Virginia Review of Asian Studies
THE UNTRAMMELED BRUSHWORK: HUANG BINHONG’S LATE
LANDSCAPE PAINTINGS
CHEN XIAO
HONG KONG UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Introduction
Probably no modern Chinese artist could exhibit more proliferated artistic creation in his life than
Huang Binhong (1865-1955). Huang’s ninety-two-year life is widely regarded as an epic
composed of thousands of splendorous landscape paintings. In reviewing Huang’s artistic
innovation, one may find that his style of landscapes evolved highly slowly during his young and
middle-aged time, suggesting a self-determined learning process with calmness and patience. Early
paintings are products of Huang’s copying of diverse ancient artist models from the early Song to
the late Qing dynasty, indicating his appreciation for and eagerness towards the best from the
Chinese tradition. Works during his formative years bear relatively antiquarian scholarly
characteristics, expressing a sense of refinement, transparency and tranquility. Not until he arrived
at the final period of metamorphosis into his seemingly chaotic landscape paintings do we witness
the ultimate expressive personality of the artist ‘Huang Binhong.’
Making a drastic departure from his previous works, Huang Binhong’s late stage of art perplexes
viewers profoundly. Viewers find it hard to comprehend his pictures---a jumble of ink dots and
apparently random brushstrokes. Huang himself, conscious of his ‘artistic incomprehensibility,’
as well claimed that his paintings could only be understood thirty years after his death. Most of his
late landscapes, though intensively accomplished in a few short years, possess unprecedented
unruliness realized by his ‘untrammeled brushwork.’ Such untrammeled brushwork forges his
landscapes into esoteric works of abstraction, disorderliness and black massiveness. Influenced
and derived from Chinese calligraphy, Huang’s untrammeled brushwork serves as the core of his
eventual artistic transformation from tradition. Therefore, to investigate his untrammeled
brushwork is warranted to find an answer for the eccentric beauty of his late landscapes.
Huang Binhong’s Early Landscape Paintings
Huang Binhong was born in 1865 in Shexian County, Anhui Province. Influenced by the
traditional Confucian values and literati culture of his hometown, the little son started to obtain
professional training of art and literature, with the expectation that he would step on official career
after taking the civil service examination. Unfortunately, this well planned route was torn into
pieces, with the abolition of the civil service exam in 1905 and the subsequent poignant social
reforms brought by the Western Imperialism and domestic voices for ‘modernity’. Helplessly,
Huang continued to live a homeless life by writing prolifically on art and culture as an editor,
teaching art at schools and producing a numerous deal of paintings. He was forced to wander from
place to place, drawn into the national transformation towards modernization passively. However,
as an artistic traditionalist, the titled ‘refugee of the country’ cannot fully represent his identity.
Like a sponge absorbs water as much as possible, Huang was actively participating in various
artistic societies and groups in Shanghai, which aimed to build up a cultural national identity by
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promoting Chinese traditional art, including calligraphy, painting, epigraphy and literature. Some
significant intellectual and cultural groups he was involved in were the Association for the
Preservation of the National Essence and the Cathay Art Union. Besides organizing activities, he
personally wrote articles of art history and theory for publications like the Journal of the National
Essence, National Glories of Cathay and Collectanea of the Arts, etc. The eloquent spokesman for
Chinese artistic tradition thus arrived in his late middle age, with an enormous accumulation of
traditional artistic knowledge. After realizing the incompleteness of emulating masters as the only
source, he made best use of intervals of work and completed plenty of grand tours to different
Chinese landscapes for self-contemplation, observing nature and sketching extensively.
After those tumultuous years in Shanghai, Huang was offered an appointment by the Capital
District Court of Nanjing in 1935 to authenticate paintings in the Palace Museum in Beijing. Soon
after his arrival there, the Sino-Japanese war broke out and the Japanese military occupied Beijing.
This national adversity trapped Huang in the old capital for another ten years, but it was such
abundance of time without external intervention that left more room for him to develop his artistic
style. The final stage of his life eventually came when the Chinese Communist Party led by Mao
defeated the Japanese invasors and the Nationalist Party around 1940s, and founded the People’s
Republic of China in 1949. Sweeping out a sense of alienation from the homeland and uncertainty
about his destiny, Huang Binhong settled down beside the West Lake in Hangzhou, Zhejiang
Province. There he accepted the commission to teach Chinese painting in the China Academy of
Art. The coming delightful peace of artistic life encouraged Huang to summarize his lifelong
artistic theories, and allowed him to quietly practice brush-and-ink assiduously and regularly.
Successfully, he achieved a unique style in landscape paintings, aided by his mature ‘untrammeled’
brushwork and accessory techniques of use of water and ink. The only incident that once impeded
his creation was his impaired eyesight due to his cataract around 1953-54. Given the misfortune
of blindness, his paintings of this period were tremendously black and dense, symbolizing his
irreducible madness. The overall explosive transformation came to an ultimate end, when the
artistic giant passed away on 25 March, 1955.
Huang Binhong’s lifelong artistic creation is mainly represented in his landscape paintings. In
reviewing the extant picturesque landscapes, we may clearly see his stylish evolutions shaped by
the external social contexts and the internal altering artistic values and methods. His early works
occupying most of his life changed at a slowly pace, while the ultimate transformation standing
for merely a few years embraced a sudden explosion. To get a profound understanding on his late
‘untrammeled brushwork’, we group his landscapes before 1943 as a whole to elicit the last decade
(1943-65) from eighty to Huang’s death at ninety-two. The first eighty years cover the artist’s
process of learning from both ancient and contemporary artists, and his accumulated experiences
of landscape after his intensive travels throughout China, whereas the following ten-year stage
witnessed a metamorphosis of his landscape paintings led by his unconstrained brushwork.
Early landscapes of Huang Binhong commonly demonstrate a ‘deliberate scholarly style’. The
word ‘deliberate’ indicates his self-aware imitation of masters as a means of personal invention.
He pointed out the significance of learning by saying that, ‘copying by one method or another is
not creative work, but it is the only way to acquire the ability to create.’1 He got comprehensive
inspirations from masters of the Song, Yuan, Ming, and early Qing dynasties, which was highly
different from many contemporary traditionalists who were satisfied rigidly imitating the orthodox
literati paintings, representative of ‘Four Wangs’ (i.e., Wang Shimin, Wang Hui, Wang Yuanqi
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and Wan Jian). Huang’s copying was in a systematic order as he explained, ‘I first copied Yuan
dynasty painting, for its brush-and-ink is excellent. Then I copied Ming painting, for its
composition is stable, and there is less chance for me to go astray. Next I copied Tang dynasty
painting, for it enables me to pursue antiquity. Finally, I learned from Song painting, for its style
is rich and varied. In copying, one should not be like a silk pupa that gets enmeshed a in a web of
its own spinning.’2
Take Mount Jiuhua for instance, Huang’s earlier depiction ‘Mount Jiuhua’ (Fig.1) in 1906 was
obviously akin to the traditional late Ming literati style. Stylistically reminiscent of Dong Qichang
(1555-1636) and Gong Xian (1618-89), the picture shows inevitably stark contrast of black and
white in layering of the mountains, given by a meticulous contouring brushwork at a constant
velocity. It can be inferred that Huang was trying to demonstrate specific scenery by restoring
detailed houses and groves of trees nearby. Another album of ‘Landscapes’ (Fig.2) in 1909 records
the forty-year-old man’s deep appreciation towards the Xin’an School artists, representative of
Hong Ren (1610-64), Cheng Sui (1605-91) and Zha Shibiao (1615-98) . A dry and light inked
brushwork distinctly outlines the mountains, leaving merely the old pines along the precipice in
dark ink, and conveys tranquility and elegance that are distant from the chaotic mundane world.
Another hanging scroll ‘Landscapes in the style of Li Tang’ (Fig.3) in 1926 reveals his critical
learning from masters by comparison study. He inscribed that both Tang Yin (1470-1523) and Yun
Shoupin (1633-90) understood well the essence of brushwork of their mutual model Li Tang
(1066-1150), but their untrammeled brushwork performed better comparatively. The picture’s
one-sided composition and forceful texture of rocks remind that of Li Tang, whereas Huang’s
quietly elegant landscape rendered in light ink and his highly fine brushstrokes of contouring
mountains depart from the blackness of Li Tang. From Huang Binhong’s early landscapes before
late 1930s, we may be tempted to conclude that these works, instilled with his admiration for the
previous masters, earn a scholarly formal composition and a peaceful rhythm. The brushwork was
traditional, in the process of modification led by different calligraphic scripts. Paintings due to the
greyish and brownish color tones are poor in tactile sensation and personal expressive power, while
remaining an elegant serenity.
Huang Binhong’s long-term apprenticeship was later added in a new identity of ‘traveler’ around
late 1930s. From his fifties to seventies, Huang Binhong committed himself to travelling
throughout China, immersing himself discovering the ever-changing beauty of nature and its
constant inner essence. He paid subsequent visits southern to Guilin, Yangshuo, Canton and Hong
Kong, while setting foot western to Mount E’mei and Mount Qingcheng in Sichuan, Mount
Yandang in Zhejiang and Mount Huang in Anhui. The indulgence in nature freed him to sketch
extensively under shifting observations, thus beginning his stylistic experiments prepared for the
later explosive transformation. The landscape paintings he finished during this period possess an
intrinsic dynamic rhythm compared with his inchoate ‘scholarly’ works. A sense of freshness,
movement and originality can be traced in his precipitous mountains and translucent streams.
Mount Huang, one of the most inspiring places for Huang Binhong, was remodeled in his album
leaves ‘Scenes of Mount Huang’ (Fig.5; 6) in 1938. Unlike many paintings from his early career,
the drawings abandoned traditionally formal and constructive composition, replaced by holistic
pictorial weight of the hefty mountain. Brushwork was obviously that of calligraphy that Huang
had practiced assiduously. The angular strokes of dark ink outline the convex and concave contour
of mountains, while the sprightly strokes of light ink successfully depict a wall of water rushing
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down the valley. The calligraphic brushwork vocabulary was more diverse than before to express
certain effects that he yearned. Meticulous lines of small houses, crisscross strokes of grove of
trees, and dots of green moss along the mountain edges make the landscapes honestly
representative yet freshly alive. The rhythmic paintings tell that Huang was painting with more
spontaneity and strength now, which might be explored from his growingly mature yet bold
personality. An undated work in memory of his trip to Guilin was ‘Peaks of Yangshuo’ (Fig.6).
The pictorial contradictions in this painting in retrospect generate a beauty of harmony. The
verticality emphasized by a group of narrow and cliffy mountains in the middle is neutralized by
the lower horizontally vigorous grove of trees and a house protected by it. And the contouring
rendered in expressive brushwork saturated with black ink counterbalances the blank space within
mountains. White representative of void, managed to depict solidity of mountains, and the greyish
ink brushes of mountain planes well pacifies the extreme contrast between black and white.
Both dynamic rhythm and strength are easily observed in landscapes after Huang Binhong’s
cultivation from nature before early 1940s, regardless of what geographical contents he chose to
tell. This demonstrates his increasingly mature calligraphic brushwork and loftier vision on nature
above the formal resemblance, as he maintained that, ‘A painting with landscapes of mountains,
rocks, streams and trees, if not depicted in clear brushwork, is a work from which nothing can be
identified. However, the energetic expression, vigor and inner beauty of those landscapes are much
in common, and vary in accordance with seasonal environment.’3 The abundant artistic tradition
and calligraphy, together with nature, acted as the unremitting mechanics for his impending
transformation, an era when his artistic style was ready to embrace a radical change.
Huang Binhong’s Late Landscape Paintings
Nobody can feel more obfuscated in Huang Binhong’s artworks than his late landscape paintings.
It was never a matter of quantitative change but a dramatic explosion of novelty in Huang’s artistic
life. Paintings since mid 1940s, particularly around early 1950s, including masses of his
uninscribed works, share a common ‘incomprehensibility’ perceived by viewers. When first
looking at his late works, one may easily concluded that they contain nothing new in the content.
All one sees is mountains, streams, trees, boats in the river and houses of subtle variation. Puzzles
come when figures in paintings are found disproportional and landscapes composed of jumble of
ink dots are indiscernible and unpleasant. Most importantly, one cannot distinguish the exact kinds
of brushstroke. At first glance, the only object one experiences is crisscross lines and overlapping
ink touches, and spattered ‘dirty’ dots of all sizes. The calligraphic brushwork ran into an
unprecedented unruliness and freedom, expressing anything possible the artist was eager to share.
One may imagine those instant moments when Huang was applying such untrammeled brushwork
in the paper, bearing the risk that few people would understand his art!
Faced with similar awkwardness, Huang Binhong’s confidant, the renowned artist Fu Lei(190866) proposed formally a question in his essay ‘Viewing Paintings and Answering Questions’,
‘Huang’s paintings are predominantly landscapes, but his mountains do not look like mountains
and the trees do not look like trees. The brush strokes are chaotic and do not coalesce into forms.
Why is that?’ 4 With regard to such doubts, Huang admitted the inaccessibility of his late
landscapes, indicating that his brand-new stylish development was in coherence with his heart and
mind, and that there were reasonable explanations for his untrammeled art. He once divided
‘painting’ into three categories. The first two kinds are paintings of empty reputation, which
merely resemble physical objects and paintings guilty of duping people, which display complete
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non-resemblance with objects and claim to express inspired ideas and feelings. Only the third
category, paintings which are a seamless fusion of resemblance and non-resemblance can be
regarded as ‘true paintings’.5
To pursue the ideal fusion of ‘resemblance and non-resemblance’ and the qualification of ‘true
paintings’, Huang endured untold hardships and suffering, and eventually forged his untrammeled
brushwork, the key to the expressive forces of his landscapes. The supreme effects of his
unrestrained brushwork are primarily demonstrated in three directions. It is first seen in his
transmutation towards abstraction. Undistinguishable brushwork freely applied into the paper
generates semi-abstract landscapes. For the old man, it was no longer a conventional act of
describing figurative pictures, but a distinctive process of unconstrained expression of his own
understanding of nature. Furthermore, the lighthearted brushwork lies in painting’s ‘order within
disorder’. The ostensible dirty and chaotic landscapes are in practice a well-organized fusion of
brushstrokes. His reverence and curiosity of Chinese calligraphy and collections like epigraphy
and seal-engraving invigorated him to develop his inimitable system of calligraphic brushwork.
And it is his innovative combination of those brushwork techniques and supplemented mastery of
ink and water application that realized those uncompromising ‘disorderly’ mountains. To prevent
painting from suffocating blackness, Huang in addition well controlled his brushwork and
compensated for an economy of luminous spaces within solid landscapes. The positive structural
use of void polished his late works with an air of freshness and brightness.
Huang Binhong’s insouciant brushwork first displayed its uniqueness in its extraordinary
abstraction in Huang’s many works. The trial of abstract calligraphic brushwork may suggest his
increasing awareness of the interchange of soul and reality, a deeper layer of communication
between the artist and nature. Sometimes, abbreviated calligraphic strokes mix with each other,
leaving the beginning, the middle and the end of each stroke impossible to tell, while sometimes
strokes and sparse ink dots are blended together to create a fusion full of density and thickness.
Huang’s abstract brushwork was derived from Chinese calligraphy, a kind of formal abstract art,
where the expressive forms of writing characters convey connotation above the original objects.
Without exaggerating, some of his landscapes became extremely abstract pure artworks given his
experiments in line and form. Huang’s innovative abstraction was admired by the later Chinese
artist who was also well-known for his formal abstraction, Wu Guanzhong (1919-2010). He once
evaluated Huang Binhong’s progress towards abstraction under the traditional brush-and-ink, ‘I
think Huang Binhong’s late paintings entered a stage of semi-abstraction. Comparatively, his early
works rigidly adhered to the physical properties, which hindered him from expressing a beauty of
rhythmic vitality, which his late landscapes managed to convey vividly.’6
The painting ‘Pine Tree Gully in Mount Huang’ (Fig.7) in 1952 well illustrates Huang’s abstract
strokes blended with dots. Thoroughly transformed from the depiction of Mount Huang in the
1930s, the landscape demonstrates a fantasy of blackness. Two bulky mountains dominate the
entire paper, leaving a linear blank space within the mountains as a representation of the purling
Bailong Stream. Layers of dots dipped in black ink, together with short crisscross strokes and lines
compose the powerful mountains. Looking from a closer distance, the nonrepresentational quality
of brush movement blocks viewers from identifying any detailed objects. The non-resemblance is
so aggressive, even if tinged cyanine and cinnabar applied to increase liveliness cannot help.
Moreover, Huang’s predominant application of abstract lines was represented in another album
leaf of ‘Landscapes’ (Fig.8). Instead of intensive layers of dots, forceful calligraphic brush lines
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are applied into the paper. Lines are unusually long, either spanning the river horizontally or
representing the whole cliff vertically. A fisherman in the boat in the foreground, an isolated hill
on the right, and straight trees standing in the upper background can only be recognized with
imagination and patience of repeated viewings. The overall resemblance is achieved entirely by
forms of small patches produced by intersecting lines. Interestingly, a similar effect is produced in
the oil landscape ‘La Montagne Sainte-Victoire’ of Cezanne (1839-1906). Despite such difference
of painting medium and techniques, the mutually abstract effect suggests that Chinese traditional
art shares certain similarities with the Western art after its certain artistic evolution. An
appreciation for Huang’s late landscapes by the contemporary artist Tao Ho delivers similar
admiration for his abstraction of untrammeled brushwork: ‘The late period of Huang transformed
nature into pure aesthetic qualities in art: the search for expressing the feeling of solidity, substance,
weight, mellowness, bitterness, and the pure abstract beauty of creation. Landscape no longer
represents scenery; color transcends the materialistic appearance and takes in the translucent
quality of jade, while the brushstrokes of ink, full of varieties and inner strength, dance on the
paper vigorously with the rhythm of life.’7
Not only achieving the abstract beauty of ‘resemblance within non-resemblance’, Huang
Binhong’s untrammeled brushwork intrinsically accomplished his ‘order within disorder’. The
first unkempt impression impedes viewers’ sight from entering the chaotic mountains. The freely
flying brush strokes are perceived motley due to his impatience and casual execution of brush.
However, when taking several steps closer to the hanging scroll, viewers may find that the
apparently irrational brushwork is in fact ingenious variation of brush lines! Huang cited an
analogous phenomenon that Dong Qichang (1555-1636) observed from Dong Yuan’s paintings
(?-962) to explain his ‘order within disorder’, ‘Dong Qichang said of Dong Yuan’s skill in
manipulating the brush: I have seen a section of a Dong’s painting which apparently consists of
nothing but innumerable random marks of the brush. But when the painting was hung up and
viewed from a distance, all the trees, stones and cottages surfaced, as if by magic, without any
poorly executed strokes.’8 To achieve this ‘order within disorder’, Huang decisively pointed out
the key was brushwork, ‘Textural brushstrokes should be properly controlled so that they are
arranged in an orderly way and do not seem to clash with each other.’9 Upon his maturity of
landscape paintings, he concluded the required skills into the ‘Five methods of brushwork’,
epitomizing his brush techniques after years of painstaking practice.10
The ‘Five methods of brushwork’ elucidates five brush techniques fundamentally derived from
Chinese calligraphy: ‘balanced’ (ping), ‘round’ (yuan), ‘sustaining’ (liu), ‘heavy’ (zhong), and
‘changing’ (bian). ‘Balanced’ (ping) is an idea from the calligraphic aesthetic ‘drawing lines with
an awl in the sand’ (zhui hua sha), in which each stroke is strong enough to penetrate the paper
instead of lightly touching it. ‘Round’ (yuan) is likely influenced by Huang’s absorption of the
round forms of seal-script of bronze inscriptions, exhibiting an inner strength in even lines exactly
like bending a woman’s hairpin (zhe chai gu). It requires the brushwork own great resilience, in
particular when the brush is to change its direction. The third method ‘sustaining’ (liu) is like traces
left by roof leaks on the wall (wu lou hen), where the brush moves spontaneously yet in the control
of the body. ‘Heavy’ (zhong) asks for wielding the brush with unyielding vigor, like a falling stone
from a high peak. Finally, ‘changing’ (bian) requires both the brushwork and the painting vary as
a whole to capture the ever-changing nature.11 Theoretically, ‘balanced’, ‘round’, ‘sustaining’, and
‘heavy’ are characteristics of the bronze and stele inscriptions, indicating that Huang’s concrete
calligraphic brushwork was dedicated to his industrious study of the ancient inscriptions. 12 And
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the last knack ‘changing’ was an overall principle to paint with greatest flexibility. Besides the
five-method guidance, Huang in addition explicated his approaches, ‘in using the brush, there
should be no vertical stroke without a slight movement backwards and no horizontal stroke without
a slight movement backwards. The goal is to achieve solidity and to avoid superficiality’, ‘in
sketching the outlines of a painting, the brushwork must have one wave (form of rise and fall) and
three zigzags (brush’s directional changes); both should change in accordance with the subject’.13
The three-meter-long masterpiece ‘Crisp air in mountains and lakes’ (Fig.9) created in 1951
exemplifies Huang’s diverse and solid applications of calligraphic brushwork. A later annotation
in the painting by the contemporary artist Huang Jusu (1897-1986) discloses calligraphy as the
fundamental root of Huang’s untrammeled brushwork, ‘the seal script and clerical script are
combined in harmony in depiction of the painting, to express a beauty of indistinction, partly
hidden and partly visible.’ The seemingly hodgepodge of black brushstrokes is in fact a combined
result of Huang’s ‘changing’ brushwork. The ‘balanced’ and ‘heavy’ brushwork contouring the
vein of mountains is tense and vigorous, displaying the overwhelmingly verdant nature in the
horizontal axis, while the ‘round’ brush tip portrays lively mottled green and black moss. Mixed
with light ochre and malachite, paralleled brushstrokes made up of one wave and three zigzags
depict the beautiful riverbank. Brush lines have abandoned rigid movement neither vertically or
horizontally, and turned out full-bodied and rich in variety. The picture hence is filled with a
rhythmic movement, flowing from one mountain to the river, and to another mountain. Equally
weighted is his masterwork ‘Landscape in the style of Song’ (Fig.10) finished at the age of ninety.
‘Sustaining’ brushwork is given spontaneously yet in the absolute control of Huang.
Overpowering ink lines are either solidly bent into treetops of weeping willows along the riverside,
or softly waved as representation of ripples in the lucid river. All kinds of tailored ‘changing’
brushwork altogether arrest the richness and vividness of nature, luring viewers’ entry to the
agreeable mountainscape layer after layer. Notably, the upper inscription best elucidates Huang
Binhong’s ultimate artistic ideal: solidity and density in structure and freshness and moisture in
brush-and-ink (hun hou hua zi). Separately, ‘hun’ (round) and ‘hou’ (dense) require honestly
strong and thick brushwork to compose a holistically invincible mountainscape overwhelming
viewers while inviting them in. ‘Hua’ (beautiful) and ‘zi’ (luxuriant) accentuate creating a
prosperous and energetic nature.14
Admittedly, the innovative use of ink and water serves as an equivalent catalyst for Huang
Binhong’s cluttered yet orderly landscapes, compared to his extraordinary play of brush. Both a
ponderous blackness of mountains and a gauzy thinness of streams are fruits of his ink mastery,
which can be regarded an accessory of his untrammeled brushwork. Huang maintained a similar
view by saying, ‘The wonder of the ancient masters’ use of ink lies in the manipulation of water.
The metamorphosis of water and ink, however, lies in the strength of the brush, for without forceful
brushwork, ink becomes insipid.’15 In a letter to his confidant Fu Lei, he highlighted the brushwork
again as foundation for the use of ink, ‘Since the ancient times there have been no one adept at
applying ink without first knowing how to use brush. If one is weak in his strength of wrist, his
brush cannot well control the application of ink. People who learn painting must first learn to use
the brush and then apply the ink. Only through the strength given by brushwork will the painting
obtain the vital breath of harmony and the inner beauty of nature.’16
Along with his ‘Five methods of brushwork’, Huang summarized his innovation of ink into the
‘Seven methods of ink’: thick ink (nong mo), light ink (dan mo), broken ink (po mo), splashed ink
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(po mo), left-over ink (su mo), accumulated ink (ji mo), and scorched ink (jiao mo).17 Furthermore,
according to Jason Kuo’s examination, Huang developed at least nine techniques in manipulation
of water: water with ink, water breaking ink, ink breaking water, water breaking colors, colors
breaking water, soaked water, splashed water, congealed water, and absorbing water. 18 Huang’s
renowned masterpiece ‘Sitting in the Rain in Mount Qingcheng’ (Fig.11) demonstrates his
unduplicated ‘light ink’ and ‘spreading water’ techniques. The gentle brush saturated with clear
water, added with a little cyanine, best captures moisture of the evergreen Mount Qingcheng after
rain. Plural layers of light ink touches obscure most space surrounding the mountain, leaving the
only cottage standing out with greatest clarity. The vertically dark mountain in the middle takes
on a fresh look as well, as though the earlier rain has scoured out all the dust and dirt. The
contrasting huge empty space of the two sides outside as a representation of the pervasive mist
further underlines a sense of humidity and mildness, as if the damp in the mountain is dripping out
of the picture.
Huang Binhong’s highly sophisticated methods of brushwork, complemented with his use of ink
and water, gifted him incessant possibilities to express contradictory effects on the blank paper,
from thinness to thickness, dryness to moisture, and elegance to roughness. All these combinations
of opposite effects are orderly expressed to present speciously disordered pictures. In particular,
his proficient skills even permitted him to painting when his eyesight was aggregated into almost
blindness around 1952. Other than infuriating him, the visual inconvenience in retrospect freed
Huang to apply even more layers of black ink, leaving mountains unbelievably black and dense.
Spontaneously marked dots and strokes danced in a euphonious rhythm following his heart on
pictorial surface.
Perhaps it is in need of stepping further than holding full satisfaction just because of Huang
Binhong’s dominant blackness, regardless of its abstraction or randomness of brushwork. One may
feel questioned when thinking twice on his dark landscapes. Why an unknown brightness is
naturally experienced in such blackness? And why a fresh air is captured preventing suffocation
from such inevitably darkness? The solution lies in Huang’s mastery of pictorial composition,
which was attributed to his dedication to Chinese calligraphy without exception. His landscapes
achieved the best combination of solidity and void, and this void-solid reciprocity in return makes
his landscapes fresh, lucid and vivacious. The interplay of void and solidity is considered one of
the most essential structural aesthetic of Chinese calligraphy, where ‘solidity’ means the inked
strokes on paper, and ‘void’ refers to the blank space outside the strokes. The dynamic momentum
of the writing character can only be achieved when the void and solidity balance each other in
harmony, making the spirit of character stand out. 19 Huang Binhong started his void-solid
conception when he was first admonished by the Anhui artist Zheng Shan (1811-97) as a kid, that
it was easy to depict solidity but hard to deal with void in painting. This conception was further
developed after 1901, when he began collection and study of epigraphy and seal-engravings which
were also regarded subfields of calligraphy. The reserved blank outside the character of the
confined stone seal, from the calligraphic perspective, kept reminding and inspiring him the
similarly positive use of void against substance.20
Thanks to Huang’s interactive combination of free brushwork and creative composition, landscape
paintings of his final period are impenetrably dense on one side, while exhibiting sporadic large
and small blank room to guarantee a sense of illumination and freshness. He once used an apropos
simile to describe his structured composition, ‘Painting a picture is like playing chess. Success
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depends on the ability to create ‘living eyes’ (breathing spaces), the more the better. What to chess
playing are ‘living eyes’ are breathing spaces to painting’, ‘A good chess-player arranges pieces
naturally and gracefully, making a feint to the east but attacking in the west, and then gradually
tackling the details, thus taking the initiative in every stage of the game. This shows the player’s
ability to stay ‘relaxed.’ A good painter should also be able to stay ‘relaxed.’ At first he made a
loose overall arrangement, then dots and dyes ink layer upon layer to make it look profound and
lovely, thus providing a lively feeling’.21 His ‘Travel on a River’ (Fig.12) in 1952 offers strong
evidence in the harmonious synthesis of substance and void. Four large black spots representing
the shady exuberant trees are interlaced with sporadically large and linear blank space representing
the limpidly flowing streams. Greyish ink touches are considerately applied layer after layer along
the riverside to moderate the abrupt conflict between the trickling rivulets and arrogant masses.
Black and white eventually turn balanced to delineate a harmonious oneness of mountains and
rivers, neither crammed nor empty. Furthermore, instead of merely acting as open space to balance
the composition, such positive use of luminous voids brings out the infinite splendor of nature, an
inevitable momentum that penetrates and pervades the whole paper through Huang’s detailed
arrangement of untrammeled black brushwork. He deliberately punctuated subtle voids within
mountains by inhibiting the unruly brushstrokes from full coverage. Hence the visual pleasure of
pure denseness and blackness is well expressed after the mollification of voids. Similar methods
of void-solid play are easily examined in most of his late works, from ethereal cloudy sky, rising
enshrouding mist to crystal-clear fjords.
Huang Binhong’s attainments of brushwork never ceased to flourish only till the last second of his
life. During the approximately last two years, he completed a tremendous deal of works without
inscription, indicating a hidden self-awareness of ‘incompleteness’. Interestingly, these unfinished
landscapes are controversially regarded as Huang’s daily impromptu practices, whereas interpreted
as ‘completeness’ disguised by his unruly brushwork. In March 1955, after days of health
deterioration, the old man finally passed away. His magnificent incomplete works marked with
untrammeled brushwork may be the last mystery he left for people to speculate.
Conclusion
‘None of my landscapes resemble the works of ancient artists, but I take pains in all respects to
fathom and emulate ancient artists,’ Huang Binhong’s own words concisely summarizes his
ninety-year artistic life.22 He spent the first seventy years absorbing knowledge from the Chinese
tradition and nature, while the last twelve years witnessed his inimitable novelty in late landscape
paintings representative of his untrammeled brushwork. Given his unprecedented brushwork
mastery derived from Chinese calligraphy, his final works exhibit an abstract beauty of
‘resemblance within non-resemblance’. The refined methods of brushwork and complementary
innovation of ink and water in addition endowed his landscapes with blackness, density, and
thickness, inducing viewers to investigate the hidden orderliness within the apparent randomness.
To finally lift his landscapes, Huang experimented on the positive use of void. Luminous blank
spaces thus penetrate the aggressive hefty mountains, bringing in freshness and lightness.
Consequently, his untrammeled brushwork played an indispensable role to realize his artistic
desideratum—solidity and density in structure and freshness and moisture in brush-and-ink.
Since the twentieth century, though Chinese artists have achieved enormous artistic breakthroughs
inspired by Western art, one can hardly ignore the magnificent contributions of Huang Binhong to
the reforms of Chinese painting. His aesthetic principles on brushwork in the final period not only
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inherited Chinese cultural relics of calligraphy and literati painting, but even more substantially
his free and abstract brushwork enabled later generations of artists to discover more plausible paths
for Chinese painting transmutation within tradition.
Upon examining Huang Binhong’s eventual explosive transformation in landscapes, let us bring
back our attention to his artistic evolutions during the ninety-year labyrinth. The ingenuity of
landscapes in the end merely stays for one decade for him, compared to the absolutely dominant
length of previous eighty-year accumulation of emulating ancient masters. This phenomenon
further inspires us to consider why Huang expended eighty years of slight artistic variation to wait
for such a fleeting eruption. Is it possible that something unexpected or meaningful once happened
and enlightened him to make such a lifeway decision? Or is it simply resulted from his deliberate
persistence on slowly progress? These are questions in need of further investigation.
NOTES
1
T.C.Lai, Huang Bin Hong (Huang Pin Hung) 1864-1965 (Hong Kong: Swindon Book Company, 1980), p. 52.
Wang, Bomin, Huang Binhong hua yu lu. 3d ed (Shanghai: Ren min mei shu Publishing, 1978), p. 50.
3
Zhang Zhenwei, ‘Hun hou hua zi, Gang jian e nuo,’ in Xin mei shu. Vol4. (Hangzhou: Xin mei shu za zhi bian jib u,
1982), n.p.
4
Claire Roberts, Friendship in Art: Fou Lei and Huang Binhong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2010), pp.
70-80.
5
Wang Bomin. Huang Binhong hua yu lu, p. 1.
6
Wu Guanzhong, ‘Guan yu chou xiang mei,’ in Rong, Sipin and Mei, Wenge, ed., Wu Guanzhong: Yishu Sanlun
(Shanghai: Wen hui Publishing, 1998), p. 30.
7
Jason C. Kuo, Transforming Traditions in Modern Chinese Painting: Huang Pin-hung’s Late Work (New York: Peter
Lang Publishing, 2004), p. 177. Originally in Tao Ho, ‘The Late Period of Huang Binhong,’ in An Exhibition of Works
by Huang Binhong, n.p
8
Huang Binhong, ‘Shatin Questions and Answers,’ in T.C.Lai, Huang Bin hong (Huang Pin Hung) 1864-1965, p. 25.
9
Ibid., p. 25.
10
Huang Binhong, Hua fa yao zhi (1934), in Chen Fan, Hua fa yao zhi (Hong Kong: Wan zhu tang, 1961), pp. 4-13;
Huang Binhong, Hua tan, in Chen Fan, Huang Binhong hua yu lu (Hong Kong: Shanghai shu ju publishing, 1976), pp.
1-9.
11
Trans. Richard M. Barnhart, Archives of the Chinese Art Society of America, vol.18, reproduction in Jason C. Kuo,
Innovation within Tradition: the Painting of Huang Pin-hung (Williamstown: Hanart Gallery in association with
Williams College Museum of Art, 1989), pp. 34-5.
12
Su Biyi, ‘Huang Pin-hung’s pursuit of brush and ink,’ in Jinxian Li ed., Bi mo lun bian (Hong Kong: Hong Kong
University Faculty of Art and Hong Kong Chinese University Joint Publishing, 2002), n.p.
13
Wang, Bomin, Huang Binhong hua yu lu, p. 34; 41.
14
T.C.Lai, Huang Bin Hong (Huang Pin Huang) 1864-1965, p. 42.
15
Susan Bush and Hsioyen Shih, Early Chinese Texts on Painting (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), p. 34.
16
Wang Jiwen, Bin hong shu jian (Shanghai: Shanghai Peoples’ Fine Arts Publishing House, 1988), p. 40.
17
Huang Binhong, Hua tan, in Chen Fan, Huang Bin hong hua yu lu (Hong Kong: Shanghai Shuju Publishing, 1976),
pp. 1-9.
18
Jason C. Kuo, Transforming Traditions in Modern Chinese Painting: Huang Pin-hung’s Late Work, p. 97.
19
Daniel Lau, Void-Solid Reciprocity: Ink-Rubbing Calligraphy. Retrieved Aug.1, 2013,
from http://noonhappyhour.com/Void-Solid-Reciprocity-Visual-Branding-Book-Design
2
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20
Jason C. Kuo, Innovation within Tradition: the Paintings of Huang Pin-hung, p. 25; Catherine, Woo, Chinese
Aesthetic s and Qi Baishi (Hong Kong: Joint Publishing, 1986), p. 96.
21
Wang Bomin, Huang Binhong hua yu lu, p. 5; trans. In T.C.Lai, Huang Bin Hong (Huang Pin Huang) 1864-1965, p.
50; Chang Feng, Tan yi lu, trans. Jianping Gao, The Expressive Act in Chinese Art: From Calligraphy to Painting
(Uppsala: Uppsala University, 1996), pp. 65-6.
22
Huang Binhong, Letter to Duanshi (1940), trans. In Jason C.Kuo, Transforming Traditions in Modern Chinese
Painting: Huang Pin-hung’s Late Work (New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2004), p. 167.
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Illustrations
1. Mount Jiuhua (ca.1906), hanging scroll, ink on paper. 66.5×31 cm. (Williams College
Museum of Art, Gift of Tao Ho, Class of 1960)
2. Landscapes (1909), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 36×36 cm. (Hong Kong Museum
of Art)
3. Landscape in the style of Li Tang (1926), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
79.4×31.7 cm. (Hong Kong Museum of Art)
4. Scenes of Mount Huang (1938), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 31.9×19.6 cm. (Hong
Kong Museum of Art)
5. Scenes of Mount Huang (1938), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 31.9×19.6 cm. (Hong
Kong Museum of Art)
6. Peaks of Yangshuo (undated, hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 103×41.5 cm.
(Private collection)
7. Pine Tree Gully in Mount Huang (1952), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 90×28.5
cm. (National Art Museum of China)
8. Landscape, album leaf (undated), ink and color on paper. 25×18 cm. (Courtesy of the Fu
Family Trust)
9. Crisp air in mountains and lakes (1951), handscroll, ink and color on paper. 30.6×300
cm. (Private collection)
10. Landscape in the style of Song (undated), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
81.5×30.5 cm (Zhejiang Provincial Museum)
11. Sitting in the Rain in Mount Qingcheng (undated), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
86.5×44.4 cm. (Zhejiang Provincial Museum)
12. Travel on a River (1948), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 118×39 cm. (Courtesy
of China Gallery)
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Fig.1. Mount Jiuhua (ca.1906), hanging scroll, ink on paper. 66.5×31 cm. (Williams College
Museum of Art, Gift of Tao Ho, Class of 1960)
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Fig.2. Landscapes (1909), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 36×36 cm. (Hong Kong Museum
of Art)
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Fig.3. Landscape in the style of Li Tang (1926), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
79.4×31.7 cm. (Hong Kong Museum of Art)
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Fig.4. Scenes of Mount Huang (1938), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 31.9×19.6 cm. (Hong
Kong Museum of Art)
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Fig.5. Scenes of Mount Huang (1938), album leaf, ink and color on paper. 31.9×19.6 cm. (Hong
Kong Museum of Art)
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Fig.6. Peaks of Yangshuo (undated, hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 103×41.5 cm.
(Private collection)
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Fig.7. Pine Tree Gully in Mount Huang (1952), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 90×28.5
cm. (National Art Museum of China)
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Fig.8. Landscape, album leaf (undated), ink and color on paper. 25×18 cm. (Courtesy of the Fu
Family Trust)
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Fig.9. Crisp air in mountains and lakes (1951), handscroll, ink and color on paper. 30.6×300 cm.
(Private collection)
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Fig.10. Landscape in the style of Song (undated), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
81.5×30.5 cm (Zhejiang Provincial Museum)
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Fig.11. Sitting in the Rain in Mount Qingcheng (undated), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper.
86.5×44.4 cm. (Zhejiang Provincial Museum)
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Fig.12. Travel on a River (1948), hanging scroll, ink and color on paper. 118×39 cm. (Courtesy
of China Gallery)
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