Along the River During the Qingming Festival, one of China's top ten famous paintings handed down from generation to generation, is a genre painting of the Northern Song Dynasty. It is 24.8 cm wide and 528.7 cm long. It is inked on silk. This scroll is the only surviving fine work by the Northern Song Dynasty painter Zhang Zeduan. It is a national treasure-level cultural relic and is now in the Palace Museum in Beijing. The work is in the form of a long scroll and uses scattered perspective composition to vividly record the face of urban life in China in the twelfth century.

From "Along the River During Qingming Festival" we can see several very distinctive artistic features:

First, it is rich in content. In terms of expression technique, "Along the River During the Qingming Festival" uses the method of constantly moving the point of view, that is, the "scattered point perspective method" to capture the desired scene. The vast wilderness, the vast river, the towering city walls, the rivets on the boats, the small commodities on the vendors, and the words on the market posters are all harmoniously organized into a unified whole. In the painting, there are officials, farmers, merchants,

Doctors, divination, monks, Taoists, subordinate officials, women, children, pole masters, cable pullers and other people as well as donkeys, horses, cattle, camels and other livestock.

There are plots such as going to the market, buying and selling, hanging out, drinking, gathering, pushing boats, pulling carts, riding sedans, and riding horses. The streets and alleys in the painting are lined with shops, hotels, teahouses, snack shops, etc., as well as towers, river ports, bridges, cargo ships, government residences and thatched cottages. There are 1,695 people, more than 60 various livestock, more than 20 wooden boats, more than 30 houses and pavilions, and more than 20 carts and sedan chairs in "Along the River During the Qingming Festival". Such rich and colorful content is rarely seen in ancient paintings of all ages. Various characters engage in various activities, not only with different clothes, but also with different expressions and temperaments, and various activities are interspersed with them. They are full of dramatic plot conflicts, leaving viewers with endless aftertaste.

Second,

The structure is rigorous, complex but not chaotic, long but not redundant, and the paragraphs are clear. What is valuable is that such rich and colorful content has a prominent main body, echoes from beginning to end, and the whole volume is integrated. Every character, scene, and detail in the painting is arranged in a reasonable manner, and the relationship between density, complexity, simplicity, movement, and gathering and dispersion is handled just right, so that it is complex but not complicated, and numerous but not chaotic. It fully demonstrates the painter's profound insight into social life and his high ability to organize and control pictures.

Thirdly, in terms of technique, he combines large-scale and fine-grained techniques, and is good at selecting things, scenes and scenes that are not only vivid and poetic, but also have essential characteristics. The plot is expressed. Very meticulous observation of life, describing every character and prop. Everyone has their own identity, their own demeanor, and their own plot. The structures of houses, bridges and other buildings are rigorous and meticulously painted. The carriages, horses, and boats are all present, but they are kept small without losing their overall appearance and their power. For example, the objects on the ship, the riveting methods, and even the knotting and fastening of ropes are all explained clearly, which is breathtaking.

Zhang Zeduan, courtesy name Zhengdao, was born in Dongwu (now Zhucheng, Shandong). In his early years, he traveled to Bianjing to study, and later he studied painting. During the period of Song Huizong Zhao Ji (reigned 1101-1125), he worked at the Hanlin Painting Academy. He specializes in the techniques of using a boundary pen and a ruler to draw lines in Chinese paintings, which are used to express palaces, terraces, houses and other themes. He is especially good at painting boats, carriages, shops, bridges, streets and city walls. His paintings are unique and unique. Most of Zhang Zeduan's paintings have been lost, and only the "Along the River During the Qingming Festival" volume has been preserved intact.

During the Northern Song Dynasty, Bianjing was at its peak, with four rivers running through the city and four land routes. It was the national water and land transportation center, and its commercial development ranked first in the country. At that time, the population reached more than 1 million. . There are many lively markets in Bianjing City, with various shops and even night markets. During the New Year and festivals, the capital is even more lively. "Along the River During Qingming Festival" focuses on depicting the land and water transportation and busy market scenes of the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty.

Before the Northern Song Dynasty, Chinese figure paintings mainly focused on religion and aristocratic life. Although Zhang Zeduan worked in the Hanlin Academy of Painting and the works he created were called "academy paintings" or "academy paintings", he extended his painting brush to the lives of people from all walks of life and created paintings depicting urban and rural life. Social genre painting.

"Along the River During the Qingming Festival" depicts a large number of various characters.

"Along the River During the Qingming Festival" is not only a great realist painting art treasure, but also provides us with rich image information on the commerce, handicrafts, folk customs, architecture, transportation and other aspects of the metropolis of the Northern Song Dynasty. Therefore, it also has historical documents. value. Precisely because "Along the River During the Qingming Festival" has such great artistic charm in its detailed depiction, future generations of busybodies will take the trouble to repeatedly create countless imitations and forgeries in order to gain profits.

"Along the River During the Qingming Festival" is one of the most famous works in the history of Chinese painting. It is not only of high artistic level, but also has many interesting stories surrounding it. There are many paintings named "Along the River During Qingming Festival" in the history of painting, but after all, there is only one authentic copy. After many scholars and experts have researched this topic, everyone basically agrees that the painting now in the Palace Museum in Beijing is the original work of Zhang Zeduan of the Northern Song Dynasty. Other paintings with the same name are all later copies or fabrications made by Zhang Zeduan.