Chinese Calligraphy 書法

Chinese Calligraphy 書法

Hand writing, Folk culture, Art

Chinese Calligraphy is a traditional form of writing characters from the Chinese language through the use of ink and a brush. It is a tradition that is rooted in China through centuries of practice. It is an art of turning Chinese characters into images through pressure and speed variations of the pointed Chinese brush.

Cheng Miao

Han Dynasty (206 BC - 220 AD).

Flat

Craft

All educated men and some court women were expected to be proficient at it, an expectation which remained well into modern times. Far more than mere writing, good calligraphy exhibited an exquisite brush control and attention to composition, but the actual manner of writing was also important with rapid, spontaneous strokes being the ideal.

Ink

Calligraphy initially began due to the need to record ideas and information. The unique forms of calligraphy developed and originated from China, particularly for writing Chinese characters by using ink and a brush. Furthermore, Chinese calligraphy is responsible for the development of numerous forms of art such as ornate paperweights, ink stones, and seal carving.

Just like in any other art, the most gifted practitioners of calligraphy became famous for their work and their scripts were copied and used in such innovations as printed books. The most revered of all Chinese calligraphers, as mentioned already, was Wang Xizhi (c. 303 - c. 365 CE), although he was a student of Lady Wei (272-349 CE). No examples of either figure’s writing survive, except possibly in extant copies of Xizhi’s. Wang Xizhi’s son, Wang Xianzhi (344-388 CE), was another famous practitioner, the pair often referred to as ‘the two Wangs’. Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322 CE) was another celebrated calligrapher who produced such precise characters placed neatly into square boxes on his paper that printers used his script for their own type blocks.