Artistic conception? How to understand, especially in photography.

Artistic conception refers to the artistic conception and realm expressed by literary works or natural scenery. Zhu Chengjue's Poem of Stay in the Hall in the Ming Dynasty: "The beauty of poetry lies in the harmony of artistic conception. Apart from sound, it is the true taste." In the Qing Dynasty, Yu Yue's Essays on Hall Spring, Volume II: "Yun Qi's monasticism is extraordinary." Duanmu Hongliang's The Art of Guan Shanyue: "People who paint plum blossoms rarely break through the Lin Hejing-style plum blossom character, and always emphasize the faint fragrance and the artistic conception of thin shadows."

Artistic conception refers to the poetic space presented in lyric works, which is full of scenes, reality and reality, active in life rhythm and infinite charm. If the typical image is a single image, then the artistic conception is an image system composed of several images, and it is an advanced form of literary image as a whole image.

Although there are different opinions on the theory of "realm" in literary and art circles, it is surprising that most theorists equate "realm" with "artistic conception", which is called "literary image" and "world in works". This view is undoubtedly one-sided.

As a general idiom, the word "realm", such as the cloud "there are two realms, the realm of poets and the realm of ordinary people", refers to an abstract realm in works. Another cloud says, "Those who have achieved great success in ancient and modern times, when asked by universities, must go through three realms." This so-called realm refers to people who have achieved success at different stages. Another example is the cloud "the bright moon shines on the snow", "the river flows day and night", "the bright moon hangs in the sky" and "the Yellow River gathers yen", which can be described as a wonder of the ages. The so-called border lunch here refers to the scenery described by the author.

Structural characteristics of artistic conception

The structural feature of artistic conception is the coexistence of reality and reality. Artistic conception consists of two parts: one part is a more realistic factor of "being like the present", which is called "reality"; Part of it is the virtual part of "reading between the lines", which is called "virtual environment". Virtual reality is the sublimation of the real world, which embodies the intention and purpose of creating the real world, embodies the artistic taste and aesthetic effect of the whole artistic conception, restricts the creation and description of the real world, and is in the position of soul and commander in chief in the artistic conception structure. However, the virtual environment cannot be created out of thin air, and it must be carried out in the concrete description of the real environment. In a word, virtual reality is represented by real reality, and real reality is processed under the control of virtual reality, which is the structural principle of the artistic conception of "virtual and real coexistence"

The essential characteristics of artistic conception

The essential feature of artistic conception is "life rhythm", that is, to express the beauty of life itself. In the aesthetic psychological structure of our nation, the universe realm and artistic conception are regarded as a seamless and isomorphic relationship. Because the universe itself is a life form, the poet's experience of the universe is the experience of the rhythm of life, and the artistic conception is precisely the expression of this rhythm of life. Although the human heart is small, it can hold the whole universe. The poet's heart itself is the creation of the universe, and he can reflect the poetic heart and gas field of the universe. Therefore, we say that artistic conception is essentially a psychological phenomenon and a life rhythm of human mind. As a life rhythm of human mind, literary artistic conception has three characteristics: (1) expressing sincere feelings. (2) Interest in flying. (3) spread the spirit of all things.

Artistic conception and image are not the same concept.

In our daily life, we often use the word "artistic conception". For example, if a poem is very good, we will say, "This poem is very artistic." A painting is very good, so we say, "This painting is very artistic." Even after watching a movie and walking out of the cinema, we will hear someone say, "Today's movie is very artistic." But although everyone is using this word, many people don't know what artistic conception is.

In recent ten years, there have been many papers and monographs on artistic conception in Chinese academic circles. Everyone's understanding and explanation of "artistic conception" are not consistent. And in my opinion, most people's explanations are inaccurate.

Many people confuse "artistic conception" with "image". Many people say: What is artistic conception? Artistic conception is the blend of "emotion" and "scenery". This explanation probably began in the Qing Dynasty. In the Qing Dynasty, there was a painting theorist named Bu Yantu, who defined "realm" as the blending of scenes. Later, Wang Guowei's interpretation of "artistic conception" or "realm" in his works such as "thorns on earth" is also a blend of scenes. But in China's traditional aesthetics, scene blending is another concept, namely "image" rather than "artistic conception". China's traditional aesthetics holds that the noumenon of art is "image", and the basic provision of "image" is the blending of scenes (which will be discussed later). Any work of art should create an image, so any work of art should blend scenes. But not all works of art have "artistic conception". "Artistic conception" has its own special stipulation besides the general stipulation of "image" (scene blending). The connotation of "artistic conception" is greater than "image", and the extension of "artistic conception" is less than "image".

Philosophical implication of "artistic conception"

From the perspective of aesthetic activities (aesthetic feeling), the so-called "artistic conception" is to go beyond specific limited images, events and scenes and enter infinite time and space, that is, "thinking about the universe through the ages", so as to gain a philosophical feeling and understanding of the whole life, history and universe. On the one hand, it transcends the limited "image" ("taking the image outside" and "outside the image"), on the other hand, "meaning" has also risen from the feeling of a specific thing and scene to the feeling of the whole life. This philosophical significance to life, history and the universe is the meaning of "artistic conception". As we said before, "artistic conception" has both general and special provisions of "image". The sense of life, history and universe contained in images other than this one is the special stipulation of "artistic conception". Therefore, we can say that "artistic conception" is the most metaphysical type of "image".

Artistic Conception of Painting, Poetry and Garden

To illustrate this point, we can give several examples.

Ancient landscape painters in China like to draw "far", which is high, far and flat. Why do all landscape painters in China paint "Far"? Because mountains and rivers are physical things, and "far" breaks through the limited form of mountains and rivers, making people's eyes reach into the distance, from the limited time space into the infinite time space, into the so-called "image outside the image" and "scenery outside the scene" So "far" is the artistic conception of China's landscape painting.

Similarly, the ancient poets in China also liked to climb high and look far. Qu Yuan, Ruan Ji and Li Bai all wrote poems about climbing high and looking far. Why do you want to climb high and look far? It is also from a limited time space to an infinite time space, which leads to a sense of life and history.

On this issue, China's gardens are probably the most telling (what is artistic conception is the most telling). The greatest aesthetic feature of China's garden art is artistic conception. The characteristics of China gardens are not the beauty of an isolated building or isolated landscape, but the artistic conception. So what is the artistic conception of China gardens? Is to break through the small space and enter the infinite space. The aesthetic value of buildings, terraces, pavilions and pavilions in China's classical gardens lies not in the buildings themselves, but in the fact that they can guide tourists from small space to large space, thus enriching their feelings about the beauty of space. In the Ming Dynasty, there was a gardener named Ji Cheng. He has a book called Yuanye, which contains a passage: "Gao Shuang has a porch, the windows are bright and empty, and Wang Yang is a thousand hectares, and the four seasons are brilliant." This passage is very good. Why are the building columns so high and the windows so big in China gardens? It is for "a thousand hectares of Wang Yang, enjoying the splendor of the four seasons", that is, to let tourists "receive" and "accept" the infinite scenery outside.

Artistic conception gives people a special aesthetic feeling.

What are the characteristics of China's artistic conception and aesthetic feeling? In other words, what kind of beauty does it give? Kant once said that there is a beautiful thing, and when people come into contact with it, they often feel a kind of melancholy. This is the artistic conception. As we said before, the aesthetic feeling of artistic conception actually includes a sense of life and history. Because of this, people often have a feeling of melancholy, like a person who has lived in a foreign country for a long time missing his hometown. This aesthetic feeling is what Nietzsche called "metaphysical comfort". The ancient poets in China liked to climb high and look far, which triggered their own philosophical understanding of life and brought them a sense of melancholy. This melancholy is also a kind of poetic beauty. It also brings a kind of spiritual pleasure and satisfaction to people. In this aesthetic feeling, there are some experiences and feelings about the whole life, so we can say that this is the highest aesthetic feeling.

Western works of art are also artistic.

Do western works of art have artistic conception? We say that "artistic conception" is a unique category of China's classical aesthetics. This is from the aesthetic category, refined by ancient thinkers in China, and consciously pursued by many artists in China. But this does not mean that western art has no artistic conception, because the special significance of "artistic conception" lies in its philosophical sense of life. Of course, there are such works in western art, and Beethoven's symphonies are full of sense of life, history and universe. Of course, artists of different times and nationalities have different sense of life and history. But as long as there is a sense of life and history, there is artistic conception. For example, the Russian folk song "Song of the Volga Boatman" not only sang the sufferings of the Volga trackers, but also sang the sufferings of the Russian nation and human beings, so it resonated with audiences all over the world. Someone heard me say that the TV series "Dream of Red Mansions" lacks artistic conception. Q: Is it difficult to produce works of art as an art form of film? I don't think so. If I watch the movie doctor zhivago, I think it is full of life. It not only wrote the tragedy of the times, but also wrote the tragedy of life.

Five realms of artistic conception:

(1) meets the physiological material needs and has a utilitarian realm;

(2) Because people love each other, there is an ethical realm;

(3) There is a political realm due to the interaction of crowd groups.

(4) Poor physics, pursuit of wisdom and academic realm;

(5) there is a religious realm because of the desire to return to nature and the unity of man and nature. The utilitarian realm is dominated by benefit, the ethical realm is dominated by emotion, the political realm is dominated by power, the academic realm is dominated by reason, and the religious realm is dominated by god. But between the latter two, taking the specific life of the universe as the object, enjoying its hue, order, rhythm and harmony, so as to get a glimpse of the deepest reflection of myself; Turning a real scene into a virtual scene, creating an image as a symbol, and concretizing and physicalizing the highest human mind is the "artistic realm". The artistic realm is dominated by beauty.