Traditional Culture Encyclopedia - Photography major - 1907 12 Zhu Qingsheng: the law of opposites in aesthetic thinking

1907 12 Zhu Qingsheng: the law of opposites in aesthetic thinking

1. One of the meanings of the law of opposition: opposition to classical art.

Second, the second meaning of the law of opposition: opposition with other artists.

Third, the origin of the law of opposites of Impressionism

Monet and Renoir oppose classical art in color.

5. Conscious opposition between contemporary artists.

Abstract of intransitive verbs

The second law of contemporary art creation is the law of opposition, which is actually a new method often used in contemporary art, and the law of opposition is to consciously set opposing goals.

1. One of the meanings of the law of opposition: opposition to classical art.

One of the meanings of the law of opposites is the opposition with classical art.

In essence, there is no standard for contemporary art and a standard for classic art, but different art categories and different media have different standard concepts and evaluation objectives for techniques. In other words, whether calligraphy is well written or not is completely different from whether sculpture is well done. People who make sculptures may not know what calligraphy is at all, and people who write calligraphy may not care about sculpture at all. So they all have their own standards, both clear standards and potential aspirations.

Therefore, art moves forward layer by layer, from the beginning to progress and finally to perfection, so in this process, classics are established.

In fact, this is the development of art in the history of art. A survey of various cultures and histories or a visit to major museums will show such great achievements. I am the editor-in-chief of CCTV documentary When the Louvre meets the Forbidden City. I told them that there is such a big difference between contemporary art and classical art. Therefore, in the process of explaining the Louvre, we used the material of another CCTV documentary "The Forbidden City" for comparison. But the most important thing here is not contrast but vision. What is vision? That is, can we look at western sculpture from the perspective of calligraphy? If you can, it means that the method of calligraphy is a universal principle. If not, it means that the principle of every art is only a "partial" principle and has its limitations.

Therefore, there are universal and common principles in art, and there are also unique principles in some categories and methods.

The degree of specialization of art is very high, that is, the highest state of art is often a subtle point. For example, Wang Xizhi, in fact, there may be thousands of people who write like Wang Xizhi, but he may be the only one who can best reach the level of Wang Xizhi. Why? There are very professional problems in this. For example, there are nine paragraphs in writing. If your own ability does not reach seven paragraphs, you can't tell what eight paragraphs and nine paragraphs are. If you don't reach the eighth paragraph, you may not even see the subtle achievements of the ninth paragraph.

But we can't just focus on the details. If we all do this, art will become something useful only to a few professionals. Fortunately, there is still a part of art that can penetrate into all classes and reach our hearts, so all this is the subtlety of classical art, which is the basis of the law of opposites.

The law of opposites is actually against the classics. What is its opposition? Its objection is that as long as there is a classic or a rule, the creativity of contemporary art must try to deny it, even at a small point, or even advance bit by bit. In other words, contemporary art must oppose the existing things, not along the tradition or classics, but against it, break through it and criticize it. Today, we say that this criticism refers to criticism in the philosophical sense. Only by judging and evaluating it can we develop new possibilities of our art, which is one aspect of the matter, that is, setting opposing goals.

Second, the second meaning of the law of opposition: opposition with other artists.

The second meaning of the law of opposition is to oppose other artists. From a business point of view, we need team spirit. But from the creative principle and artistic point of view, this is not allowed. In other words, if two people do art together, they must also keep differences. Even if they are opposed to the same object, their objections should be different from those of the second person or people around him, and they must form objections. This is the creation of art.

Picasso had a friend named Braque, and his creative method was the same as Picasso's, even more direct than Picasso's. Their works were very similar from the beginning. Especially 19 10, the two of them * * * use a studio, and they can't tell anything from each other. If they don't sign, they don't know who painted it. This situation can be regarded as a kind of transition and regret of contemporary art.

However, Picasso later took a new road, a road of his own, so he became the greatest master of the 20th century. Picasso's method is that he has certain opposition goals. In addition to the existing norms, methods and styles, this opposition target should also pay attention to maintaining differences with his peers and peers. This is the law of opposites.

Third, the origin of the law of opposites of Impressionism

In essence, the rudiment of the law of opposites originated from impressionism. Impressionism has enough breakthrough spirit and subversive courage, but it has not consciously and thoroughly applied the law of opposites. Why? Let's analyze the law of unity of opposites with this question.

Impressionism is actually a nickname, originally called independent artist salon. There are some artists in the salon of independent artists, and their works are actually various. For example, the following two works:

Above: Monet, a woman with a parasol, 1875.

Bottom: Pu Sang, a shepherd in Arcadia.

The left picture is an impressionist work, and the right picture is a classical work. The picture on the left is the classical painting of Impression Party. In Impressionism, there are all kinds of artists who are only dissatisfied with the system, classical art and academic school, but their goals are not the same. The so-called * * * goals are shared by only some people, and they are actually real impressionists. So, what is Impressionism and what did Impressionism do?

Sharon, an independent artist (that is, impressionism), was a group of revolutionaries at that time. Some of them did create something, but they didn't create it completely.

For example, Monet's work "Woman with an Umbrella" above is impressionism. Not all people in independent artists' salons do art according to this law, only a few people do it, among which Monet and Renoir are typical representatives. They are against classical art and academics.

So, what's the difference between academic school and impressionism or classical art? Academic or classical art is actually about sketching. The original meaning of sketch is monochrome painting, that is, drawing with pencil and charcoal pen, but this is only the surface. In fact, the concept of real sketch is: we assume that there is a body, which belongs to the category of philosophy. It assumes that what we can't see also exists. For example, there is a sculpture that we can't see with our eyes, but we can touch it. When we touch it, it is there. Therefore, the practice that I can fully express its form without vision is called sketch, which is the fundamental meaning of sketch, and sketch should shape the form.

Looking at Impressionism again, Impressionism thinks that painting is a visual response of light, especially the light waves reflected by sunlight on objects. Even if I can't see it, there is no painting. All I can see is the surface of the painting, just the impression of the painting. This part can be painted separately. This view occurred in 1870 to 1872, which is now almost 150 years. It was very advanced for people of that era to have such an idea. This idea fundamentally breaks through the classical concept since the past art, and is the result of thoroughly applying the law of opposites. Instead of painting the "truth" of things, it only paints the surface of things.

Monet, Sunrise Impression, 1872

The above picture is called Impression of Sunrise, which was painted by Monet, the leader of independent artist salon. This painting has become a typical representative of academic criticism. People who criticize independent artists' salons in academic circles are not good at painting at all, but just scribble by impression, so they are called impressionism. However, people in the independent artist salon were not ashamed but proud after listening to it, so they called themselves Impressionist because its name was Impression of Sunrise.

When we looked at the painting carefully, we found that it was graffiti. This graffiti is not what we generally call graffiti, but that we hang ourselves up and pull back from our present feelings until 150 years ago. All the paintings we see are paintings like The Shepherd of Acadia. Every character and every detail are carefully drawn, and then when we look at the impressionist paintings, we will feel really sloppy and casual.

However, why did Impressionism eventually become a revolution that shook the whole Louvre and academic school? How is this opposition accomplished?

In fact, everyone has their own sunrise in their hearts. First of all, everyone watches the sunrise from different angles. In fact, it is difficult for printed matter to accurately convey the artist's feelings about his paintings at that time. So the impression of sunrise we usually see in books is probably not the original.

Furthermore, in fact, when we watch Monet's The Cliff of Eitel Tower, each of us has different physical condition and eye sensitivity. In extreme cases, some people are color blind, that is, everyone's color vision is different. What we are actually looking at is not a painting, but we can't say it, that is, what I see is actually different from what you see, but I can't tell you. This is the sorrow of life.

It is this that human differences make people have independent dignity. Therefore, the law of opposition is not created by us, but rooted in human nature and human existence.

Monet and Renoir oppose classical art in color.

Let's look at Monet's paintings now.

Above: Monet, the cliff of Eitel Tower.

Below: Eitel Tower (? Tretat) photography in the corner of the seaside town

The photo on the right was taken in Brita, France, and it's called Ertle Tower (? Tretat). This place is a small city, very beautiful, and it is a holiday place. Artists in this place like to go, especially impressionist artists, because the stones on the beach are white, and the structure and color on them can't be seen actually.

So, why did Monet paint this small town? Because he saw color in such a landscape. As shown on the left, this painting looks like a color photo from a distance, but there was no color photo at that time. In fact, the colors drawn by Impressionists are not easy, just like real colored light waves. Works like Monet look particularly bright in the distance, as if in the sun. How does a painting draw colors in the sun? We need to explore how he broke through.

Turuan Cathedral

A painting of Rouen Cathedral by Toumonet.

Rouen Cathedral is a cathedral in France and a medieval Gothic church. Monet likes painting it.

Monet told everyone with his unique color theory at that time that what the eyes saw was the reflection of light waves. Light waves reflect into the shadow, not the darker part, but another color, and the shadow reflects another color. Only a few people can see it, and the best one is Monet, who found it. When he painted the shadow, it was not a dark place, but other colors.

Later, Monet painted a series of Rouen cathedrals, including Church in the Morning, Church in the Sunset and Church in the Morning. Different works have different colors. It can be seen that Monet is not painting a church, but painting colors.

Monet is really a great artist. He really found a new way, creating a path in the principle of opposites. Look what he broke through and created.

Today, we think Monet is actually rather clumsy. Why? The change of color is not between 3 o'clock and 4 o'clock, but the fact that we are still talking. Its color has changed and we can't grasp it. Even if the painter drew a second stroke, its color changed. In fact, Monet created one for us. Artists can't draw instantaneous colors. We can only shoot instantaneous colors with high-sensitivity cameras.

How sensitive is Monet to color? Monet himself said he was crazy. He had a beautiful and gentle wife, who died when she was very young. He wrote: When my wife died, I was desperate. What I see on her face is the change of color.

But Monet is aiming at classical art, and no one can draw real colors in classical art.

After arriving in Monet, the color changed. Later, Monet left us a very important work called Water Lily. In fact, it is not a painting, but a group of paintings.

Above: Part of Monet's Water Lily.

Below: Real trees in Monet Garden.

When we get to Monet's garden, we will find that the tree is still in Monet's garden. Looking further at the trunk of this tree, it is also the trunk of the tree that Monet painted at that time. This is understandable at first glance. When we usually look at the trunk, we see the color of a tree, but in Monet's eyes, we see 50 different colors. On the same tree, he saw 50 different colors and drew them one by one. When viewed from a distance, Monet drew a trunk in the real sunlight, which was a very special thing Monet found.

But the problem is, it's even worse if it's wrong. This is talent. Monet actually found blue, red and orange on it. We need to find it accurately, draw it into the picture properly, and let our eyes see it layer by layer.

Monet actually used the complementary color principle, that is, Monet reopened people's horizons. We used to think that when people make a work, they can only draw shapes and sketch. When I arrived in Monet, I learned not only sketch, but also color, which was opened by some artists, especially artists like Monet. Later, we had color photos and color photography. If there were no Monet, the world would be dark. This is the result developed by an artist with the law of opposites.

If you want to paint colors, it is the opposite of classicism. What is this opposition? Artists in the classical period painted pictures, whether Leonardo da Vinci or Greece, even though they could draw the internal structure, the shapes he drew were clear and definite. But the reflection of light on a thing, whether it is on a tree, on a water lily or in a church, is actually not reflected according to the condition of that body.

Now let's push this question forward and see how impressionism did it. Now let's talk about the opposition principle of impressionism. How do they oppose classical art?

Photo: Renoir's Human Body in the Shadow.

The picture above is a painting by Renoir. You will find that this painting actually has no chin. He didn't draw. This place is a blur. Imagine what color westerners draw best. Quite simply, the color changes of western women's bodies in the shade under their eyes are the most, which are many times richer and more subtle than water lilies and churches.

So Renoir made a work, which is an extreme work of impressionism, and it is difficult to do this. I feel a lot of spots, but each spot is a part, with cold white, yellow, blue and red, and all kinds of colors are in it. I don't know how many colors there are.

In fact, looking at this painting, it is nothing special to draw a human body, because the human body is actually an impressionist state, and the painting is not very accurate, nor is it to draw the structure and shape of the human body. Mainly as a color tray with many colors piled on it.

The opposition between impressionist painters is really not obvious and unconscious, that is to say, they have not consciously applied the law of opposition.

Photo: "Frog Pond" was painted in the same year, and Monet and Renoir's paintings are indistinguishable.

The picture above is a painting by Monet and Renoir. As long as they paint together, their paintings are very similar and almost indistinguishable. This is a sign that there is no conscious opposition between painters.

5. Conscious opposition between contemporary artists.

But the post-impressionist situation has changed a lot. What happened? That is, they began to consciously apply the law of opposites.

Photo: Self-portraits of Cezanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin

The above three are self-portraits of Cezanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin. But self-portraits are not compatible at all, but they are all called post-impressionism. Post-impressionism is an artist who developed from impressionism and anti-impressionism and broke through impressionism. These three people broke through from completely different directions.

For example, Van Gogh and Gauguin had a good relationship. They also used the studio, Gauguin painted Van Gogh and sunflower. Then there was a fight. Finally, Van Gogh cut off his own ear. Why? Because their nature hides the opposing principles and laws.

Gauguin painted pictures. In fact, he never painted what the object was, but made up a color to draw his meaning.

Photo: "Where do we come from? Who Are We? Where are we going? " (partial)

Gauguin painted a picture called "Where Are We From? Who Are We? Where are we going? Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? )。 He also signed the photo and drew a flower next to the title. For example, China is painting an inscription, but he is not from China. He is a western artist. How could he do that? Because he doesn't follow other people's routine at all.

Gauguin's idea is connected with "primitive", which he thinks is fundamental. There was once a man who drew Gauguin's idea that every color was. If you see it is yellow, you can paint it with special yellow. If you see it is red, paint it full red, that is, keep its original essence.

Later Gauguin moved to Tahiti, where he simply lived in a primitive society. In his imagination, only in primitive society can we find the fundamental nature and simple nature of human beings.

There is also a man named Cezanne who actually thinks he is Pu Sang. Cezanne took advantage of the difference between Pu Sang and Leonardo da Vinci. Pu Sang was a great painter after the Renaissance, and French art came from studying the Renaissance in France. But what is the difference between Pu Sang and Leonardo da Vinci?

Photo: The Last Supper

The picture above shows Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper. There is actually something called linear perspective in Leonardo da Vinci's paintings.

If we find out the perspective lines of Leonardo da Vinci's painting The Last Supper, every perspective line has its focus, just like a camera. But when people look at things, they hold their heads on a shelf and stare at them with one eye covered? No, only Da Vinci, who regards viewing as a science, can make it have this soul.

The Renaissance actually replaced humanity with science and established an art with reason. Of course, leonardo da vinci is not alone. The Renaissance as a whole was like this. We just saw the most wonderful and accurate embodiment in Da Vinci's The Last Supper.

There are many things on the table in The Last Supper. The access to this thing is not in a convenient way, but in a disorderly way. These things are out of reach in front. Why are you posing like this? It's simple. We should take these things as the carrier of artistic perspective in the Renaissance. With it, we can draw them. Without it, we don't know where the close shot, the middle shot and the long shot are.

In other words, Leonardo da Vinci made a human camera. It's just that it was so difficult at that time that ordinary people couldn't draw accurately at all. For generations, no one in the world has been able to draw accurately. Only in the Renaissance, starting with Da Vinci's teachers and then handed down from generation to generation, could they paint so well in Da Vinci. But with photography, everyone can do this set of things.

Photo: Pu Sang, a shepherd in Arcadia.

What about Pu Sang's paintings? For example, both Pu Sang's painting "The Shepherd of Acadia" and Pu Sang's painting actually contain a line, but there is more than one line hidden in this line. This line is rickety, and there are still some lines hidden behind it. Why is there this line? This is because in the era of painting in Pu Sang, unlike Leonardo da Vinci, people didn't put their heads on a shelf and look at them with one eye. When he paints, he paints the front to see the front and the back to see the back. If the process of looking at people is a changing process, then in a classical painting, this changing process must be shown, and it is truly classical, not more like Leonardo da Vinci, the pioneer of modern photos.

Cezanne saw this. In fact, people see things as individuals, not machines. What we are most afraid of now is being replaced by artificial intelligence, but in fact everyone is unique and irreplaceable in art, because he is not accurate when he looks at things, but the unique relationship between people and things when he looks at things.

Cezanne thinks this is the most important thing. Only in this way can painting be truly modern. Therefore, what he did in the middle of painting was what Pu Sang did, not what he did in the Renaissance. Is it a revolution? This is a revolution.

Does he look like Pu Sang? It's not the same. Everything he painted is a mess, but there is an opposite principle in his thought, that is, I can never let the real modeling of things become the way we deal with objects. This is a very huge philosophical thinking and an affirmation of human rights, from which human rights come out.

People look at things not by imitating a thing according to a machine, but by explaining it.

When Van Gogh painted a church, he painted his feelings in the middle of each stroke. His works are like a box and a plate, bringing out his own world, Cezanne is his own world, Gauguin is his own world, and there is no relationship between the two worlds.

Above: Cezanne's house.

Below: Cezanne's red-roofed house.

The picture on the left is Cezanne's house, not a real house. The picture on the right shows Cezanne's house, but the contrast between the two is wrong, because the picture on the left is a perspective view of the focus, and there is a shaking distance in the middle of the focus on the right, indicating that people will have such a shaking distance when they look down. Looking at the mountains and trees he painted, it is easy to understand how his ideas are reflected in the paintings.

Cezanne is also a contemporary post-impressionist artist with Van Gogh and an explorer of the first revolution of contemporary art. The principle they follow is to break through the limitations of impressionism, but their breakthrough directions are actually different.

Cezanne was born in 1939, one year older than Monet, but he is clumsy in painting. However, his family has money, so he paints casually. After he got an inheritance from his father, he returned to his hometown of Aix-Provence, where he painted all day. Later, someone finally found him in Paris, because everyone's paintings of Renaissance, Pu Sang and Impressionism were all dead, too traditional and too boring, so they looked everywhere for old painters with opposing laws.

1900. At this time, Cezanne was over 60 years old and had already returned to his hometown to paint alone. There was an artist named Pierre bonnard who went to the south to find him and worked with Cezanne. Later, piere bonnard returned to Paris, and he and Cezanne corresponded frequently. All Cezanne's letters became the first complete document of contemporary art called Cezanne on Art, so we regard Cezanne as the father of modern art in history.

The Law of Opposites emphasizes to some extent that Cezanne is regarded as the father of contemporary art. He is different from tradition and consciously maintains the difference with revolutionaries of his peers, thus pushing art to a deeper level step by step.

Abstract of intransitive verbs

This lesson talks about the principle of opposition, which is actually from two dimensions. The first dimension emphasizes that the principle of opposition must be to find a kind of past art, especially traditional art, as the goal of confrontation.

The principle of opposition has become a common way of local art development, and to some extent, the extreme law is also a manifestation of the law of opposition or the principle of opposition. To put it to the extreme, it is to sum up and surpass the existing state of the past. Transcendence itself is at least a quantitative opposition to some extent, which can't be the same as the original, but just a little more or less than it. It's not the original state anyway.

When discussing the law of opposites, besides opposing the past, we should also pay attention to the horizontal contrast, which may be very important for the creators. I am different from the previous people. Can I be the same as the people next to me? No, this is unacceptable in artistic creation. If two people do the same thing, generally speaking, it will only choose the best one as the representative, and the others are ignored. Therefore, it is cruel in the middle of art, and it is particularly strict with the ability and result of creation. Therefore, we should consciously keep the differences with our peers or opponents.

This difference is particularly important for us now, because we are now facing a common problem: we are forced by technological revolutions such as artificial intelligence and bioengineering. As an ordinary person, a physical person, perhaps human computing ability, memory ability and action ability will gradually be replaced by a network state, a special mechanical computing efficiency that can contact everyone.

This problem is getting closer and closer to us. Will one day we never have a chance to be human again? A depressing metaphor is that each of us will degenerate into a stall of meat next to the machine, which is useless and just a pile of waste.

However, in fact, I think such a thing is impossible, or completely impossible. Many scholars are very alert to this change and have issued an appeal to everyone to take their time, but this appeal is very pale and fragile. Can you tell it to slow down? Because the development of this technology intersects with capital, the technology is developing rapidly and the competition is fierce, and it is impossible to stop because it is driven by national interests. Of course, this appeal is reasonable, and it gives us a situation of review and reflection.

However, it is not so terrible that machines will defeat people, because people are born with the law of opposites, and most people don't. That is to say, as long as an individual's life is different from person to person, his reaction, feeling and motivation to things are different, but this difference is very subtle and tiny. But technology can not only make calculations faster, but also amplify people's differences.

If this difference expands, then the difference between each of us and others, between each of us and all individuals and collectives in history, can become our independence and the guarantee of our personality freedom. In other words, a person's so-called freedom and independence is because he is a person, he is not a group of people who have been classified, nor is he a calculated formula and algorithm.

Therefore, it is possible for every individual to expand the opposition between self and others into a universal application and a universal way. If so, when any machine appears, our individual differences can keep a proper distance and necessary differences from it, so that human dignity can be maintained.

Therefore, when we talk about the law of opposites, we should increase our understanding that contemporary art does not want to make fun of this matter. In fact, it expresses and realizes some aspects of human nature in an extreme and distinctive way. In fact, these things, these laws and rules generally exist in human nature, only in the middle of art, and sometimes reflected in people's temperament. People feel it, but they may not be able to present it.