Art 345: Ch. 3

Prime Minister Li Ssu

(c. 280-208 bce) Chinese politician of the Qin dynasty. He served as the Chancellor (or Prime Minister) of the Qin dynasty from 246-208 BC, well known Legalist writer and politician, and notable calligrapher. He served under two rulers: Qin Shi Huang, the king of the Qin state and later the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty; and Qin Er Shi, Qin Shi Huang's youngest son and the Second Emperor. ___ ___ __ ___ was charged with designing the new writing style. This third phase in the design evolution of Chinese calligraphy is called hsiao chuan, or "SMALL-SEAL" style.

Chinese calligraphy

Ancient writing system, continued to be used today by more people than any other visual language system. a purely visual language. It is not alphabetical, and every symbol is composed of a number of differently shaped lines within an imaginary square. The Chinese sacrificed the realism found in hieroglyphs for more abstract designs. Aesthetic considerations seem to have intere

Dharani

Buddhist "charms"; type of stone pillar engraved with simple ___incantations that is found in China; were usually erected outside Buddhist temples, and became popular during the Tang Dynasty (618-907).

Oracle Bones

Chinese pictographs are found incised on tortoise shells and large animals' flat shoulder bones, called ____ ____, which convey communications between the living and the dead. When one wished to consult an exalted ancestor or a god, one asked the royal diviner to inscribe the message on a polished animal bone. The diviner pushed a red-hot metal bar into a hole in the inscribed bone, and the heat produced an intricate web of cracks. The diviner then read or interpreted these cracks, which were believed to be messages from the dead.

The oldest surviving printed manuscript is the ________, which was printed by one Wang Chieh to honor his parents and widely distributed in A.D. 868. It consists of seven sheets of paper pasted together to form a scroll. Six sheets of the text convey Buddha s revelations to his elderly follower Subhuti.

Diamond Sutra

Ts'ai Lun

Dynastic records attribute the invention of paper to the eunuch and high governmental official ___ ___, who reported his invention to Emperor Ho in 105 ce. Whether ___ ___, truly INVENTED PAPER, perfected an earlier invention, or patronized its invention is not known. He was, however, deified as the god of the papermakers

During the Han Dynasty, seals, called chops, were made by carving the background away from a calligraphic character. The resulting print was a red character on a white background. Around A.D. 500, artisans began to cut the characters in the opposite manner.

False

T/F: In the tenth century A.D., Prime Minister Feng Tao ordered the use of wood blocks to print Confucian classics so that they would be available to the masses.

False

T/F: The Chinese calligraphic system consists of about forty characters.

False

T/F: The Chinese were immediately receptive to the use of paper in its early decades because of its greater elitist appeal.

False

Buddhist dedicatory stele c. 562 ce

IDENTIFY

Four-handled vessel with chinwen 11th century bce

IDENTIFY

Li-shu tablet of Hua Shan Pagoda 165 ce

IDENTIFY

Shi Tao, the Love of Lotus landscape

IDENTIFY

Zhao Meng-fu 14th century ce

IDENTIFY

Logograms for sun, moon, water, rain, wood, and dog in chiaku-wen, or bone-and-shell script, on the top and in hsiao chuan, or small-seal style, on the bottom.

IDENTIFY (What type of script is on the top vs. bottom row?)

Codex-style book

In the tenth or eleventh century stitched books were developed. Two pages of text were printed from one block. Then the sheet was folded down the middle, with the unprinted side of the sheet facing inward and the two printed pages facing out. Sequences of these folded and printed sheets were gathered and sewn to make a ____-____ book.

Cinnabar

In using chops, the user inked this flat surface by pushing it into a pastelike red ink made from ____, and then pressed it onto a substrate to form an impression, as one does with present-day rubber stamps. The impression was a red shape with white characters.

Tsang Chieh

Legend holds that Chinese was first written about 1800 bce by __ ___, who was inspired to INVENT WRITING by contemplating the CLAWMARKS of BIRDS and FOOTPRINTS of ANIMALS. __ ___ proceeded to develop elementary pictographs of things in nature. These images are highly stylized and composed of a minimum number of lines, but they are easily deciphered.

How was paper made?

Natural fibers, including mulberry bark, hemp fish nets, and rags, soaked in a vat of water and beaten into a pulp with pounding mortars. Mold was dipped into the pulp solution and shaken to cross and mesh fibers as water drained through the bottom. Then, paper was couched (or pressed) onto a woolen cloth to absorb water. Finally, Pressed and hung to dry.

What are the two theories behind the origins of printing in China?

One is that the use of engraved seals to make identification imprints evolved into printing. As early as the third century bce, seals or stamps were used to make impressions in soft clay. Often, bamboo or wood strips bearing writing were wrapped in silk, which was then sealed by clay stamped with an impression. The second theory about the origins of printing focuses on the early Chinese practice of making inked rubbings from inscriptions carved in stone. Beginning in 165 ce, Confucian classics were carved into stone to ensure an accurate, permanent record. The disadvantages of these tone "books" were their weight and the space they required. One historical work required thirteen acres for storage of the tablets, which were arranged like rows of tombstones.

Name three substrates that the Chinese have used with their calligraphic writing system.

Paper, woven silk, wood

Explain how a positive image printed from a chop differs from a negative image

The artisans cut away the negative area surrounding the characters so that the characters could be printed in red surrounded by white paper. Cutting away the positive area provides contrast to the delicate strokes of smaller characters for legibility

Chiaku-wen (bone-and-shell script)

The earliest known Chinese writing is called _________ script used from 1800 to 1200 bce. It was closely bound to the art of divination, an effort to foretell future events through communication with the gods or long-dead ancestors. This ancient writing—as with hieroglyphics and cuneiform—was pictographic.

Chen-shu or kai-shu (regular style)

The final step in the evolution of Chinese calligraphy which has been in continuous use for nearly two thousand years. In regular style, every line, dot, and nuance of the brush can be controlled by the sensitivity and skill of the calligrapher. An infinite range of design possibilities exists within every word. Structure, composition, shape, stroke thickness, and the relationship of strokes to each other and to the white spaces surrounding them are design factors determined by the writer.

Relief printing

The first form of printing; the spaces around an image on a flat surface are cut away, the remaining raised surface is inked, and a sheet of paper is placed over the surface and rubbed to transfer the inked image to the paper.

Diamond Sutra

The oldest surviving printed manuscript is the Diamond Sutra. It consists of seven sheets of paper pasted together to form a scroll 5 meters (16 feet) long and 30 centimeters (12 inches) high. Six sheets of text convey Buddha's revelations to his elderly follower Subhuti; the seventh is a complex linear woodcut illustration of the Buddha and his disciples. Buddha decreed that "whosoever repeats this text shall be edified." Apparently one Wang Chieh responded to the Buddha's charge, for the final lines of text declare that he made the Diamond Sutra for wide, free distribution to honor his parents on the date equivalent to 11 May 868. The excel- lence of the printing indicates that the craft had advanced to a high level by the time it was produced.

Pen Ts'ao

The pages of the __ ___ medical herbal were assembled in this fashion. Illustrations and calligraphy were used for headings. A design used to separate the text into sections was shown in the center of the right-hand page. In this illustrated wood block book on Chinese herbal medicine, ruled lines bring order to the page.

Accordion-style book

The scroll was replaced with paged formats in the ninth or tenth century. First, scrolls were turned into folded books that opened ___-____, like a railroad timetable.

Chop

The traditional Chinese identification stamp/seal is inscribed into the bottom of a small decorative sculpture carved from soft stone. made by carving calligraphic characters into a flat surface of jade, silver, gold, or ivory.

Hsiao chuan (small-seal style)

This third phase in the design evolution of Chinese calligraphy is called hsiao chuan, or "small-seal" style (designed by Li Ssu). The lines are drawn in thicker, more even strokes. More curves and circles are used in this graceful, flowing style, which is much more abstract than the earlier two styles. Each character is neatly balanced and fills its imaginary square primly

In contrast to Western writing, Chinese calligraphic strokes express spiritual states and deep feelings.

True

T/F: Chinese calligraphy is a purely visual language.

True

T/F: It is curious that movable type was first invented in cultures whose written language systems contained not hundreds but thousands of characters. This woodblock illustration from ca. AD 1313 shows an interesting invention for sorting and setting Chinese movable types.

True

T/F: Relief printing is the process of removing the negative spaces surrounding an image and then inking the raised surface, which is rubbed onto paper.

True

T/F: The Chinese scroll, Diamond Sutra, the oldest surviving printed manuscript.

True

Why was the use of movable type limited in the Asian cultures?

With a total of more than forty-four thousand, nonalphabetical characters, it is not surprising that movable type never came into widespread use in China and the Far East. One interesting effort to simplify sorting and setting types was the invention of a revolving "lazy Susan" table with a spinning tabletop 2 meters (7 feet) in diameter (Fig. 3-20). The compositor could sit at this table and rotate it to bring the section with the character within reach.

Li Fangying

__ ___ (1696-1755) was a Qing Chinese painter from Jiangsu. He served as a county magistrate for 20 years. As a painter he is best known for painting plant imagery specifically pines, bamboos, plum blossoms and orchids. He was one of the Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou. The painting of bamboo from the ALBUM OF EIGHT LEAVES by __ ___ (1695-1755 ce) shows how the vividly descriptive strokes with a bamboo brush join calligraphy and painting, poem and illustration into a unified communication. Nature is the inspiration for both, and every stroke and dot is given the energy of a living thing. Children begin their early training by drawing bamboo leaves and stems with the brush to learn the basic stroke

Shi Tao (Yuanji)

a Chinese LANDSCAPE PAINTER and poet during the early part of the Qing Dynasty; ___ ___ (_____) is one of the most famous individualist painters of the early Qing dynasty. The art he created was revolutionary in its transgressions of the rigidly codified techniques and styles that dictated what was considered beautiful. Imitation was valued over innovation. The poetry and calligraphy that accompany his landscapes are just as beautiful, irreverent, and vivid as the paintings they complement. His paintings exemplify the internal contradictions and tensions of the literati or scholar-amateur artist, and they have been interpreted as an invective against art-historical canonization. ___ ___ (_____)s painting, the LOVE OF LOTUS landscape, (Qing dynasty) is simple and refined, the painting displays both personal expression and reality.

Paper

a magnificent and eco- nomical substrate for transmitting information, and printing, the duplication of words and images, made possible the wide communication of thought and deed; Dynastic records attribute the invention of paper to the high governmental official Ts'ai Lun, who reported his invention to Emperor Ho in 105 AD. Ts'ai Lun's process for making paper continued almost unchanged from 105 AD until papermaking was mechanized in 19th century England.

Woodblock printing

a technique for printing text, images or patterns used widely throughout East Asia and originating in China in antiquity as a method of printing on textiles and later paper. Originated in 9th century; process: thin manuscript was pasted onto the block and the text was carved by cutting through the paper

In China beginning in the ninth or tenth century A.D., the scroll evolved into a paged format. Instead of rolling the scroll, it was folded ___________. In the tenth or eleventh century, stitched books were developed: two pages of text were printed from one block; the sheet was folded down the middle, then the sheets were gathered and sewn to make a codex-style book.

accordion-style

About 1800 B.C., Ts-ang Chieh was inspired to invent Chinese writing by _______. Elementary pictographs of things in nature were highly stylized and composed of a minimum number of lines.

claw marks of birds and footprints of animals

Chin-wen (bronze script)

consisted of inscriptions on cast-bronze objects, including food and water vessels, musical instruments, weapons, mirrors, coins, and seals. Messages were inscribed in the casting molds to preserve answers received from gods and ancestors during divination. The permanence of bronze also made it suitable for important treaties, penal codes, and legal contracts. Ceremonial vessels used to hold food offerings during ancestor worship and vessels inscribed with dedictions contained well-formed characters in orderly alignment. Most inscriptions were made inside the vessels, and the characters were more studied and regular than in the bone-and-shell inscriptions.

Logograms

graphic signs that represent an entire word. (The sign $, for instance, is a _____ representing the word dollar).

Legend suggests that by the year 2000 B.C., a culture was evolving in China in virtual isolation from the pockets of civilization in the West. Three innovations developed by the ancient Chinese that changed the course of human events. They are ____, ____, and _____.

gunpowder, paper, and the compass

One theory about the origins of relief printing in China focuses on chops, seals made by carving calligraphic characters into a flat surface of jade, silver, gold, or ivory. Another theory focuses on the practice of making __________ from inscriptions carved in stone.

inked rubbings

There is no direct relationship between the spoken and written Chinese languages. Written Chinese was never broken down into syllabic or alphabetic signs for elementary sounds. The Chinese calligraphic writing system consists of _________ , graphic signs that represent an entire word.

logograms

China became the first society in which ordinary people were in daily contact with printed images. In addition to block prints of religious images and texts, paper ___________ began to be designed and printed around A.D. 1000 due to an iron shortage.

money

When making a woodblock print in China, the wood around each character is painstakingly cut away. Around A.D. 1045, the Chinese alchemist Pi Sheng extended this process by developing the concept of __________ , an innovative printing process that was never widely used in Asia because the sheer number of characters made the process too tedious.

movable type

Li

now the word for "tripod"; The___ was an innovative product design, for the black discolorations on some surviving examples indicate that it stood in the fire to heat its contents rapidly.

Name an artifact based on each substrate

on paper: on woven silk: on wood:

Tao

the cosmic spirit that operates throughout the universe in animate and inanimate things

Who is Pi Sheng? What are their contributions?

was the Chinese inventor of the world's first movable type technology. Pi Sheng's system was made of Chinese porcelain and was invented between 1041 and 1048 during the Song dynasty. Pi Sheng (1023-63) extended this process by developing the concept of movable type, an innovative process never used widely in Asia. If each character were an individual raised form, he reasoned, then any number of characters could be placed in sequence on a surface, inked, and printed. He made his types from a mixture of clay and glue. These three-dimensional calligraphic characters were baked over a straw fire until they hardened. To compose a text, Pi Sheng placed them side by side upon an iron plate coated with a waxy substance to hold the characters in place. The plate was gently heated to soften the wax, and a flat board was pressed upon the types to push them firmly in place and equalize their height from the surface of the form. After the wax cooled, the page of calligraphic types was printed exactly like a woodblock. After the printing was complete, the form was heated again to loosen the wax so that the characters could be filed in wooden cases. Because Chinese writing is not alphabetical, types were organized according to rhymes. The large number of characters in Asian languages made filing and retrieving the characters difficult. Later, the Chinese cast letters in tin and cut them from wood, but movable type never replaced the handcut woodblock in China.

Li Shu (Clerical Style)

which had a major impact on Chinese calligraphy, can be divided into the Qing and Han styles. Later, Cheng Miao made a further simplification of the hsiao chuan, often referred to as the "Li transformation." Writing was made much easier through chang- ing the more rounded strokes into straight and angular ones. Within its flat structure,_____ is carefully and neatly executed, delicate with many variations. This style represents a watershed in the development of Chinese character, ushering in a new era of Chinese calligraphy. At the same time, it laid the foundation for the adoption of chen-shu.