A Disciple of Mr. Wu Fuzhi
——Zhang Yuejian

In the autumn of 1947, I was admitted to the Department of Traditional Chinese Painting in National College of Art to study flower-and-bird painting. Under the instruction of great teachers like Huang Binhong, Pan Tianshou, Wu Fuzhi, Zhu Lesan, I made increasing progress for my painting skills, which laid a good foundation for my art career in the future.

Wu Fuzhi was an artist and art educator who took it as his own duty to advocate and innovate Chinese painting. Learning from various masters like Qing Teng, Shi Tao, Wu Changhuo and Li Shan, he created a style of his own for flower-and-bird paintings by integrating their painting styles with his innovative conception. In the early 1930s, he had been renowned on in Shanghai art circle when he was the professor in Shanghai College of Fine Arts. When I was at the elementary school, I often looked through Bai She Album (a & b) of my family collection, in which there were many Mr. Wu’s flower-and-bird paintings. I was not yet ten years old then, and was very fond of calligraphy and painting. My father, an art teacher at the elementary school, told me, “Zhu Wenyun, Pan Tianshou, Wu Fuzhi, Zhang Shuqi and Zhang Zhenduo were several painters in Bai She Album, and the last three were all from Pujiang.” My father’s words encouraged to study harder on calligraphy and painting. At that time, I took two sets of Wu Fuzhi Anthology as the model for painting. I often reviewed his paintings, and tried to fathom and then had enlightenment on them. After that, I would work out the composition of the painting based on my own imagination from the simple one to the complicated one. Gradually, my painting skills, modeling and art of composition were naturally affected by Wu Fuzhi’s painting style. A painting named Crested Myna in Wu Fuzhi Anthology left me deep impression, and also exerted significant influence on my painting style. It was a five-feet long painting, split in vertical axis. In the upper part of the painting, there was a flying crested myna, which was vivid and animated with smooth and easy lines and ink; in the lower part, there was a solid rock, interspersed with some wild grass; a poem was inscribed from the top right corner, saying “Bird that can understand and imitate human language end up in cages and captivity. They may as well retreat to deep mountains and sing freely in morning breeze.” This painting inspired me to take sketches on nature. In my hometown Pujiang, where crested mynas clustered, I often observed their postures when they were flying and twittering, nestling and eating. Then I started to make conception of paintings after reviewing Mr. Fuzhi’s techniques on painting crested mynas. Thus, the pictures were painted from memory or from a copy. After that, I got more inspiration to take close observation on chickens, ducks, and sparrow, and practiced composing on Chinese art paper. When I came across some difficulties and unsatisfactory, I would study and use Wu Fuzhi Anthology and other anthologies for reference. The anthologies at that time were mostly black and white, and few in colors. I had completed the transition from copy to sketch, from monochrome to ink and color painting. It was Wu Fuzhi who enlightened me on painting. Since then, I was determined to be an artist.

Graduating from Hangzhou Shufan High School (Senior High School) in 1946, I was soon employed as a teacher at Puyang Center Elementary School in Puyang County. In the spring of 1947, when Mr. Fuzhi came to Pujiang to visit his family from Hangzhou, he came to the school with his daughter to see his nephew Wu Shiji, and had a long conversation. Under Shiji’s recommendation, Mr. Fuzhi walked into my living room next door. After viewing my flower-and-bird paintings pasting on the wall, which depicted about eagle, crested myna in maple wood, ducks gaming in the pond and red lotus and jade green feather, etc., Mr. Fuzhi nodded and said, “You’re courageous to paint with the boldness of vision. You have mastered the basic painting techniques of flower-and-bird paintings, but you are not confined with conventional patterns by applying unusual art of composition. Hope you can keep trying!” That was the first time I met the famous painter Wu Fuzhi, so I was so excited that I didn’t know what to do and what to say. Before leaving, Wu Fuzhi told me, “National College of Art will recruit students this summer, and you can come to Hangzhou to register for examination.” Mr. Fuzhi’s instruction this time greatly stimulated me to study hard and endeavor to take further study in National College of Art.

In the autumn of 1947, I started my study at Hangzhou National College of Art. There were only majors in the Department of Chinese Painting, including flower-and-bird and landscape painting. Figure painting was not open due to the shortage of qualified teachers. During the first year, all students in flower-and-bird and landscape painting had classes on professional knowledge and theories at the same classroom. At that time, Mr. Fuzhi was the dean of Department of Chinese Painting, and Mr. Pan Tianshou was the president. They gave lessons to the freshmen to lay a profound impression on students so that they could build up traditional artistic view. In the first year, Mr. Fuzhi gave lessons on flower-and-bird painting in free-sketch style, and introduction of Chinese paintings. An Introduction to Chinese Painting was the work of Mr. Wu’s teaching experience and art theories for decades. In his class, we benefited a lot and made quick progress by integrating creative practice with theories. When I created flower-and-bird paintings, I found my themes were not clear, so Mr. Wu told me to practice basic flower-and-bird painting skills by painting plum blossoms, orchid, bamboo and chrysanthemum more often. The first step to learn flower-and-bird painting was to paint painting plum blossoms, orchid, bamboo and chrysanthemum well. Mr. Wu also instructed me to practice calligraphy every day. As calligraphy and painting are of common origins, good handwriting brings out the best in painting. He also encouraged us to do our best to excel in poetry, calligraphy, painting, and carving. For this purpose, Mr. Fuzhi gave me his treasured collection, Songfeng Pavillion by Huang Shangu, a hardback of calligraphy rubbings, after which I could practice calligraphy. At that time, many rubbings and printed notebooks were sold at Pinghu Qiuyue in front of our school. I bought Cuan Bao Zi, Cuan Long Yan, Efficacious Temple in High Mountain, and Twenty Statues in Longmen. I practiced calligraphy after Cuan Bao Zi because I thought the style of the stone tablet was simple, bold and unique. Mr. Wu was not angry to see that I chose to practice Cuan Bao Zi instead of Copybook of Huang Shangu. On the contrary, he was happy because he thought I was a student with own characters and unique perception. After I entered in Hangzhou National College of Art, I didn’t completely focus on Mr. Fuzhi’s style, but turned to study the painting characteristics of Ba Da, Shi Tao, Wu Changshuo and Pan Tianshou, and applied into my own paintings. Mr. Fuzhi felt satisfied with my changes. Once when Mr. Wu got up from afternoon nap, he ran up to next door in a hurry to see a small painting named Painting of Plum and Orchid. We asked him what he hurried for. He replied, “I thought just now that this painting presents a new conception. Though it’s an old theme, its expression techniques are innovative.” This painting was the one I recently painted with one stroke and I added casual touches to the painting. The uniqueness of the painting was that the colors of the whole narcissus gave us a sense of elegance with the effect of contrast, because I painted the upper part of leaves with juicy green and the bottom turning into chocolate, the tuber and flower of the narcissus were in white with the bud in wax yellow. I found this technique of painting by accident. Hereafter, when I applied this technique to paint lotus petal in bright red color, there was also an ink blooming at the root of petal, which generated a good effect. As for general goal, Mr. Fuzhi instructed us to make a good and profound traditional foundation on Chinese painting; in terms of details, he was also concerned about our innovative consciousness and encouraged and directed us to further explore, develop, and improve our artistic attainments, so that we could make contributions to the innovation of Chinese painting.

As Mr. Fuzhi was my teacher and fellow villager, and he became one of my families the next year, I often went to his home for advice, and saw him painting. In 1947, his family lived in the best place of Jiang Manor (now inside Huagang Garden). The West Lake was to the south of his studio. With the scenery of waterside landscape and the scent of lotus, the environment of his studio was secluded and beautiful, as well as peace and quiet. Many of his representative works were created in this studio, such as Rose and Chick, Red Plum and Flying Sparrow, Plum Flowers (darkly sweet scent and sparse branch lines), etc. Mr. Wu used to starting to paint in unrestrained place with boldness and resolution to decide keynote of the whole painting, then he completed the overall arrangement by gradually adding colors and lines and carefully trimming. When Mr. Wu painted, he finished at one fling, and would not say anything but let you understand, perceive, experience and master the artistic theories and techniques in the paintings on your own. He always said, “There is no need to say anything to those who are clever enough to get an epiphany.” This kind of direct teaching method and heuristic modes of teaching was his effective teaching method, which was generally popular with students. Mr. Wu often checked students’ assignments in class, to see what and how we had painted. Sometimes, he would add some key points to students’ works to make the finishing point, and then the paintings became alive and perfect; while sometimes he would inscribe a poem as an encouragement on the work that he regarded as fine and unique painting. One day, I came to Mr. Fuzhi with my new work Plum Blossom and Orchid for advice. After he saw it, he was very happy, and inscribed his improvised poem on the painting, “Your fragrance dwarfs all the other flowers with righteous moral integrity, which is only known by the wind and the moon. Yuejian painted the plum blossom in upright and vigorous manner, and orchid with charm and wit, as what Dongpo described as ‘robust but graceful and dignified but beautiful’. I’m delighted to inscribe a twelve-word poem to his painting, which is written in a rainy day at Wangwushan Building on November, 1948.” At another day, I went to Mr. Wu with another work Plum blossom, Orchid, Bamboo and Rock for advice. When he opened it, he said I had written my names in the wrong place. Then he folded the painting from top to bottom and inscribed my names on the top of the painting after cutting my original name. After his modification, it became a very fine work. Mr. Wu said, “You can invite a professional to mount it as vertical axis painting. At the top, you can require to add antique paper and invite Mr. Pan Tianshou to inscribe on it.” One day, Mr. Pan came to class, and after he saw the painting, he nodded and said, “The painting has a sense of pureness and freshness.” Thereupon, he sat down, and grabbed a writing brush made of weasel's hair, inscribing “Painting in pureness, freshness and clearness, is the recent work of Yuejian. Written by Tianshou in early summer of 1949.” The two paintings are collected in Anthology of Zhang Yuejian.

In 1949 when Hangzhou liberated and the People’s Republic of China was founded, the new era ushered in Hangzhou National College of Art. Department of Traditional Chinese Painting was merged with Department of Oil Painting, becoming the Department of Painting. Since then, we turned our main attention from flower-and-bird and landscape painting to figure sketches or oil painting. The school also organized students to go into the thick of life for the purpose of figure painting creation. At that time, traditional Chinese painting was clearly abolished because teachers of traditional Chinese painting were indulged in their own creation and researches instead of giving lessons. As Mr. Fuzhi had seen my figure paintings, which were painted in my middle school time, such as figure sketches of Zhong Kui, Ji Gong, and Eight Immortals (in Chinese legend); he thought they were in profound moulding and vivid painting techniques. He encouraged me again and again to learn figure painting well, to refute the nihilistic mentality with you excellent achievements and actual actions. After liberation, the school mobilized students for several times to collect themes for New Year paintings from life experiences. As we were about to graduate, we needed also to collect painting themes for our graduation creation. At last, led by Mr. Yan Han, all students in Department of Painting took part in the construction of water conservancy in Yiqiao Village, Yuhang County. After half a month, Mr. Yan Han held a meeting to discuss our creation drafts. When it was my turn, I introduced the main idea of Embanking. In the middle view of the painting, several leaders were taking measurements and conducting the work of embanking, which highlighted the theme of the leadership of the Party; in the close-ups, intellectuals and farmers were stepping forward to carry heavy loads for embankment; in the long shots, there was a scenery of vast field with a promising bumper harvest, which indicated that the construction of water conservancy was the guarantee of good harvest every year. Mr. Yan Han said with a smile, “What are you gonna do with the gray and black colors in your painting?” I replied that I would first sketch the persons, field and river embankment, and then erased the gray traces of pencil when they were under the light or in white. In this way, there appeared black, white and gray colors in my paintings, and the figures eventually emerged. As a wood engraver at the old liberation area, Mr. Yan paid close attention to the color processing of “black, white and gray”. He was surprised about my explanation and had nothing to say but to give a pass. After the meeting, Mr. Yan asked me to give him a line drawing of Embanking. Soon after, Embanking was published on People’s Daily. Hence, I sent two copies to Liberation Daily in Shanghai and Zhejiang Daily in Hangzhou, which were both published successively. At the same time, I painted a colorized New Year painting, named Production and Fortune. At that time, Mr. Jiang Feng was in charge of students’ creation of New Year painting of in Hangzhou National College of Art. Five paintings from the Department of Painting were successfully selected, of which all works were from the students in traditional Chinese painting. Mr. Jiang Feng wondered why the works from students in oil painting were not selected, and said “I’ll have a study on it!” In the summary conference of New Year painting, thereupon, he admitted that students in traditional Chinese painting were better than those in oil painting. Jiang Feng’s article -- Issues on Creation of Students from Hangzhou National College of Art, was published on People’s Fine Arts, No. 5 (October 1950), on which my painting Production and Fortune was also published as the illustration.

When I reported the above information to Mr. Wu Fuzhi, he felt very delighted and pleased that I had made considerable progress and outstanding attainments in figure painting. Mr. Wu also said firmly, “Traditional Chinese painting is scientific, which can always reflect real life. We have to strive for the revitalization of Chinese national painting!”

In Hangzhou on July 28th, 1997

The article is collected in Marvelous Artistic Study Life – Memoirs of Schoolfellows in National College of Art

(The 70th Anniversary of China Academy of Art, China Academy of Art Press)