[Abstract] "Han Xizai's Night Banquet" is Gu Hongzhong's only handed down work, which shows the indulgent nightlife of Nanzhao minister Han Xizai. In the form of a long scroll, it is divided into five scenes: listening to music, watching dance, resting, blowing, and seeing off guests. The characters in the painting are vivid and expressive, and the different postures and appearances as well as the expressions of the hands are all successfully handled. In particular, Han Xizai's image is full of portraiture characteristics, and his clothes also reflect his indulgence. The opening night banquet is about listening to the playing of the pipa. All the characters at the table are immersed in the music, and their expressions reflect each other and highlight the theme. Various scenes are divided and connected into one by using screens, etc. The brushwork is delicate and vigorous, and the bright colors are coordinated with the calm colors of the bed table and men's clothes. Get very good results. The painting "Han" depicts the psychological contradictions and decadent life of frustrated bureaucrats. It has profound social significance.

[Keywords] comic strips; disconnected scenes; gorgeous and elegant; drama; beauty in beauty; joy in suffering

1. Appreciation

"Han Xizai" "Night Banquet Picture" is based on the life anecdotes of Han Xizai, the minister of Zhongshu in the Southern Tang Dynasty. The author Gu Hongzhong was a native of Jiangnan. Li Jing, the Zhongzong of the Southern Tang Dynasty in the Five Dynasties, was an imperial edict in the painting academy at that time and was good at painting figures. The works recorded in the history of painting include "The Ming Emperor Playing Chess", "Portrait of Zen Master Fayan", "Wenhui Picture", "The Jade Concubine Traveling to Immortals", "The Ming Emperor Attacking the Indus", "Han Xizai's Night Banquet" and more than 70 works. pieces.

"Han Xizai's Night Banquet" was highly regarded by people at the time. This painting was created by Gu Hongzhong, who was assigned by his later master Li Yu. He went to Han Xizai's residence at night with the painters Zhou Wenju and Gao Taichong to get a glimpse of the scene of his night banquet. Painted from the heart, there are two original paintings. Unfortunately, the one painted by Zhou Wenju has been lost.

Han Xizai, according to the "Nanzhao", was born in 602 AD and died in 670 AD. His courtesy name was Shuyan. He was a native of Beihai, Weizhou (now Weifang, Shandong). He was born into a wealthy family in the north. Zhu Wenshi became a Jinshi Third, he was proficient in poetry, calligraphy, painting, and music. He was a politician with lofty ambitions. Due to the war, he entered the Southern Tang Dynasty from the north. During the reign of the emperor Li Jing, he was highly used and was promoted to the minister of Zhongshu. After Li Yu succeeded to the throne, the power of the Southern Tang Dynasty was sluggish, while the Song Dynasty in the north rose rapidly. Li Yu did not think about saving the country and becoming strong. He indulged in wine and sex all day long, talked about Buddhism, wrote poems and painted paintings. On the one hand, he used his wealth to please the Song Dynasty in exchange for a moment of peace. On the other hand, he rejected dissidents. He was "very suspicious of northerners and often killed them." , under such circumstances, he felt disappointed and depressed, and lost the last trace of confidence in the Southern Tang Dynasty. When the rule of the Southern Tang Dynasty was declining, Li Yu asked him to be the prime minister, but he "knew that the current situation was changing day by day, and was ashamed to be the prime minister." ”, so he kept his voice and appearance obscure and had no intention of becoming an official. Therefore, he adopts the attitude of letting go of his madness, pretending to be crazy and acting stupid, and entertaining himself with sound and lust to "avoid the order of the country to become the prime minister." He also said: "The Central Plains is always eyeing this. Once God appears, Jiangnan will be abandoned. I can't laugh at it for the ages." Therefore, he played tricks at home, held night banquets, drank with guests and friends, and behaved indulgently. Li Yu heard about his debauchery and wanted to know the situation, "He ordered Hong Zhong to go to his house at night to peep at him, to see and remember, and to draw pictures. Above, I wanted to use pictures to persuade him, but Xizai regarded him as safe."

This picture shows five interrelated but relatively independent plots in the form of a comic strip, showing the night banquet. The activities include listening to music, watching dance, resting, playing the wind, and making fun and farewell.

The first section is "Listening to Music". At this time, the night banquet has just started, the red candles are burning, the wine and food are listed on several tables, and the fresh fruits are mixed. Seven men and five women are sitting or standing, listening to Li Jiaming, the director of the Jiaofang The younger sister "Plays the Pipa", the protagonist Han Xizai wears a straight coat and hat, sitting on the bed with red lotus legs, his hands hanging down naturally, staring at the player. Next to him, Lang Can, the champion, was dressed in red clothes, leaning forward with his right hand on the bed, and holding his knees with his left hand to keep his body balanced. Some of the other guests lowered their hands, some held their hands, some tilted their ears, some looked back, and looked at them many times. The light jade fingers gathered on the pipa strings seem to be immersed in the beautiful music. A woman behind the screen also squeezed in to admire it. She held the screen with one hand and smiled knowingly. A red-painted castration drum appeared next to it, guiding the viewer to the next section.

The second paragraph is "Watching the Dance". Han Xizai's favored prostitute Wang Wushan has a slim figure and wears a long blue dress with narrow sleeves. With her back to the screen, her face turned sideways, she dances the Six Yao Dance to the sound of drums. Although only the back is exposed, the posture is extremely vivid. Han Xizai wore a magenta robe, rolled up his sleeves and held a mallet. He played the red lacquer castration drum with great interest and looked calm.

Han's protégé Shu Ya pressed the clapper and beat the time. Han's close friend Monk Deming did not dare to look at the dancers. He held his hands and stretched out his fingers as if to salute, as if he was embarrassed because he was at the night banquet. Lang Can Sit back and watch, the people around you are either watching the dance attentively or tapping with their hands. The rhythm of their tapping, the shape of their chants and the beats of the drums are all consistent with the dance movements.

The third paragraph is "rest". Midnight is approaching, the red candles are half-burned, the guests have dispersed, and the noise has stopped. Han Xizai and four female prostitutes sit around on the couch in the inner room to rest. A maid holds a basin in her hand to serve the waiter. Han Xizai washes his hands and talks to several female prostitutes. His expression is depressed and sleepy. From his expression and the slow movements of washing his hands, it is not difficult to see the protagonist's true inner world. There are two other maids preparing musical instruments, adding tea and wine, and preparing for a new round of feasting.

The fourth paragraph is "Qing Blow". Han Xi was sitting cross-legged on a chair leisurely in a white coat, with his chest exposed and his belly slightly waving his silk fan. He was accompanied by three women, and five prostitutes sat in a row with elegant expressions and played flutes. Their movements were different. The arrangement is orderly, and there are changes in the unity. The author especially carefully depicts their fingers holding the flute. During this period, only Shuya was still pressing the board to join in the fun. Another male guest stood by the screen, looking back to chat with the woman outside the screen, watching the audience. The viewer's gaze leads to the next picture.

The fifth paragraph is "laughing". As time passed, the guests still had more to say. Some were teasing and flirting with the prostitute, and some were hugging the prostitute and whispering. Han Xi, wearing a yellow shirt and holding a drumstick, stood at attention, implying that the party was about to resume and the night was not yet young.

2. Artistic processing

Although the entire scroll of "Han Xizai's Night Banquet" is divided into five sections, the scenes are disconnected and the author handles them skillfully and naturally. It is a kind of comic strip form that focuses on the occurrence and development of an event. The process is also seen in early paintings, such as Gu Kaizhi's "Picture of Admonitions of Women's History", which also shows the activities of the characters in one long scroll, but each is independent, slightly stiff, incoherent, and lacks an overall unified effect, while "Picture of Han Xizai's Night Banquet" is in This aspect is handled very well. The layout of the whole volume has ups and downs, and is patchwork and unified. The image of the protagonist appears repeatedly in the painting, but it does not make people feel repetitive and monotonous. This is the author's ingenuity and an important art of the work. feature. Each paragraph of the author is separated by screens, common decorative furniture in ancient interiors, and connected by screens, so that the front and back are continuous and independent of each other. The picture unfolds in a time sequence, using the characteristics of comic strips to greatly facilitate the arrangement of the characters' story paintings. , this processing method in which space and time are closely aligned and unfolded at the same time, really looks like a modern movie.

The whole picture depicts many characters, but the author deliberately expresses only the protagonist Han Xizai. In the five paragraphs, Han's clothes and actions are different, but his appearance and personality are unified. The historical records are consistent and have the nature of a portrait. It truly records that he was in the lively banquet of singing and dancing, but he was always in a dull, melancholy, detached and joyful atmosphere, happy but not obscene, gorgeous but not vulgar. From his face, we can see the worries and depression in his heart. He is an image of a politician with little talent. However, with his long beard, burly body, strong and steady demeanor, he has the demeanor of a distinguished gentleman. . The other characters are all in official uniforms and look majestic, but he is the only one who wears casual clothes and his own original tall gauze hat. He has a burly body, majestic air, long face, beautiful beard, plump cheeks and round nose. Although he is in a joyous place, he is depressed, depressed and sluggish. He still maintains a solemn expression without any frivolous behavior, which truly reflects a man who is full of knowledge and ambitious. He has to be "willful, self-willed, sensual, and unconcerned." Although other characters also show their spiritual temperament, he is not as prominent as the main character. The author not only describes the surface indulgence and joy, but also goes deep into the character's heart. world. It depicts the protagonist's empty and boring inner world. In order to highlight the theme, the author also painted the main characters larger, the guests slightly smaller, and the singing girls and ladies smaller, which is a legacy of Tang Dynasty painting.

Gu Hongzhong is highly skilled in all-round modeling, brushwork, and coloring. The author uses wire to draw hook lines, and the lines are neat and fine, with different changes in thickness, weight, speed, etc. , smooth and composed.

The colors are gorgeous and elegant, with layers of deepening, but also with light colors, which change naturally. The bright light colors and the strong black, white, and red are interspersed with each other, creating a sharp contrast. The characters' faces, hands, and clothes pleats are all hook-dyed. The combination reveals the structure's concave and convex while explaining the structure. The ink lines that have been covered by color are outlined with colored pens, which increases the sense of distinctness and unity. What is particularly valuable is that Gu Hongzhong is not limited to the depiction of human figures, but also outlines them with colored pens. Pay attention to the portrayal of the character's inner world. Gu Hongzhong was also a master at describing details. Clothes, beds, chairs, tables, screens, bottles, lamps, curtains, musical instruments, etc., were all described with detail and lifelikeness. They all showed the identity and status of the characters and became an indispensable part of the composition. The missing factors also provide historians with good image data for research.

In some artistic treatments, the author is also ingenious. The picture adopts a traditional composition method, breaking the concept of time, organizing activities carried out at different times in the same picture, making the overall organization coherent and smooth, and the plot of the picture It is complex, with many characters, but the guests and hosts are arranged in an orderly manner, with a balance between complexity and simplicity. Between the scenes, the painter skillfully uses screens, tables, orchestral music, beds and other utensils to make them both interconnected and mutually exclusive. The sense of separation is both independent and integrated into the painting. Secondly, the author repeatedly used a few simple screens and necessary props in the picture of "Han Xizai's Night Banquet". The author did not describe the lights and scenes like Western paintings, but it fully gave readers the feeling of an indoor night banquet. The so-called "artistic conception" of Chinese painting. This is like old Chinese dramas, which do not use scenery and only use gestures, eyes and other actions to make the audience feel the surrounding scenery vividly. Let's take a look at the "Qing Chui" section where the prostitutes are depicted with heavy lines and heavy colors. Look at the background of the characters to see if they look like an opera stage. There are no real scenes but rely more on imagination.

"Han Xizai's Night Banquet" shows the artist's profound skills and superb skills in terms of composition, shape, brushwork, coloring, etc. It vividly describes Han Xizai's cynical attitude towards life and melancholy. The unhappy mood. Objectively, it played the role of exposing the extravagance and decadence of the feudal aristocratic class and intensifying conflicts within the rulers. It is a masterpiece of figure painting that is not only highly artistic, but also has profound ideological and practical significance.

3. Supplementary words

"Han Xizai's Night Banquet" is historically recorded as being painted by Gu Hongzhong, but it is doubtful whether the surviving painting is the original work by Gu Hongzhong. I think what exists is not Gu Zhi’s original work, but a copy by later generations. Furthermore, when later generations copied, they added a lot of their own things to make this masterpiece more perfect, but I don’t want it to be too perfect and have confusing features. Locality, this is mainly reflected in the following two aspects, which are proposed today for the purpose of discussion with everyone:

Customs and habits. This is mainly reflected in the clothing and hairstyles. The Tang Dynasty was the heyday of the comprehensive development of ancient Chinese painting. Figure paintings, especially paintings of ladies, have been handed down many times, such as Zhang Xuan's "Picture of Tamping Lian", "Picture of Mrs. Guo Guo's Spring Outing", Zhou Fang's "Picture of Lady Waving Fan", "Picture of Lady with Hairpin Flowers", especially "Picture of Lady with Hairpin Flowers" ", "Old Ancient History" records the high bun of the palace ladies of the Southern Tang Dynasty. Some people conclude that it is the work of the late Tang Dynasty or the Five Dynasties, because "Sauve Acacia" written by the queen of the Southern Tang Dynasty is a poem with a strong sense of painting. The first half of the poem depicts a woman in great detail: "One cloud, one jade shuttle, a light and thin shirt, and two light snails." Look, this beautiful woman has cloud-like hair and a jade hairpin in her hair. , wearing a light silk shirt, the depiction is mostly like the characters in "Ladies with Hairpins". If this conclusion is true, it has impacted Zhou Fang and Gu Hongzhong to a certain extent; if the ladies depicted in "Ladies with Hairpin Flowers" are ladies from the Southern Tang Dynasty, then the ladies in the existing "Han" are not ladies from the Southern Tang Dynasty. . Because the ladies painted in "Han" are very different from the ladies seen in paintings of the Tang Dynasty; although the Southern Tang Dynasty was the end of the Tang Dynasty, it was still the Li family, and the customs and habits could not have changed so much.

In terms of background landscape painting, we all know that landscape painting became mature in the Northern Song Dynasty. In addition to inheriting Dong Ju and others, there were also schools such as Li Guo and Fan Kuan, but they all had one ** The most common feature is that they all used a panoramic composition method. Until the Jin Dynasty invaded the south and captured the two emperors Weizong and Qinzong, and controlled half of the country, the painting academy remained the same, but the style of painting suddenly changed. Liu, Li, and Ma Xia appeared, especially Ma Xia. Inspired by this, he created Ma Yijiao and Xia Banbian's landscapes, but the shadow of Xia Gui's landscapes has already appeared in "Han Xizai's Night Banquet". Both in terms of brushwork and composition, they are very similar to Xia Gui's landscapes.

I checked the information and found that one of the paintings is directly a scene from Xia Gui's "Twelve Scenes of Landscapes". From this point of view, it can be said that the existing "Han" was at least copied by people in the Southern Song Dynasty. It can only be said that "Han" We have never seen the original pink copy created by Gu. We have never seen what it looks like and how far it can be portrayed. We can only study it from the existing "Han". However, if this copy can completely elevate his art Self-restraint, I think is too abrupt. I have seen several different copies of "Han" and found that there are many differences and each has its own flavor. Just like "Lanting Preface", the Shenlong version and the Dingwu version feel different. Many ancient literati and painters have When copying ancient paintings, they often add a lot of their own things, and few can be faithful to the original paintings. They often recreate them, or seek the best of the best, such as Tang Yinlin's "Han Xizai's Night Banquet".

There is no author's seal in the whole volume, but the postscript at the end of the volume indicates that it is the work of Gu. In addition, there is a seal of "Shaoxing", which shows that it was collected by the Imperial Household in the Song Dynasty. About Gu Hongzhong's life and deeds His records are very lacking in historical materials, and are only mentioned sparingly in "Xuanhe Painting Book Volume 7". Some of his works have been lost, which creates great trouble for studying him. It is difficult to make a fair evaluation of "Han" alone, and further research is needed to determine whether the existing work is its original work.

One of the more special aspects of "Han" is that the painter plays the role of a spy. Throughout the character creations of the Five Dynasties period, themes that directly depict the lives of nobles accounted for a large proportion. Especially the painters of the court painting academy needed to portray the royal family and nobles vividly and express their luxurious and enjoyable life or the lifestyle of noble ladies. Western Shu Ruan Zhijie, his son Ruan Weide, Zhang Mei, Gao Taichong and Zhou Wenju of the Southern Tang Painting Academy are all famous for painting portraits of aristocratic figures, but the aristocratic life they depict is similar to Zhou Wenju's "Spring Dawn in the Tang Palace" and "Han". In comparison, "Han" seems slightly inferior. "Han" depicts the psychological contradiction of frustrated bureaucrats - that is, in order to protect his body, Han Xizai will not hesitate to ruin his reputation with a decadent life. If he can really be happy and take one day at a time like in the painting, then It is also worth it. After watching it, the viewer will realize that everything is empty and only joy in suffering. Compared with others, it is more thought-provoking and emotional.