Return to a Mind as Clear as a Mirror

The highest state and the essence of Chinese traditional landscape painting is “to learn from nature, to acquire inner sentiments; to read artworks as a supplement of traveling in mountains and waters, and to combine nature and humans”. Various sects in the ancient times, ever since Tang and Song Dynasty, until the intellectuals' painting sect in Ming and Qing Dynasty, regarded this as their highest principle. While at present, in this bustling world, artists who can pursue this kind of artistic conceptions and internal spirit, are as rare as the feathers of phoenix and the horns of kirins.

I have not known Mr. Chan Kengtin for a long time. My first encounter with his paintings gave to me a “tranquil and infinite, solitary and divine” feeling. Kengtin has immersed himself in Chinese painting for over a decade. In 2003, he graduated from the Department of Fine Arts in Chinese Culture University in Taiwan. In 2006, he obtained the diploma in Visual Arts Education in Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). He entered Chinese National Academy of Painting Lu Yushun Studio in 2008. His works have been exhibited in mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. He has created a lot of award-winning pieces. He is always able to get to grips with the abstruse secret of ancient landscape painting. The magnificent monumental landscape painting in Song Dynasty, the classical, graceful and elegant intellectuals' landscape paintings in Ming and Qing Dynasty, and even the contemporary painters' artistic conceptions, have influenced him on his art creation. Nevertheless, he does not overvalue the study of techniques, or get bound by the limit of traditions. What he endeavoured to achieve is a state with personality and satori, a state beyond reality. In Kengtin's landscape paintings, we would not see meticulous and dense brushworks or compositions of trees and rocks. These elements are integrated in his works without traces. They melt in the way he outlines mountains and waters, the way he uses colors and ink, black and white, as well as the space of emptiness and fullness.

Kengtin is good at landscape paintings. But he does not insist on showing the texture of the mountains and waters. Moreover, he chooses to demonstrate the outlines and the shapes of the mountains and waters by painting in layers. He manages to create a unique landscape of mountains and rivers, clouds and waters, by using different shades of ink, different directions of lightness and darkness. Across the Western Clouds No.1 (西雲横渡之一) was his work in 2013. He only outlined the the sea of clouds, leaving a large part of the paper blank. Still, the different shades of the layers enhance the swirling, flowing clouds and hazes. A couple of mountains are hidden in the clouds while the shade variations of the ink and use of light umber color add to the power of massive landscape. The Everlasting River in Heavenly Garden (帝苑長流) in 2014 depicted huge mountains and big river from a bird's-eye view. The long river is represented by the void, giving the painting a space to breathe. The layers that represent the mountains get deeper and deeper after layer. Moreover, with the dyeing strokes of ink and scattering fragments, the painting manages to recreate a kind of "deep" and "lofty" composition, which is a reinterpretation of the ancient way. Just like those monumental landscape paintings in Song Dynasty, this piece of work is particularly magnificent. Jades in Silence (皋澤凝翠), which he painted in the same year, is magnanimous and clear. The rocky island in the foreground lies horizontally through the painting. Covered with rich and dark colors, the island varies a lot, contrasting with the light-colored mountains far behind. He does not utilize the traditional brushstrokes for trees and rocks, instead, he painted split fragments to represent the luxuriant trees and interspersed rocks. The river is painted with solid and bold green color, forming a spacial contrast both vertically and horizontally with the surrounding mountains and rocks. In this way, time seems to be frozen within the Jades in Silence.

In recent years, Kengtin has made great progress. He adds animals in landscape paintings, creating a new series of works. He frequently paints deer in this series. Maybe this is because deer is by nature mild and kind, living freely from the hustling world. In ancient Chinese legends, deer is an auspicious beast. In Chinese, the word is pronounced as “lu”(祿), which means “good fortune”. In addition, deer is regarded as a symbol of longevity. It usually appears with longevous god, or Nan-ji-Xian-Weng (the Elderly Man of the South Pole, also longevous god), and the pines and cypresses. Therefore, deer is a common theme in ancient Chinese paintings. The Deer in Autumn Forest (秋林呦鹿) from the Five Dynasties in the National Palace Museum's collection in Taipei is a good example. With deer becoming one of Kengtin's favorable themes, Deer in Four Seasons (鹿鳴四季) is said to be his masterpiece in this series. The four frames respectively show splendid flowers in spring, shady forests in summer, refreshing gold autumn and vast cold winter. The top half of the painting is left blank to depict clouds and glow, formed by simple and classic shapes. The deers are either wandering in the forest, or standing in waters, or staying on rocks, or in the moment of looking backwards. All of them are very relaxed, melting into nature perfectly. The whole scene is like a song dedicated to nature. In his long scroll painting Sound in the Lotus Sutra(法華安平), the overlapping mountains drawn with lines and painted in dark blue and green colors are as charming as blue-and-green landscape paintings in Jin and Tang Dynasty. An ox slowly walks among the mountains and waters, looking back to the sky, as if it was the Taoist green ox on its way to return to the west. After Spiritual Practice (靈修忘歸) pictured a panther. Kengtin painted the snow mountain and the dark blue sky with different shades of ink, and a moon hanging high in the sky. The panther on the left of the canvas hesitates and stops, then raises its head and looks at the moon, as if it is thinking about something. It is no longer a fierce and brutal beast, but a divine creature that realizes Tao, sublimes from the mortal life, and forgets to return. One could easily notice what Kengtin wants to express in this series of landscape paintings with animals. Everything shall have a clear heart, follow the nature and return to the Great Tao.

The painting techniques Kengtin uses are particularly unique. The most obvious is that he organizes and decorates the images with his “fragments”, to form the mountains, and to replace the traditional brushstrokes for mountains and rocks, as well as the way to picture trees. These “fragments” look like pieces made of gold and silver. They also look like snow flakes and honeydews, swirling, dancing and flying elegantly and freely. They manage to bring a sense of freshness and movement to the paintings. These “fragments” also remind readers of the crazing glaze or the ice crackle glaze on celadon wares in Song Dynasty. The glaze cannot be artificially controlled. They just naturally happen in kiln firing. Their beauty is graceful, elegant, simple and pure. Similarly, you cannot force art to happen. An art could only be creative and unique, be with one's personal style when this person's ability of understanding, personal accomplishment and emotions naturally integrate together. Kengtin has created a new page of contemporary landscape painting, not through insistent study on painting techniques, but through his diverse usage of simple and pure strokes, the black and white of ink, and the space of emptiness and fullness, together with his “fragments” techniques.

The empty mountain is solitary. The heaven and earth is emotional. In Kengtin's works, we could see the mountains and rivers, but more importantly, we could feel and listen to the celestial songs and chants of nature.

TANG Hoi Chiu

Guest Professor

Hong Kong Baptist University Academy of Visual Arts

September, 2015