera was born when the Four Great Anhui Troupes
came to Beijing in 1790. Originally staged for the court, it later became a form of public
entertainment.

Qing poetry

Yuan Mei, a well-known poet who lived during the Qing Dynasty, produced a large body
of poetry, essays and paintings. His works reflected his interest in Zen Buddhism and the
supernatural, at the expense of Daoism and institutional Buddhism—both of which he
rejected. Yuan is most famous for his poetry, which has been described as "unusually
clear and elegant language." His views on poetry, elaborated on in the Suiyuan
shihua (隨園詩話), stressed the importance of personal feeling and technical perfection.
Early Qing painting

The  Yongzheng Emperor  Enjoying Himself During the 8th Lunar Month, by anonymous court artists,
1723-1735 C.E., Palace Museum, Beijing.
"Eleven Pigeons" painting by Jiang Tingxi

Shanghai School (1850 – 1890)

After the bloody Taiping rebellion broke out in 1853, wealthy Chinese refugees flocked
to Shanghai where they prospered by trading with British, American, and French
merchants in the foreign concessions there. Their patronage encouraged artists to come
to Shanghai, where they congregated in groups and art associations and developed a
new Shanghai style of painting. The new cultural environment, a rich combination of
Western and Chinese lifestyles, traditional and modern, stimulated painters and
presented them with new opportunities.
 Peonies and Daffodils (牡丹水仙图), Wu Changshuo, Jilin Provincial Museum

New China Art (1912-1949)

Transformation

After the end of the last dynasty in China, the New Culture Movement (1917 – 1923)
defied all facets of traditionalism. A new breed of twentieth century cultural
philosophers including Xiao Youmei, Cai Yuanpei, Feng Zikai and Wang Guangqi called
for Chinese culture to modernize and reflect the “New China.” The Chinese Civil
War (1927 – 1950) brought about by a split between the Kuomintang and the
Communist Party of China, and the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937 – 1945), in
particular the Battle of Shanghai, threw the Chinese art and cultural worlds into tumult.
Nevertheless, several important developments of Chinese modern art took place during
this period.

The Big Three

Shanghai became an entertainment center and the birthplace of the three new art
forms, Chinese cinema, Chinese animation and Chinese popular music. Heavily inspired
by Western technology, Chinese artists adapted it to Chinese culture in a positive way.
 Comics

The most popular form of comics, lianhuanhua, circulated as palm sized books in
Shanghai, Guangzhou, Wuhan and Northern China. Comic books became one of the
most affordable forms of entertainment. The famous Sanmao character was born at this
time.

Painting

In the late 1800s and 1900s, Chinese painters were increasingly exposed to the Western art, and
an artistic controversy arose over how to respond to it. Some artists who studied in Europe
rejected Chinese painting; others tried to combine the best of both traditions. 

Guohua

As part of the effort to Westernize and modernize China during the first half of the twentieth
century, art education in China's modern schools taught European artistic techniques, which
educators considered necessary for engineering and science. Painting in the traditional medium
of ink and color on paper came to be referred to as guohua (国画, meaning 'national' or 'native
painting'), to distinguish it from Western-style oil painting, watercolor painting, or drawing.

The loss of the Big Three

The Communist regime quickly classified popular music as yellow music (pornography),
and began to promote revolutionary music (guoyue) instead. Many filmmakers, artists,
and popular musicians immigrated to Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan, where they fueled
the development of modern Chinese art.

Painting

Artists were encouraged to employ socialist realism. Some Soviet Union socialist realism

was directly imported, and painters were assigned subjects and expected to mass-
produce paintings. This regimen was considerably relaxed in 1953, and after
the Hundred Flowers Campaign of 1956–57, traditional Chinese painting experienced a
significant revival.

Poetry

Modern Chinese poems (新詩, free verse) usually do not follow any prescribed pattern.
Bei Dao is the most notable representative of the Misty Poets, a group of Chinese poets
who reacted against the restrictions of the Cultural Revolution.
 Redevelopment (Mid-1980s - 1990s)
Contemporary Art

Contemporary Chinese art (中国当代艺术, Zhongguo Dangdai Yishu), often referred to

as Chinese avant-garde art, has continued to develop since the 1980s, when the
restrictions of the Cultural Revolution were lifted. Contemporary Chinese art
incorporates painting, film, video, photography, and performance. Until recently, art
exhibitions deemed controversial were routinely shut down by police, and performance
artists in particular faced the threat of arrest during the early 1990s.

Visual art

Beginning in the late 1980s younger Chinese visual artists received

unprecedented exposure in the West through Chinese museum curators based
outside the country. Museum curators within China, such as Gao Minglu, and
critics such as Li Xianting (栗宪庭) have reinforced the promotion of particular
newly-emerged brands of painting, and spread the idea of art as a strong social
force within Chinese culture.
The new visual art market

The market for Chinese art, both contemporary and ancient, has exploded in recent years.
Globalization has increased Western awareness of and appreciation for Chinese art, and the
growth of a wealthy middle class in China has created a new market within China.