Private Treasure ——An introduction to the calligraphy, ink wash, glue color, charcoal sketches and watercolor works of Chen Cheng-po By Huang Tung-Fu∗ Preface This volume enlists watercolor paintings, charcoal sketches, ink wash paintings, glue color paintings, calligraphy and all works other than oil paintings and sketches by Chen Cheng-po. Watercolor was the medium Chen favored most, his creations stretching the Taiwan Governor Mandarin School (hereinafter referred to as Mandarin School), Tokyo School of Fine Arts and Shanghai teaching periods, to his return to Taiwan towards the end of 1930. The charcoal sketches, ink wash paintings and calligraphy are mainly from Chen’s time at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts and include works created after graduating from the school. The glue color paintings were course assignments created during the Tokyo School of Fine Arts period. Although the course assignments were not official works, they were works created without deliberate modification, naturally revealing Chen’s learning process as well as the formation of his painting style. Therefore, the works included in the volume are of great reference value for the study of the formation of Chen Cheng-po’s painting style and artistic habits. These works have never been publicly displayed and can be described as Chen’s private treasure. The subsequent discussions are in the sequence of calligraphy, ink wash, glue color, charcoal sketch then watercolor. I. Calligraphy Calligraphy was an important screening indicator of the ancient Chinese imperial examination1, and in Han culture regarded as a rudimentary literary attainment of the intelligentsia. Under the influence of traditional values and the sayings “the worth of other pursuits is small, the study of books excels them all” and “he who excels in study can follow with official career”, children took basic calligraphy training to write with a brush during the start of literacy. Chen’s father, Chen Shou-Yu (1867-1909) was a Qing Dynasty scholar. As he passed the Qing Dynasty scholar selection exam, naturally, he had mastered to considerable extent the official Guangeti style of calligraphy. It is worth noting that the Cultural Affairs Bureau of Chiayi City has a collection of calligraphy ∗ Huang Tung-Fu: Vice President of the National Pingtung University of Education and Professor of Department of Visual Arts 1 See Art Education History of China (2003). Huang Dong-Fu, Taipei: Shih-Da Shu Yuan. p.51-52. 1 by Chen Shou-Yu. The National Museum of Taiwan Literature in Tainan also maintains a collection of a number of his brush exercise calligr aphy (both donated by Chen’s family members). The works reveal that the regular script of small characters by Chen Shou-Yu emulated Wen Zhengming’s calligraphy style, which was spiritual and elegant. And his running script and cursive script followed the style of two Wangs (Xizhi and Xianzhi), combined with Mi Fu and Wang Duo’s bold style, natural and without any pretense. This was different and surpassed the Guangeti style. His work was highly artistic and reached the level of calligraphers. It is likely Chen Cheng-po often got the chance to watch his father write calligraphy when he was young. Chen Shou-Yu also passed on a significant 2 number of brush scripts and calligraphy exercises after his death which Chen Cheng-po kept and treasured. The Master Chu's Homilies for Families collection was passed down three generations completely Date unknown intact, which is quite rare. How did calligraphy and its styles Ink on paper influence Chen Cheng-po? This will be a topic that deserves 136.7×68cm further study in the future. When Chen Cheng-po studied at Mandarin School, he learned calligraphy for three years in school courses3. Unfortunately, those early year calligraphic works are long gone. During Chen’s time at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts (1924-1927), the entrance exam included calligraphy and the school required a three-hour calligraphy exercise course each week through the three years of fine arts training4. Looking at the student yearbook of the Department of Fine Arts of Tokyo University of the Arts, the only teacher who taught brush writing during the three years that Chen studied there5 was Okada. Therefore, Okada was probably the one who conducted Chen’s calligraphy training. Among Chen’s calligraphy works, regular script Master Chu’s Homilies for Families was the most mature and the closest to a formal work. The works can be dated to the period after his graduation from the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. This volume also contains a collection of Chen’s calligraphy works never seen by the public. The works date to the Tokyo School of Fine Art period and retain corrections made by his teacher Okada. The inscriptions suggest that the works were assignments completed through Chen’s third 2 60 calligraphy works by Chen Shou-yu have been donated to the Cultural Affairs Bureau of Chiayi City by the Chen family; and 392 test post assignment works have been donated to the National Museum of Taiwan Literature in Tainan by the family members. 3 See Calligraphy Education at Taiwan Elementary School in Japanese Colonial Period, Yeh Xin-Tan, (1999) for the education calligraphy teachers at public schools during Japanese colonial period, Taipei: Hui- Feng-Tang. p.19-43. 4 See Toshiaki Shirane (2012) Chen Cheng-po’s Japanese Glue color Painting, edited by the Committee of Soka Art Center (2012) and included into Under the Searing Sun ─ A Solo Exhibition by Chen Cheng-po, Taipei: Qin Xuan Cultural & Education Foundation, p.34-35. 5 See Student Yearbook of the Department of Fine Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts (1981), p.15-35. 2 year of undergraduate study. Some of the works were signed “Chen (陳)” with no first name and had teacher’s corrections which suggested the works were course assignments. Furthermore, Chen Cheng-po and Liao Ji-chun were the only students from Taiwan as shown in the yearbook of the Fine Arts Department. Also, only one student had the surname Chen (陳)6, so it can easily be identified that the “陳” on the works were indeed Chen Cheng-po’s signatures. Confucian Analects, Book IX: Zi Han 1926 Ink on paper 29.2×130.3cm Chen Cheng-po’s first year calligraphic works in regular script and running regular script were emulated from copybooks. The calm and restrained brush strokes reflected considerable basic calligraphy training from early family education or the calligraphy foundation Chen developed in Mandarin School. His third year works included a large amount of cursive and near cursive Hiragana writing of haiku which moved past copybook boundaries and represented his distinct style. Further analysis of his works also uncovered a combination of different calligraphic styles in the same work. There were often mixes of regular script, running script and running script with Japanese interpenetration. For example, in Chen’s horizontal banner writing, Confucian Analects, Book IX: Zi Han: Yan Yuan sighed and said, “I looked up to them, and they seemed to become higher…” The main body was mostly written in regular script, but there were many words written in the running script formation, such as “Ran (然)”, “Qian (前)”, “Shan (善)”, “Yu (欲)” ... etc., can be described as running-regular script. In addition, the words “Yue (約)”, “Ba (罷)”, “Neng (能)”, etc. are written in typical running script. The intermixing of chirography indicated Chen’s immature style shortly after he abandoned the copybook. Also, the structure of Chen’s regular script seems to be based on Ou Yang-Xun, but the point of the initial stroke moved directly into the front hinted slightly of Chu Sui-liang and Zhi Yong. The horizontal stroke often ended in pause brush and a push back that closely resembled the style of Yen (Zhen-Qin), Liu (Gong-Quan) while the structure of vertical pen stroke and drop are close to Yan and Liu. As for the running script, it seemed that Chen was influenced by the style of Wang Xizhi’s Ji Zi Sheng Jiao Xu (集字聖教序). Overall, Chen’s calligraphy style had little trace of a definite model which may have been the result of learning from Ink Script Version. It is also worth noting that Chen created a few banners during his third year calligraphy exercises which adopted running script at the right and cursive Japanese Hiragana at the left part (with running-regular script within running script). The Japanese was especially smooth and clearly superior to the running script and regular script. It could have been an outcome of observation and imitation from the demonstrations his teachers gave in the classroom. The fluency of unrestrained rhythm in the Japanese writing may also 6 Ibid., p.355-356. 3 have been more suited to Chen’s naive and enthusiastic7 personality. Master Chu’s Homilies for Families–the central scroll of calligraphy in regular script was basically Chen’s continuation of the regular script style from the Tokyo School of Fine Arts period. He also incorporated the calligraphy styles of Ou, Chu, Yan, Liu and Zhi Yong, etc. to become more mature and attain better overall sense. Curiously, there were a lot of words clearly tilted to the left (such as the last line of the word “Ruo (若)”, “Shu (庶)”, “Yan (焉)”, etc.) which may be related to Chen’s writing posture– his left shoulder tilted slightly downwards while his right shoulder was slightly lifted8. The inscription “Yin- Chuan Chen Qing-Lan Lu (穎川陳慶瀾錄)”–“Yin-Chuan (穎川)” was the Han nationality ancestral hall name of Chen’s family and “Qing-Lan (慶瀾)” was the nickname he used when he taught in Shanghai.