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The Order of Space and Spirit

Xu Sheng

Space is one of the archetypes of spirit. when it comes to art, our abstraction and induction of space are invariably related to our understanding of the order of the spiritual world. 

In our context the distinction we make between the two abstract spaces, i.e.,“the East” and “the West”, is one of the primary factors that prevents us from exploring an individual and our spiritual world. These two concepts were not invented until the last years of Enlightenment in Europe in the 18th century.    The two words have since then become a common sense and adjectives for two “inherent” cultural “identities”. The dichotomy is based on our “review” of the past two hundred years. Such review and nomination, to both “the East” and “the West”, is actually a kind of isolation that cuts us off from our past, putting all the fresh cultural experience in a pre-classified system, and making rash repairs in the system. It results in the fact that any discussion about culture cannot do without this oversimplified premise. We almost forget that originally only our experience and memory existed before conceptualization, and there was nothing called “the East” or “the West” then. Undoubtedly these two concepts result from the theories that have distorted our memory. Sometimes “reason” can actually become a dictator that represses experience, so that our fresh memory that grows in nature is strangled by those cultural theories that work like cement buildings. 

 When we free ourselves from these two concepts, we can truthfully face our being in this world and the way we view it. In other words, we can face the influence that our own sense of reality has on art from a more self-centered perspective. Our discussion of the sense of reality as an individual has to refer to art, a more primordial form. 

As far as art is concerned, spatial order does not naturally follow nature, or in other words, falls into the category of naturalism, as the order of the spirit is art’s first concern. In the old Egyptian murals, depiction and composition are highly stylized. It does not mean that techniques at that time were backward but that there was an emphasis on the sense of eternal order. The expression of spirit was given preference over “accurate” description of figures and space. Spatial order therefore had to subordinate itself to a more elevated and more lasting order. The same is true of sculpture and painting in the Pre-Qin period. The presentation of images and the spatial relation between the images and the observer all underline the magnificence of the everlasting empire. Art in ancient Greece, on the other hand, showed its pursuit of “verisimilitude”. The Greeks at that time believed that true order must have a direct bearing on the viewer’s vision, or on the viewer. Art in ancient Greece highlighted a religious sublimity in another unified ideology.  

Compared with the criteria of murals that is based on the size of images, classical Chinese ink painting followed the same fundamental criteria of perspective, such as the relation between distance and size, but there was no universal rule that is based on mathematical model, so space was determined by the inner world, as well as the order of the inner world, rather than the visible physical or natural order despite their similarities. More importantly, compared with medieval art in the West, Chinese literati painting, started in the Tang and the Song Dynasties, was the first to explore the space in an individual’s inner world.   

European artists in the early years of Renaissance took over the ideal of the artists in ancient Greece by turning to mathematic model to build perspective space, and they established a kind of spatial order based on human vision, or in other words, on human beings. This order ran through western painting from religious painting to easel painting in the 19th century, and it continues to be a fundamental reference in modern times. Our perception of the perspective goes along with our own perception and instinct since the space mankind lives in remains three-dimensional, no matter it is in China or in Europe. Perspective therefore has become the most accepted and common perception standard. It can spread instinct to wider audience as it becomes the vehicle of a strict order of spirit in painting. 

 

 

 

 

 


 

The late 19th century saw our world views begin to vary thanks to the great changes in science and philosophy, even in the same cultural background. There was no more unified instinct, and the presentation of space in artworks accordingly stopped to follow the classical order and became records of the diversified perception patterns of the individual. Since an artist has to find his or her own way to perceive this world before becoming a real artist as the result of the loss of a common perception standard, or in other words, the loss of the premise. Whatever the choice is, it has become part of the divided human perception. With the establishment of new order of the spirit centered on the individual, modernism occurred. 

As far as ideology is concerned, we can say that until the Enlightenment European artists did not have an awareness of their identity and unsolicited wish to express, nor did they have a free choice in respect to creation methodology and value system. Neo-classicism and Romanticism are typical choices in this respect. Such autonomy was not given enough emphasis until Modernism came. As far as an artist’s circumstances are concerned, the autonomy can be dated earlier. The masters in Renaissance did established themselves in that ear with their own distinct styles though sometimes they were still bothered by their identity. Their creative capacity, in the framework of the standard in the age, gained them more freedom in terms of techniques, therefore changing the law of existence in the world of art. 

In China, however, literati painters enjoyed complete autonomy as early as the 10th century. In the Tang and Song Dynasties, China witnessed great progress in philosophy, technology, thinking, industry, and economy, and moreover, foreign invasions in late Tang and late Song enabled “literati”, the highly developed cultural group, to detach themselves, of their own accord,  from the mainstream of society and reality twice. Admittedly there are still arguments about the form and subject of “literati” painting, as well as its range, but whatever the border of its form and subject reach, it is always a kind of art that is autonomous belonging to the intellectual elite without any social function. Painting thus became a medium for the artists to depict their inner world, and “literati painting”, as a concept, is merely a way of generalization.   

Obviously, both European Modernist artists and Chinese literati artists, in spite of the difference in their life reality, base their art production on the independence and exile of their identity as artists. It derives from their spiritual autonomy. Here when we put aside the time aspect of “Modernism” and consider it as a mere state of art creation and make comparisons of the overall conditions of varied art forms in their own times, we will find that Song literati paintings, as well as its relation to other art forms, as well as its relation to the age, have almost all the characteristics of early “Modernist” art. It is therefore the basis of our understanding of the spatial order in literati painting, and at the same time it provides a clue to the conditions of art and the inner world.  

In the last hundred years space-presentation methods undergone great changes, more than it had in the past 600 years, but compared with the religious order in early times, or with the cultural order in later times, it is easy to find that there is only one spatial order in painting in these hundred years: order of the individual. Nietzsche said God is dead, but it is mankind that believes in premise and a common order who is dead. It also makes up the premise for our discussion about presentation of space that is based on individual experience. 

An artist can never separate from his or her age--there is no way to conceal whatever the age has offered, even if for a genius of lies. Artists today have experience in common, even though such experience means the loss of a unified order. There is no common order in art, but the instinct of human instinct for vision is always there, only that it is difficult for our instinct to reach the eternal spirit as there is no longer a common order of spirit to follow. The spatial order of the individual space has become a trace of such experience.     

Ever since Modernism made its debut, artists found it hard to live in the settled order and they could not stay in the order of yesterday. Now it is only the beginning of fragmentation of Modernism, and the so-called “Post-modernism” is nothing more than a more individualized continuation of the same freedom and ambition. Mankind has just realized the split of individual, the desire and fear as a result of the loss of order, and they have just learned to lie and act. In this carnival atmosphere and loneliness, how to view an artwork, or our way of view, has become the topic of our discussion. Such discussion has to be introspective. 

Consequently our discussion of art has to focus more on how an artwork exists in the space than how an artwork presents the space. The most real and the basis of view that connects our innermosts, it has to be pointed out, lie in nowhere other than what is independent, unfunctionalized and free of any instrumental rationality.   

 

 

The Order of Space and Spirit

Xu Sheng

Space is one of the archetypes of spirit. when it comes to art, our abstraction and induction of space are invariably related to our understanding of the order of the spiritual world. 

In our context the distinction we make between the two abstract spaces, i.e.,“the East” and “the West”, is one of the primary factors that prevents us from exploring an individual and our spiritual world. These two concepts were not invented until the last years of Enlightenment in Europe in the 18th century.    The two words have since then become a common sense and adjectives for two “inherent” cultural “identities”. The dichotomy is based on our “review” of the past two hundred years. Such review and nomination, to both “the East” and “the West”, is actually a kind of isolation that cuts us off from our past, putting all the fresh cultural experience in a pre-classified system, and making rash repairs in the system. It results in the fact that any discussion about culture cannot do without this oversimplified premise. We almost forget that originally only our experience and memory existed before conceptualization, and there was nothing called “the East” or “the West” then. Undoubtedly these two concepts result from the theories that have distorted our memory. Sometimes “reason” can actually become a dictator that represses experience, so that our fresh memory that grows in nature is strangled by those cultural theories that work like cement buildings. 

 When we free ourselves from these two concepts, we can truthfully face our being in this world and the way we view it. In other words, we can face the influence that our own sense of reality has on art from a more self-centered perspective. Our discussion of the sense of reality as an individual has to refer to art, a more primordial form. 

As far as art is concerned, spatial order does not naturally follow nature, or in other words, falls into the category of naturalism, as the order of the spirit is art’s first concern. In the old Egyptian murals, depiction and composition are highly stylized. It does not mean that techniques at that time were backward but that there was an emphasis on the sense of eternal order. The expression of spirit was given preference over “accurate” description of figures and space. Spatial order therefore had to subordinate itself to a more elevated and more lasting order. The same is true of sculpture and painting in the Pre-Qin period. The presentation of images and the spatial relation between the images and the observer all underline the magnificence of the everlasting empire. Art in ancient Greece, on the other hand, showed its pursuit of “verisimilitude”. The Greeks at that time believed that true order must have a direct bearing on the viewer’s vision, or on the viewer. Art in ancient Greece highlighted a religious sublimity in another unified ideology.  

Compared with the criteria of murals that is based on the size of images, classical Chinese ink painting followed the same fundamental criteria of perspective, such as the relation between distance and size, but there was no universal rule that is based on mathematical model, so space was determined by the inner world, as well as the order of the inner world, rather than the visible physical or natural order despite their similarities. More importantly, compared with medieval art in the West, Chinese literati painting, started in the Tang and the Song Dynasties, was the first to explore the space in an individual’s inner world.   

European artists in the early years of Renaissance took over the ideal of the artists in ancient Greece by turning to mathematic model to build perspective space, and they established a kind of spatial order based on human vision, or in other words, on human beings. This order ran through western painting from religious painting to easel painting in the 19th century, and it continues to be a fundamental reference in modern times. Our perception of the perspective goes along with our own perception and instinct since the space mankind lives in remains three-dimensional, no matter it is in China or in Europe. Perspective therefore has become the most accepted and common perception standard. It can spread instinct to wider audience as it becomes the vehicle of a strict order of spirit in painting. 

 

 

 

 

 


 

The late 19th century saw our world views begin to vary thanks to the great changes in science and philosophy, even in the same cultural background. There was no more unified instinct, and the presentation of space in artworks accordingly stopped to follow the classical order and became records of the diversified perception patterns of the individual. Since an artist has to find his or her own way to perceive this world before becoming a real artist as the result of the loss of a common perception standard, or in other words, the loss of the premise. Whatever the choice is, it has become part of the divided human perception. With the establishment of new order of the spirit centered on the individual, modernism occurred. 

As far as ideology is concerned, we can say that until the Enlightenment European artists did not have an awareness of their identity and unsolicited wish to express, nor did they have a free choice in respect to creation methodology and value system. Neo-classicism and Romanticism are typical choices in this respect. Such autonomy was not given enough emphasis until Modernism came. As far as an artist’s circumstances are concerned, the autonomy can be dated earlier. The masters in Renaissance did established themselves in that ear with their own distinct styles though sometimes they were still bothered by their identity. Their creative capacity, in the framework of the standard in the age, gained them more freedom in terms of techniques, therefore changing the law of existence in the world of art. 

In China, however, literati painters enjoyed complete autonomy as early as the 10th century. In the Tang and Song Dynasties, China witnessed great progress in philosophy, technology, thinking, industry, and economy, and moreover, foreign invasions in late Tang and late Song enabled “literati”, the highly developed cultural group, to detach themselves, of their own accord,  from the mainstream of society and reality twice. Admittedly there are still arguments about the form and subject of “literati” painting, as well as its range, but whatever the border of its form and subject reach, it is always a kind of art that is autonomous belonging to the intellectual elite without any social function. Painting thus became a medium for the artists to depict their inner world, and “literati painting”, as a concept, is merely a way of generalization.   

Obviously, both European Modernist artists and Chinese literati artists, in spite of the difference in their life reality, base their art production on the independence and exile of their identity as artists. It derives from their spiritual autonomy. Here when we put aside the time aspect of “Modernism” and consider it as a mere state of art creation and make comparisons of the overall conditions of varied art forms in their own times, we will find that Song literati paintings, as well as its relation to other art forms, as well as its relation to the age, have almost all the characteristics of early “Modernist” art. It is therefore the basis of our understanding of the spatial order in literati painting, and at the same time it provides a clue to the conditions of art and the inner world.  

In the last hundred years space-presentation methods undergone great changes, more than it had in the past 600 years, but compared with the religious order in early times, or with the cultural order in later times, it is easy to find that there is only one spatial order in painting in these hundred years: order of the individual. Nietzsche said God is dead, but it is mankind that believes in premise and a common order who is dead. It also makes up the premise for our discussion about presentation of space that is based on individual experience. 

An artist can never separate from his or her age--there is no way to conceal whatever the age has offered, even if for a genius of lies. Artists today have experience in common, even though such experience means the loss of a unified order. There is no common order in art, but the instinct of human instinct for vision is always there, only that it is difficult for our instinct to reach the eternal spirit as there is no longer a common order of spirit to follow. The spatial order of the individual space has become a trace of such experience.     

Ever since Modernism made its debut, artists found it hard to live in the settled order and they could not stay in the order of yesterday. Now it is only the beginning of fragmentation of Modernism, and the so-called “Post-modernism” is nothing more than a more individualized continuation of the same freedom and ambition. Mankind has just realized the split of individual, the desire and fear as a result of the loss of order, and they have just learned to lie and act. In this carnival atmosphere and loneliness, how to view an artwork, or our way of view, has become the topic of our discussion. Such discussion has to be introspective. 

Consequently our discussion of art has to focus more on how an artwork exists in the space than how an artwork presents the space. The most real and the basis of view that connects our innermosts, it has to be pointed out, lie in nowhere other than what is independent, unfunctionalized and free of any instrumental rationality.