Anti-Japanese War,Propaganda,and Fine Art——The Study Of Xu Beihong’ Painting "Yu Gong Yi Shan"

After the outbreak of Anti-Japanese War, the national government decided to fight with Japanese in all aspects. Cultural war became an important part of the whole war. "Culture Construction Principle Outlines" which was proposed by Chen Guofu in March 1938 was the main document about cultural war, declaring that during Anti-Japanese War, the culture construction should be based on the nation theory to resist the enemies and to encourage people to fight. Also, the government adopted big stick and gold dollar policy in culture construction. The government conducted everything."Culture Construction Principles Outlines" encouraged creative cultural works which used the tales of the sages and heroes in history as themes, because these works could be a measure to resist Japanese aggression. Fine art, an important art form, had also been included in the system of cultural war. During the war, the best work of fine art war theory was Zhu Yingpeng’book "War and Art". This book was full of patriotism, in accordance with the government’s policy of cultural war. Some specific steps about fine art war people took later were exactly what were told in "War and Art". On the other hand, the core idea of this book was that the national government tried to unify people’s thinking with the Three People’s Principles (Nationalism, Democracy, the People’s Livelihood)and to consolidate one-party authoritarian politics. In practice, the Third Office of Political Department of Military Commission of National Government was the first to take action in fine art war. Xu Beihong was closely related to the Third Office. By the push from the Third Office, China National Fine Arts Anti-Japanese Association was founded, where Xu Beihong served as executive director. The founding of the association was closely monitored by The Social Department of KMT Central Executive Committee. The association focused more on the needs of political and military propaganda, so it could not discuss purely artistic topics. What the association did was using fine art works as a kind of propaganda weapon in cultural war, like organizing art exhibitions where paintings could be sold to raise money for military. China National Fine Arts Anti-Japanese Association paid attention mainly on the speed of the creation and the easy understanding of folks than the academic discussion and research. By government’s propaganda, everyone believed that nation should come first, which was the guiding ideology in the circle of thinking, literature and art. Among various propaganda paintings, historical paintings became a powerful propaganda tool. According to ancient fine art records and the spread of western historical paintings in China, historical paintings were quite welcome in Chinese folk. The story that the historical painting told showed the painter’s ideological tendency in a particular historical moment, containing rich social and political metaphors, which would have a strong national cultural propaganda effect. In many traditional Chinese stories, the story of Yu Gong Yi Shan is so famous that nearly everyone knows it. People in all dynasties took records of this story. From reading those records, we can find that this story was not only widespread, but also won good evaluation. Although somebody thought Yu Gong was stupid and clumsy, but more people praised him positively:praising his perseverance, his powerful spirit which moved the gods, or praising his big family in which his children and grandchildren were the most important guarantee of success. In modern times, the story of Yu Gong Yi Shan was still popular, very common in the media. During Anti-Japanese War, the story of Yu Gong Yi Shan was combined with the spirit of fighting. There was an article demonstrating this kind of combination. It was written by Zhang Junti, published in 1939, with the title of "The story of Yu Gong Yi Shan (what is National United Front)".In this article, Yu Gong Yi Shan was given a special meaning in politics, closely integrated with the background of Anti-Japanese War. Each figure in the story had some relation with Chinese government, Chinese friends or enemies in reality. By this way, the author inspired Chinese people to continue fighting, to gain international assistance to win. Xu Beihong had been supportive of the national government’ fighting. He sold his paintings many times to raise money which was donated to the government. In 1940, when Xu Beihong was in India, he completed the painting "Yu Gong Yi Shan" to promote the propaganda in China. In artistic aspect, this painting was the embodiment of the new painting theory created by Xu Beihong. Xu Beihong was influenced by Kang Youwei, having a negative attitude towards traditional Chinese painting. After finishing the study aboard, Xu Beihong established his own painting theory which using western art works as the measure of value. The "New Seven Laws" was his most important theory to improve Chinese painting. This theory ignored the basic status of "Qi Yun", ruining traditional Chinese fine art. Before the creation of "Yu Gong Yi Shan", Xu Beihong had drawn "Sages Women " "Giu Fang Gao", "Tian Heng’s Five Hundred Warriors" and other historical paintings, having formed his own style. However, in "Yu Gong Yi Shan", the figures’ costumes and hairstyles lacked basic knowledge of archeology. The figures were similar to those in the previous works, without any innovation. The whole painting was lack of an artistic charm to move people’s hearts. The painting just gave a visual impact by the huge size and body images."Yu Gong Yi Shan "was in accordance with the government’s propaganda policy, but not influential in the country. Among all the national newspapers, only The Shen Pao Weekly reported it with a small part of the coverage. Although "Yu Gong Yi Shan" did not have a significant achievement in art, it was a model work meeting the political demands from upper class for cultural war. This is the purpose and significance of "Yu Gong Yi Shan", also the purpose and significance of this kind of propaganda paintings created in a special time.