The Qing Dynasty Page 1
THE QING DYNASTY
Introduction
The advent of the Manchus and the founding of the Qing dynasty in 1644 were less disruptive to the flow of Chinese political and cultural life than might be assumed. The Manchus had been a formidable power north of the Great Wall since the late sixteenth century. Under a very able leader, Nurhaci had established their capital at Mukden in 1625 and, in 1636, named their dynasty Qing. In 1644 when Peking was held by a Chinese rebel, Li Zicheng, a Chinese general, invited the Manchus to help regain the city. The Manchu leaders gladly led their forces through the Great Wall, occupied Peking and stayed. China was not subdued until the 1680s when the last resistance of the old regime supporters was crushed in South China.
Despite the humiliation of foreign rule, the Chinese adapted themselves to the new conditions, and the number of the old bureaucracy took service under the alien rulers. There were no drastic changes in government administration; the Manchu rulers held Chinese civilisation in the most profound respect and devoted themselves with genuine interest and zeal to understanding and absorbing the culture of their subjects. Manchu rule brought a long era of peace and considerable material well-being.
No break in the continuity of painting occurred during the fall of the Ming Dynasty. Several painters classed as leading artists of the Qing were born and did a considerable amount of their work under the preceding dynasty. Still, it is customary to assign them to the dynasty they died. The most essential and most unified class of painting in the later seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries continued the ideals of Dǒng Qíchāng. It embodied modifications or variations of the Sung Xiang tradition.
On the one hand, the great painters of the Yuan Dynasty, particularly Huang Gongwang, with his brilliant, detailed brushwork and attention to surface quality, were still considered the most critical models. But, on the other hand, the painters who continued the general tradition of Dǒng Qíchāng were interested in the same aesthetic problems and branched out into a wide range of experiments, trying one style or another or indulging in the freest interpretations. For this reason, a great deal of their work has almost a monotony in its variety because they became less interested in what was painted and more in the manner of presentation, in the problems of expression through the organisation of forms and the character of the brush strokes.
The Four Wangs
Wáng Shímǐn, Wáng Jiàn, Wáng Huī, and Wáng Yuánqí
A close associate of Wáng Shímǐn in Taicang was his somewhat younger contemporary, Wáng Jiàn, who was also a retired official and painter.
However, Wáng Jiàn was a most accomplished painter in the style that had become the Ming/Qing version of a generalised Yuan style. In some of his large and more complete pictures, he followed rather closely the grand, somewhat detailed and explicit manner of Dŏng Yuán and Juran.
On the other hand, some of his more personal paintings on a smaller scale follow a form that Dǒng Qíchāng had employed: an album of ten or twelve pages in which each landscape is a free interpretation of a different old master.
‘Pine Shades in a Cloudy Valley at I-ya-ko’ was painted by Wáng Jiàn and is a variation on Wáng Méng. It possesses no originality in composition but does have a personal touch, a waving, rolling rhythm of considerable grace.
These two artists, Wáng Shímǐn and Wáng Jiàn, are constantly linked with two other artists of a younger generation who also bore the surname Wang. One of these was Wáng Huī, and the other was Wáng Yuánqí, who was the grandson of Wáng Shímǐn. These four are famous in the history of later Chinese painting and are known as the Four Wangs.
Wáng Huī, was a born painter. His genius was unusual, combining the utmost in natural talent with ambition and great application powers. The painting was traditional in his family, but although he had this friendly atmosphere in his home, means were insufficient to allow him the proper course of study.
Early in life, however, he met Wáng Jiàn, who introduced him to Wáng Shímǐn, who accepted him as a pupil. In the company of Wáng Shímǐn, Wáng Huī had the opportunity to study not only his patron’s extensive collection of work but also most of the important collections in the district. He pursued his studies for some twenty years, his progress was phenomenal, and he mastered many styles.
However, it could never be taken as a Wáng Méng or anyone except Wáng Huī himself. Compositionally there is no daring or boldness to be found, but there is impressive control of brush and ink.
The fourth of the Four Wangs, Wáng Yuánqí, was active in public office all his life, rising to be chancellor of the Hanlin Academy and senior vice-president of the Board of Finance. His artistic training must have been associated with the group at Taicang. The paintings of Wáng Yuánqí are of a much more special kind than those of the other artists of Taicang; in many respects, he was a painters painter. One critic has said that the great body of his work could be entitled Theme and Variations. His monochrome paintings demonstrate the typical continuous space of later Chinese paintings essaying the earlier monumental styles.
However, he finds his complete means of expression in colour. He employed a careful, almost laborious method similar to Cezzane in his watercolours. Glazes of colour, more limited in the hue range than those used in the west, were applied one above the other. In Free Spirits Among Streams and `Mountains and other works, he follows the style of Ni Zan, producing concrete and well placed structures in his paintings.
Two painters followed Wáng Yuánqí, Huáng Dĭng was one of his direct pupils, and Zhang Zongcang was a pupil of Huáng Dĭng. Zhang’s style was superficially similar to Wáng Yuánqí though he relied more on ink and less on colour.