The Painful Choice

As for the Chinese painting, no phase of history is more challenging compared to 20th century, when Lin Fengmian was surpassing and outstanding as a peak. He stood for the typical mental phenomenon at the time of transformation of the modern Chinese painting and left many puzzles in the whole life, among which the great change in his art creation is after the 1930s.His transformation has been refered to by many critics such as Wang Chaowen, Tao Yongbai, Nie Weiguo etc and also been shown in the articles of Shui Tianzhong, Lang Shaojun, Zheng Chao, Wu Guanzhong and so on. But so far, no one can give a thorough understanding and comment on his style.The innovation of this article lies in the way to combine the inside and outside factors to search the reasons of his artistic transformation even the deeper things by means of sociology and artistic phychology. Besides, on the basis of the current comment of some critics, I propose my individual idea that his style shows the transformation from the rational social consciousness to individualized mental rebel. This kind of form under the background of"local culture"presents the Utopia mood characterized self-helpness.The paper can be divided into three chapters:The first chapter gives us the reason of his artistic transformation. With the rich worrying mentality, Lin Fengmian is a freedom artist who unifies the individual value with the social value. But in the end of 1930s, the theme of"survival"became the main stream while art became the part of aggression. Given up the"pure art", it means that his value has no rely any more. The fact that art and national survival, individual value and social value cannot be harmonious made his heart suffer a lot. The Chinese characterized traditional value promoted his mind to change inside. His perfect freedom value on the basis of individualism is opposite to the racial and class value. This kind of inside character made him indulge in loneliness and lack the ability and encourage to struggle with the actuality when facing difficulties. The braveness in the art, in the other hand, released his depress. He advanced himself in the art and came true his dream in the art, as well.The second chapter presents the artistic transformation of his art. After 1930s, he lived by himself for a long time. Art comes from the life and also the human emotional experience. The pureness, narrowness and silence of his space make his artistic stand from the macro perspective to the micro perspective, from the society to the nature. The artistic theme also changes from the social release to the individual mood. In order to express the emotions, Lin Fengmian is involved in the practicing the form language. After the lonely and long research, he varies the Chinese and western language from the opposition to meltation.The third chapter shows my attitude towards his artistic transformation. Someone think that his transformation is in accordance with the mind of the ancient artists and still suffers the limitation of the mind in rujia and also the time. I believe that his escape from the society is not the positive living means but different from the ancient way to lead people from the reality. There are three reasons: firstly, it is with the character of subjective consciousness."the choice is to gain the life safety and soul calmness. The premise is not to cowardly yielding but to refuse the challenge of the outside force on the individual dignity, which means the stubborn of the mentality and refusal of the outside force". His style shows the transformation from the rational social consciousness to individualized mental rebel. This kind of form under the background of"local culture"presents the Utopia mood characterized self-helpness. Secondly, he doesn't regard the painting as the only means of living and the tool of political disappointment but reform the painting language to make paint free from politics, literature and calligraphy. He is in search of the real independence of the paint itself. The return of the art itself shows his effort to seek the artistic independence and individual mentality. Thirdly, he is the pioneer of the modernized transformation. To begin with, he shakes the two base of the traditional Chinese painting—"pen"and"ink": leading the color into ink, to degrade the ink's position to be leveled with the color and change the traditional value of color;Abandon the calligraphy and cut the relation between paint and calligraphy. Secondly, he creates"square frame"—showing the form sequence and management of position in the space. It faints the invading of the time factor into the picture and at the same time, avoids the limitation of the realistic space of the focus peer. This kind of new special sense completely changes the traditional visual experience and creates the new esthetic frame.