The Evolution Of Painting Techniques And Ideas Of Birds Paintings From Bird-and-flower Paintings Of Hua Yan And Ren Bonian

Emergence of any painting technique cannot separate from the influence of certain times and cultural thoughts. Due to different pursuits of painters,painting techniques present different styles of paintings. Painting is the soul voice and able to reveal painter’s aesthetics views on a single theme. Bird(called bird theme) is the important expression theme in bird and flower painting.Among painters who express birds by freehand brushwork in traditional Chinese painting, Hua Yan and Ren Bonian in Qing Dynasty become the outstanding painters. From many bird and flower paintings, the vivid bird image becomes the character of the painting and adds more appeals to their bird and flower paintings. Research on this theme can reflect their different artistic concept.Hua Yan and Ren Bonian both are professional painters taking painting as means of livelihood. They have more free innovative thoughts. They are respectively influenced by different thoughts in early Qing Dynasty and late Qing Dynasty, and form own art views in different succession of teachings to make the expression of birds have distinctive features.Through literature review, concept analysis and comparative analysis, this paper makes comparison on 30 classical birds image works with different categories and different shapes of the two painters, combines western composition theory with Chinese paintings’ traditional theory, interprets birds image of the two painters from views of point/line/plane and black/white/gray in plane composition, analyzes color drawing features of birds image from the angle of color composition and makes conclusion from aspects of dynamic features, ink expression form and image artistic conception creation. Hua Yan’s expression on birds is dominated by the aesthetics views of paintings of man-of-letters,presenting liberated and ease style. His brushwork is concise and elegant, ink is light. His color is mild and pure, simple not complicated. His birds images are dominated by soft contour lines and externalize implicit temperament of the man-of-letters. Shapes of his birds images are refined and changeable, forming ethereal artistic sense. While Ren Bonian absorbs western realistic painting’s art view and learns sketch and water color. In terms of birds expression, he pays more attention on the realness and vividness in vision, displaying the artistic sense different from the artistic conception of man-of-letters.His brushwork has flexible degree, which is magnificent and powerful. In terms of ink, his painting is dominated by moisture and distinctive five colors. In terms of color, his painting is fresh, elegant, rich and subtle. His birds image enhances strength and is dominated by straight contour lines, presenting open and grand temperament opposite to the temperament of man-of-letters. Feature is distinctive, structure is accurate and ink color is rich. He discards simple and liberated style of the paintings of man-of-letters to form artistic styles suitable for refined and popular tastes. Judging from this, variation of artistic concepts directly influences the expression of painting techniques. Therefore, research on painting techniques and views will enlighten modern bird and flower painters to expand broader space in birds creation, express unique artistic style and develop expression of birds in bird and flower painting.