The Fluttering Pear Flowers on Hu Minde’s Paintings
In our world, weather the separation or the reunion is not a matter of time. If all the encountering are the reunion after a long separation, then either Hsi Muren’s poem The Reunion or the reunion in Yan Jidao’s poem thousands of years ago, as well as the reunion on Hu Minde’s paintings of pear flowers, are all the same kind of reunion after a long separation.
As a matter of fact, we are always shrouded by the fury of this secular world. On Hu’s painting, however, we can pacify our soul with great peace and tranquility. Embraced by the warm sunshine of winter, a gust of cool breezing blows lightly, immersed in the subtle and secret fragrance of the pear flowers in the Decai hall, our mind is refined and our heart is consoled by the white pure pear petals. Without the disturbance of works or the necessity to do any intellectual pretension, we only need to be the authentic selves and enjoy life leisurely, just like the white and pure pear flowers in Hu’s landscaping paintings. Way down in the distance, a wisp of pear flower’s scent fluttering in the light rain, the wind blowing with the dancing snowflakes, our mind is in such a broad and peace state that as if we are enjoying a cup of tea in the company of Zen music.
Then here came the sound of the flute in the wind. Many years ago, Hu departed his beloved country and crossed over to study Tao Yuanming’s painting in Japan. Nevertheless, he went back later for the sake of his fidelity towards China during the anti-Japanese war. At that time, in order get away from away from the secular turmoils, he led a pastoral life like that of Tao Yuanming. Since Hu called himself as a “painting buff”, I’d like to change Tao’s famous verse “While picking asters beneath the Easter fence , My gaze upon the Southern mountain rests” into “ While drawing pear flowers neath Lingnan ridges, My obsession for painting is displayed”, which can be used to perfectly depict his deep love for painting.
The world is never lack of beauty but an eyes for it. It is Hu who catches the sight of those charming pear flowers in the yard. Late in the afternoon, the pear petals trembling in the light rain inside the closed door. As thousands of years passed, the eternal beauty of those gentle pear flowers of the Song Dynasty keep blooming on the Xuan paper(a Chinese art paper). Inside the Decai Hall, the whole room seems to be filled with dancing white pear petals, which are either swiftly flying in the air or entering into our heart.
The snow-white pear flowers thus incarnate as a Zen master, peaceful and combed, colorless and reserved; and he still has affection and faith to the world with properly self-control. This distinctive color black and white usually arouse different sentiments among people, but it can always make people feel the same kind of awe in silence and then become even more fascinated by pear flowers’ pureness, so the kind of life condition with no big up and down, agony and ecstasy is the core principle of Buddhism. Maybe the highest spiritual plane can be exactly what Buddha said “as there is nothing from the first, where does the dust collect itself” .
Those simple but elegant pear flowers fluttering with modesty without lost its dignity, dazzling like beautiful butterflies in the gentle wind. The blossoming voice that we heard is, actually, the chant of Sanskirt from Pure Land. In a sudden came the spring wind, then thousands of pears bloom slowly in tranquil evening, deliberately and dauntlessly. Though the paintings are only colored with black and white without any other variegation, they still display the best of plain colors’ beauty.
By simple contrasting and shading around, common people’ humanity is unfold before us in Hu’s paintings. Those paintings, though looks very subdued and simple, however, is rather all-embracing in content with secret fragrance from the pear petals and peculiar texture of the delicate lines. What those painting present are just the condition of Hu’s hermitic life. Hu has a yard of his won in real life, stories happened in this yard may not have ending, but every story must has its beginning.
Hu’s studio is piled with a heap of worn-out painting brushes since he spares no efforts to display pear flowers’ pureness and loftiness. Under Hu’s painting brush, the warm and familiar aura of daily life is vivid presented: children romping around in the yard; the wife is doing housework in the nearby, she mills the grain into flour and sometimes do some knitting. As for the husband, he could be a common frontier warrior or a powerful military officer; or he is a businessman who traveling around to make a living; or he even could be an intellectual who goes to the capital for the sake of gaining rank and fame.
No matter what is the fact, there is no need to know it anymore. For we just need bear in our mind that in the passage of life, it is the promise between them that make the landscape more meaningful; in the cross-strait of time, reunion and separation, sadness and happiness cost the same volume of tears. Unfortunately, we are unable to acknowledge what a flouring age could create such an peaceful life condition in a yard like that where the pear flowers fluttering.
In the company of wine and poetry, Hu, like the pear flower under his painting brush, leads a free-and -easy life according to his will. Immersed himself in this pleasant life, wine in hand, Hu transferring all his passion to his landscape painting through brush. His drawing stop and dash in a flexible way, the whole layout is properly arranged while still carrying a freewill sense. Even if ink and the white pear flower are all in austere colors, they still possess an unrestrained and unique character, so the poetical beauty of the pear flower can be presented to the best. Consequently, when we are appreciating those painting, we would have the feeling that we are standing in a serene Temple where the wooden knocker belling and snow-white pear flowers blossoming quietly, our soul sublimed and our mind become enlightened. At that moment, Hu just laughs loud, claps his hand, and then walks away, leaving the fury of the world behind him.
Hu tries his best to detail the incomparable charm of pear flowers with brush and ink. Those newly-milled ink soon become one after another pleasing landscape paintings. we often unconsciously moved into tears by the people and life in those paintings, then we cannot help to wonder that is he a man who is returned from the battlefield with tears in our eyes? what is the story about?
As we all know, no matter how far a traveler goes, he will comes back home eventually. Because he cannot break his promise with the one who is waiting for him, he also cannot leave behind him this serene mountain and the beautiful pear flower. As time flying by, the pear flower beside the pool near the gate become an eternal embodiment of the traveler’s sentiment, which would never vanishing away with time. The painter employs the black ink to draw the whole scene with wide and smooth sweep, thus a picture of imagination is vividly presented on the paper. Black and white as the most abstract colors, their unity and opposition can be used to express Hu philosophical thought about daily life.
Actually, that is how Hu arranges his daily life as he like the comfortable and natural lifestyle so much. He deliberately abandon his in the pureness generated by this simple lifestyle. However, it is this simplicity that add a more enthralling charm to his paintings. In his works, black works in concert with white; besides, the shade and brightness of colors ,the thickness and thinness lines,or the dispersion and density of light are all arranged in a very expressive way. The exquisite yard together with the dancing snow-white pear petals feature the paintings with both vividness and quite. Hu usually starts his painting with great elegance and cautiousness, which achieves him a unique charm as a painter.
When I was in the Decai exhibiting hall, I think that I really have heard the Zen music winding in my ears. Hu’s landscape paintings present us what the real life condition should be, that is to be a tough person like those plants under his painting brush ; when the pear flowers came into full blossom, finding a secluded place to reside in, or devolve your sentiment to those landscapes. If you stay at home, the tree in your yard can serve you as a shelter; while you are out, it would be a wise choice to take some wine and sail on the lake.
Those eye-catchinglandscape in Hu’s paintings are already stamped on my mind. I also think that they are perfectly for fan decorations. The flowers are destined to bloom and wither as seasons change, but the memory shall survive in our mind. When the flower blooming and the wind blowing lightly, boiling some wine under the pear flower tree nearby the river and then spending one night in the wooden house. As a result, Hu devolves all his sadness and happiness to such kind of black and white paintings. Despite weal and woe of the secular world, Hu still face the fate with a calm and peaceful mind.
2014.01.24 / LILE
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