CHINESE ART

the painting, calligraphy, architecture, pottery, sculpture, bronzes, jade carving, and other fine or decorative art forms produced in China over the centuries. Chinese art traditions are the oldest continuous ones in the world, stretching back 7,000 years or more in some media. Delicately potted wares and sophisticated jade carvings were being produced by the late Neolithic Period (c. 3000-1500 BC). During the Shang dynasty (18th-12th century BC) the art of Chinese writing developed and techniques of bronze casting became quite advanced. The earliest extant Chinese paintings date from the Chou dynasty (11th century-255 BC), and the origins of the distinctive bracketing system that characterizes Chinese architecture also appeared at this time. Calligraphy, the art of painting Chinese characters with a brush, is one of the oldest and most fundamental forms of Chinese art. Chinese painters have used essentially the same materials as calligraphers-brush, ink, and sheets made of silk or paper-and their works are judged by the same criteria, namely the vitality and expressiveness of the brushstrokes and the harmonious rhythm of the composition. Painting in China is thus essentially a linear art whose practitioners strive less to convey a sense of reality and suggest three-dimensional mass than to transmit to paper an awareness of the inner life and wholeness of things by means of the quality of the brushwork. The aesthetics of painting and calligraphy have significantly influenced the other arts in China. In the motifs that adorn ritual bronzes, in the flow of drapery over the surface of Buddhist sculpture, and in the decoration of lacquerware, pottery, and cloisonn enamel, it is the rhythmic movement of the line that largely determines the form and gives to Chinese art its remarkable harmony and unity of style. Chinese painting is at once more abstract and more efficient (in terms of brushstrokes) than is Western painting. Landscapes have been the most popular theme, but portraits and figural compositions are common, and small objects-a bird, a flower, a fish, or bamboo-are also depicted. In all such genres, Chinese artists have traditionally sought to express both inner harmony and harmony with the natural surroundings. Most Chinese painting is executed in ink monochrome with a pointed-tipped brush. The silk or paper surface allows no erasure or correction, so the painter must know beforehand what he intends to paint. The execution demands confidence, speed, and a technical mastery of brushstrokes that is acquired only by long practice. Traditional Chinese buildings are made of timber and have a post and lintel frame (vertical columns topped by a horizontal beam) that defines the planes of enclosing walls. The columns support a system of interlocked brackets upon which a massive, steeply sloping, tiled roof is set. The heavy overhang of the roof is carried by sloping, cantilevered rafters that rest on the brackets. Swept-up eaves at their corners impart a distinctive curve to the roofs of Chinese buildings. The domination of the roof allows little variation in the form of the individual building, but its sweeping expanse imparts a restful serenity to the structure. Works of sculpture in China have usually been created not as art objects in themselves but for a specific ceremonial, religious, or funerary purpose. The most important sculptures are large-scale works in stone or wood of Buddhist deities. The principal decorative arts in China are pottery, jade carving, metalwork, lacquerware, furniture design, and textiles. True pottery glazes were developed in China before the end of the 2nd millennium BC, and porcelain was developed by the 6th century AD, more than 1,000 years before its discovery in Europe. Perhaps nowhere in the world has pottery assumed such importance as in China, and the influence of the country's porcelain on later European pottery has been profound. Bronze casting, while not so ancient as that of the Middle East, reached by 1000 BC a perfection of beauty and craftsmanship not matched in the ancient Western world. In terms of style, these crafts share with sculpture a debt to pictorial art and an aesthetic based on the rhythmic movement of line.