Contemporary Chinese Calligraphy Trends: From Modern Calligraphy to Calligraphyism — Calligraphy Trends in China at the End of the 20th Century

Author: Shen Wei
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2001-01-01
Features: The topic of this book sets forth the following argument: In the context of calligraphy, a specific manifestation of traditional culture with local characteristics, how has contemporary culture or contemporaneity gradually permeated it, enabling it to acquire the meaning and characteristics of contemporary art? Trends reflect independent judgment of thought and its existence, embodying dynamic reflections on cultural meaning and value. They make choices within the horizontal and vertical relationships of history, ultimately converging into the exploration and experimentation of artistic forms and discourse, thereby filling the vitality of interaction between art and reality. Here, we must first distinguish: How much of the artistic element remains in the contemporary cultural phenomenon of calligraphy? Perhaps we have reason to believe that traditional calligraphy art, in fact, like what Hegel's historical determinism once predicted, is an art on the verge of death. Moreover, in a certain sense, what we call art today—this thing that still shows vitality—is already another kind of art: it is assigned other purposes and endowed with different meanings. Without a doubt, this calligraphy as another kind of art—the changes in the artistic approach to Chinese character culture and its contemporary writing in the contemporary environment—will be the object and scope of analysis and discussion in this book.