Taihu Stone And Chinese Cultural Spirit

Stone has always captured the great fondness of Chinese literati through the ages and there lie within Taihu stone their unique aesthetic knowledge and ability under their philosophy.Therefore,the Chinese cultural spirit is intertwined with Taihu stone culture and the fondness for Taihu stone in Chinese cultural context contains Chinese people's philosophies of the universe and life.The shape of Taihu stone resembles “Tao”,which lifts the literati to the ideological level that man is an integral part of nature-their sense of beauty emerges and they are raised to a higher level spiritually.Taihu stone can refine and refresh the spirit of the literati,allowing them to not only appreciate the beauty of the landscape,but also get limitless spiritual experience through their limited bodies,thus achieve spiritual freedom.And with the interest and charm in appreciating stone changing throughout the dynasties,different aesthetic orientations have provided the art of Chinese painting with endless inspiration and material.Through an organized presentation of historical documents and works and a textual research on documents,actual material objects,and paintings,this paper analyzes the relationship between Taihu stone and Chinese philosophical concepts and studies how Taihu stone resonates philosophically with the thinking of Chinese literati from the perspective of philosophy,painting,spirit and thinking combined.The paper then does a textual research on the humanistic spirit contained in the different forms of portrayal of Taihu stone in Chinese paintings.Meanwhile,it studies how Taihu stone affects and connects with Chinese cultural spirit and the spiritual and cultural connotations displayed by Taihu stone in Chinese art creations through a detailed analysis of Chinese paintings and combining my artistic practice of drawing creative inspiration from Taihu stone.