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- numbers of the shi as wenren took up painting as an activity suitable to retirement. Theoretically, they were amateur painters. The preferred subject was shanshui and bamboo, which was treated as intermediary between calligraphy and painting. Aesthetic theories revolved around the preference for amateur literati expressions over the output of professional artists.
Aesthetic activity became the means by which the literati expressed their experiences as individuals, a heady value given the rigidly conformist and non-self-assertive nature of most of their lives, their occupations, and normative Chinese religion itself, which placed family and society higher than the individual. With few exceptions, the scholar- officials continually functioned in highly ritualised dual hierarchies, that of clan and state. Aesthetic experience for the literati was usually based on contemplation or trance experience of nature (not necessarily direct), which in itself is understood to be the Dao. Aesthetic activity served as an alternative, complementary mode of religious behaviour for the traditional elite, whose primary mode of religious behaviour was to serve as priests in family, clan and state rituals.
Chinese Literati Painting
Painting, as an offshoot of calligraphy, is an integral part of Chinese civilization, and together with calligraphy, is considered by the Chinese to be their only �true� art. To the Chinese, painting is more than a mere craft. It took years of practice to achieve control of body and discipline of mind, which is needed to master it. Chinese literati brushwork is the only art form that is powerful and lyrical enough to command an equal footing with their poetry and philosophy. As the predominant art form of China, painting conceptualises much of the beauty and philosophy of life that can be found in one of the world�s oldest cultures.
The fifth century art critic, Xie He, laid down the most important set of principles of Chinese paintings in his essay, Critique of Ancient Painting. The six basic canons he made are as much alive today as they were centuries ago. They are: 1. creating a lifelike tone and atmosphere (rhythmic vitality); 2. building structure through brushwork; 3. depicting the forms of things as they are; 4. conformity to kind in applying colours; 5. composition must be consistent, artistic, and in accord with the dictates of space; and 6. live up to tradition by transcribing and copying the ancient masters. The sixth canon demonstrates that the Chinese were great lovers of tradition. To copy the style of the old masters was considered a necessary part of the training of every artist. The highest praise a painter can receive is to be told that his paintings were indistinguishable from those of his master or from that of a master who lived centuries before him. The Chinese, while admiring a person�s originality, demand first and foremost that he display a reverence for past accomplishments. However, since copies of many famous painters were produced en masse throughout the ages, it now causes tremendous problems with proving authenticity.
There are many subjects in Chinese painting, but it is landscape, which was the most popular and formed the nucleus of Chinese painting during the last fifteen hundred years. In their landscape paintings, the artists attempted to portray an inner poetic reality rather than an outward likeness. They sought to realize rather than to copy nature. The Chinese artist was an impressionist in that he feels free to omit objects, which were not essential to his thought. However, he never goes to the point of abstraction, there is always a degree of realism present.
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