Zhao Mengfu's Autumn Colors on the QIao and Hua Mountains

Darn those Chinese characters. Pictures for words? Where’s the logic; where’s the system? Then again, that’s why Chinese calligraphy is an art far and beyond any self-expression achievable through western penmanship. Written Chinese characters reflect the calligrapher’s aesthetic tastes, level of education, depth of sentiment, personality and temperament.  Al l made possible through the soft elasticity of the ink brush.

Perhaps you’ve seen the old gentleman at the park, dipping an over-sized brush in water, tracing characters with tai qi delicacy and footwork as gawkers stand rapt. He has three guiding principles in mind. Movement, for only through practiced flow of wrist, elbow, shoulder, and body will he maneuver the brush correctly, and control the flow of ink. Speed, force, pressing and lifting for varied brush contact, all critical to worthwhile calligraphy. Then there’s structure, the layout of the characters’ points on an imagined quadrant. This is a matter of balance, release and replacement, capping and piercing, ascending and falling, a dynamic spell which imbues the characters with life. Only with practiced movement and structure can the calligrapher’s style be seriously considered.  His inspiration, taste, level of education, and personality find expression in this realm.

Before too long the last old gentleman will grow too feeble to do his art justice, and calligraphy as an art will go the way of cloisonné and embroidery, fake pearls churned in factories for mass consumption. That lack of authenticity will douse all but a spark of interest in Chinese calligraphy, already diminished in an age when  the hand-turned is no competition for the computer-generated. But we’ll always have the following three classics of calligraphy, for the ever few who can distinguish gold from that which glitters.

Foreword to Lanting Pavilion – Wang Xizhi

Wang Xizhi had the artistic genius to not only copy faithfully the work of his different masters, but blend them into a style stamped by his own genius. His “running hand” style, in which brush hardly leaves paper between characters nor pauses in their writing, earned him the title of “Calligrapher Sage” in succeeding generations.

In ancient China, though, one could be a master calligrapher, even sage, and still party like a Peking Opera star. On the third day of the third month of the year 353 CE, Wang Xizhi and fellow intellectuals gathered at Lanting Pavilion for an ancient rite – ancient drinking game, in all truth. Each had to compose a poem extemporaneously in turn, or drink deeply from a chilled vessel of spirits.

Maybe you’ve experienced one of those transcendental moments, when you’re so at one with the world and your task that you perform at a level you know you never will achieve again without divine assistance. Such was the case with Wang Xizhi that day, imbued with the spirit of perfect friendship and the perfect amount of alcohol. He tried to rewrite his Foreword to Lanting Pavilion several times in later years, at the request of others who wanted a copy, but in his opinion never came close to the original. As for the original, it was passed on from nobleman to king, connived and stolen, and then finally lost to the ages. All that exist are copies made by later masters such as Yu Shinan and Feng Chengsu.

Su Shi’s Book of Poems Written in Huangzhou

Not so long ago, our greatest rebels were rock n’ rollers. Very long ago, China’s greatest rebels were poets. Su Shi was one of that tiny minority blessed by the Heavens with a life as a nobleman, and of an even tinier fraction who had to express his umbrage at government corruption. He was also a poet, painter, and calligrapher of distinction. His characters were known for their fullness and charm, capturing the spirit of the late Song Dynasty.

When he was 42 years old, Su Shi became a magistrate in Huzhou. The malfeasance he witnessed at the administrative level, and the poverty it caused the common people ostensibly under his care, led him to write poems of thinly-veiled censure. Some government finks ended up charging Su Shi with government slander, leading to a stretch in prison. On release he was relegated to a minor post in Huangzhou, where he dove into the poet’s favorite pastime: moping around the hills and countryside, reflecting on the hopelessness of it all.

Huangzhou gets drizzly and gray as a Dickens novel in early April, and the gloomy weather was enough to tip Su Shi into a sublimely depressed state, in which he laid out a small book of poems, full of his despair for the people at the hands of rapacious rulers. Maybe the verse wasn’t especially memorable, but the calligraphy certainly was. Described as alternately “crouching like a bear, then light as a swallow”, the work is considered to have no rival in expressing the pure mood and character of its author.

The Yan Qinli Tablet – Yan Zhenqing

It would be easy to begrudge Yan Zhenqing his talents, were it not for his unparalleled integrity. Sailing through the Imperial Exams to jinshi status with ease, and even came out tops in a post-jinshi  test  designed for the brainiest of the brainy. On top of that, his outstanding calligraphy led to his moniker as the only worthy rival of legendary Wang Xizhi.

But true character shines through under adversity, and Yan Zhenqing passed this test with honors as well. A governor during the Tang Dynasty’s An Shi Rebellion, his was the only Tang force to hold out against the rebels, narrowly preventing total chaos. His rise afterwards was stratospheric, as were his opportunities for graft. But he remained unimpeachable, making enemies in high places.  Various efforts to threaten him proved fruitless, until a jealous minister had him quietly strangled.

Yan Zhenqing brushed out the Yan Qinli Tablet in the fullness of his age, at 71, and the work shows the maturity of a life-long master. The characters tell the life-story of his great-grandfather, and are exemplars of unmatched brushwork. Solemn, elegant, yet robust, Yan’s Qinli Tablet characters are thought to express the very essence of the Tang age. The tablet is on display today at Xian’s Forest of Steles Museum.