If people are not famous, painting will not be famous; if painting is not famous, it will be even harder for people to be famous. Excluding those genuine people and paintings, if you really want to have a name, you have to put your “Kung Fu” outside the painting, for example, put a number in front of your name, and then make it public in any occasion, intentionally or unintentionally. Or ask famous people to write a word, inscription, postscript and seal… So, people have “names”, and paintings have “names”, which can be regarded as another kind of “beginning to be famous for painting and kung fu”.
However, this move is understandable. Nobel Prize winner Doris Lessing said in her 88-year-old experience that when she was 61 years old, she made an attempt to prove whether author fame really matters. As a result, the same novel, the pseudonym delivery was rejected, and the real name delivery was successfully published. The same is true for writing and painting. But the practice of the famous people in today’s society tying up the vulgar studies when they were not famous and publishing them with the help of today’s fame is another matter.
Back to “painting”. People are not famous but they paint with heart. Paintings are not famous but can be seen from time to time. There is indeed such a group of painters in the painting world. They “paint” because of “love”. For a moment; they “paint”, what they want is to wander the mind and the ethereal spirit in the “painting”, and the rest, they don’t understand, and they don’t care.
Qu Shulan is such an old man. She loves to paint, and she has done countless paintings for decades, but there are few people, and she never cares if someone calls her “painter”, she said, “I love painting and playing mahjong, but as long as I draw a good painting, it will be better than Playing mahjong is much more comfortable.” The 78-year-old put the elegance and customs in a pile, but he was in a better mood than coming out.
Qu Shulan, who was born in Longkou, Shandong Province, has lived in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Canada for decades. She has not changed her hometown accent. Her mouth is still in a melodious tune. Reminds you of some words praising Shandong people, as well as Shandong fans, green onions and rice…
The old man is not old, his face is not wrinkled, especially the thick black hair, only a few silver threads occasionally. The old man wears a pair of gold-rimmed glasses, a dark green, brick red polka-dot upper body, a small Chinese-style jacket with a lace neckline, black trousers, and a pair of light and soft casual leather shoes… Sitting on the opposite sofa how you look at it, she looks like an old lady of a leisurely family.
The old lady began to talk about her history, which was not very leisurely, softly, and related to painting.
1.
Qu Shulan has loved to paint since she was a child, using watercolor to paint the four seasons, painting still lifes, landscapes, flowers and birds, melons, fruits, pears and peaches are all themes. Because of her good painting, all teachers and students in the school knew that there was a student named Qu Shulan, whose work was given to the teacher as a souvenir by the school. So Xiao Shulan knew what it meant to be “proud”.
When the family was decent, her mother supported Xiao Shulan to go to school. After school, Shulan followed her mother to the field to plant wheat and rice, and brought dry food to the field to deliver meals. I also wanted to go to the stove when I was young. I followed my mother’s example. I lit firewood in the stove, put water in the pot, patted the reconciled rice noodles into flat circles and pasted them on the edge of the pot. ——Slipped away and became a pot of rice porridge. It’s time to go to middle school, my mother said, “Girls don’t need to read so many books”. One sentence forced out a stubborn temper, not allowed to go to school or not to eat, for 3 days in a row. In the end, it was the daughter who won, so Longkou Middle School added a little painter, Qu Shulan.
Qu Shulan went to Shanghai after graduating from middle school, met her future husband, and went to Hong Kong with her husband after marriage. When the last child went to middle school, Qu Shulan, the mother of 4 children, was able to pick up the brush again and find her. “Painting” more than ten years ago.
She began to follow the masters of the Hong Kong Wulinzhuang Painting Society. “I followed three teachers successively, the first painted landscapes, the second painted insects and birds, and the third painted lotus and peony.” She said, “The teacher told me He is a genius, in fact, where is a genius, that is, he loves to draw a picture, and the painting is justified.” “I learned a lot of skills from the teacher, such as learning to paint stones, first painting small stones, and then painting large stones. , and then add another stone behind the stone, no matter how I look at it, I feel that the painting is not good, so the teacher just traces it with a pen, ha, the layers, edges and corners of the stone are there.”
The rugged mountains accumulated with stones, and the dense jungles densely packed with trees… slowly appeared in her paintings, and the pictures gradually became rich, full and awe-inspiring. At first, the paintings were always not what she wanted.
The good paintings are still coming out, and Qu Shulan’s paintings have inadvertently first seen the style. Her paintings began to be bought, participated in various exhibitions, and went abroad to Korea and Japan.
The “painting” life in Hong Kong continued until 1991 before immigrating. In May of that year, Qu Shulan forever remembered an unknown little girl because of her paintings. On that day, Qu Shulan and a group of painters improvised paintings in the lobby of the Hong Kong Cultural Center, and the crowd gathered. Suddenly, a small face emerged from the crevice of the person, and the lower jaw just reached the height of the table, and it was stuck there motionless, like a delicate “porcelain doll” placed on the painting table. “Porcelain Doll” stared at Qu Shulan painting with good eyes. Qu Shulan was secretly amazed by the immature and dedicated face in front of her: “Child, do you know how to draw? You are only 6 or 7 years old, so you shouldn’t understand. Then what are you looking at? Favorite cats and dogs? The painting of Songhe is too old for you. What are you looking at, what are you thinking, child?” Qu Shulan, who was hunched over painting, looked up at the unmoving picture from time to time. The sensual little face, the little face rested there motionless. When the painting was over, the little girl was pulled away by her parents, but she still stood there stubbornly, looking and waiting. Qu Shulan walked over and asked, “Do you like to draw?” The little girl nodded. “Do you like this painting?” The little girl nodded again. “Then I’ll give it to you.” The little girl widened her eyes, looked at her father, and then at her mother, then extended her small hand and carefully held the “pine and crane” that was still wet. The little girl’s father was moved. He thanked Qu Shulan for the child and said, “I didn’t expect the child to like your painting so much. When it was done, I immediately framed it and hung it in the child’s room. She liked it. , let it be with the child.” The little girl carried away the painting, but the porcelain doll-like face remained, as long as she painted pine and crane again, Qu Shulan would remember this. A little girl who is not familiar with the world but is obsessed with the vicissitudes of ink painting. The little girl should be a big girl in her twenties now, can she really understand the essence of Chinese ink painting? Today’s Qu Shulan said.
It’s time to go, Qu Shulan put the little girl and Hong Kong in the depths of her heart. In September, Qu Shulan immigrated to Canada.
two
Canada is picturesque, looking back at it, it is like a landscape, and it is a picture of flowers and birds. But Qu Shulan was restless and didn’t want to paint because none of her four children came with her. Going in and out of the house is the old couple, walk around the house to see that it is still the old couple, although the old couple loves each other, but without the children’s greetings, the children’s knees laughing, it is like painting without paper, paper but no ink, If there is no ink without a pen, if one is missing, then the painting is incomparable no matter what. Missing children, that kind of thinking is heartbreaking. Qu Shulan didn’t dare to let herself be idle, but after all, when she was free, even in the short “idle” waiting for the traffic lights, she would shed tears of heartache because of her thoughts.
In addition to the son, the three daughters finally came one by one, and Qu Shulan’s “painting” came alive.
After the brain turns, it is like a perpetual hammer, constantly moving – composition: the peony in this painting should be goose-yellow, but the color is too dark now; Add two mandarin ducks…Sometimes I have a whim at night, I quickly get up and draw a few strokes to record a prototype. The next day, the whim will appear on the painting, and the painting will come alive.
In the night, the painting floats in the mind; in the day, the painting settles in the pen, and the black and white is reincarnated. In reincarnation, mottled ink embraces the sun and the moon, and nature and heaven and earth are in the heart.
On both sides of the fireplace in Qu Shulan’s living room are two meticulous paintings full of childishness. At first glance, they seem to be the same. There are suns, willows, mounds, stones and urchins in the paintings, but on closer inspection, they are completely different. Where is the difference? Qu Shulan said: “Look at the sun, one is in the east and the other is in the west, these are two pictures in the morning and evening. Look at the child, there are 5 in the morning and 3 in the evening. There are mounds of dirt in this one, and grass in that one, look again…” Sure enough. The movement and changes of those subtle objects, scenes, and people magnify the painting space infinitely, and you can imagine countless reasons and stories.
Qu Shulan loves sports, and it is spread by word of mouth in the sports circle. Everyone knows that she is a good painter. A long time ago, her paintings began to be donated and auctioned to nursing homes and churches. That year, Qu Shulan, who had never been through the auction process, sat under the stage as a “client” in the sense of charity auction, watching the auctioneer drop the hammer again and again, watching those oil paintings and Chinese paintings being bid for one piece When she took one, she was very curious and excited. She thought: I bought the painting, hundreds of thousands of donations have come, how many good deeds can be done with less money! Qu Shulan participated in the auction of paintings Still her best painting of peony and peacock. Under the light, her peonies are delicate and rich, and the peacocks are elegant and gorgeous. 1800 yuan! With a bang, the “Famous” painting has an owner, and it is the highest price in the auction! Qu Shulan was invited to the stage, and the guest of honor stood with her huge “Peony and Peacock” for a photo, hundreds of thousands of dollars. There was thunderous applause.
Qu Shulan participated in a number of charitable donations. She broke her fingers and recalled one by one: the Yikang Center, the Kangqi Dance Association, the Catholic Church…because the donations were her “paintings”, so she still remembers it vividly, But the money donated to the auction, except for the highest one, the rest, forgot.
Qu Shulan took out a loosely rolled rice paper roll from the studio and spread it out gently. It was full of large and small ink paintings, and she explained it to you one by one. Because I don’t know how to paint, I just watched a lively scene of black, white, red, green, moving and flying, but I still remember one of them. It is the only landscape in this scroll. On the picture, a few lines are wiped out, but the green hills and mists, the blue waves of the stone lake, the old man punting a boat, and vaguely looking at the red bridge in the distance, “There seems to be a song on the lake, you can hear it after watching it for a long time”, some people have so vividly “Listen” to the landscape in the painting. Qu Shulan’s landscape, where the water is flowing, the fog is drifting, and the boat is moving, how can it be silent?
This scroll is the proud work of the old man. She said that these paintings must be well mounted, but the cost of mounting is too expensive. . I will never sell them. When I am in a bad mood, I will close the doors and windows, then spread them all on the ground, kneel down, and look at them one by one on the ground…
The joys and sorrows of the old man are all painted superior. Qu Shulan’s house is full of paintings, gorgeous, simple and elegant, vigorous, quiet, light and graceful, solemn and condensed, decorated, the room is very colorful. But there is one exception. It was a small picture of pine cranes. I don’t know if it was a “good painting” by Qu Shulan, but I knew that it was not in the right place – I quickly pinned a thumbtack to the side of the huge picture of pine cranes. corner. The old man said, this is the first picture after 3 months without a pen, because my husband… is gone. I didn’t know whether I should follow this topic or not, but after thinking about it, it’s better not to talk about it, so I changed the conversation: “I only know that ink painting has the technique of leaving blank space, but I don’t know how you painted so many white snowflakes. “The old man smiled, and she said, “Take the milk on the rice paper, wait for it to dry, and then draw whatever you want on it, and then wipe it, the place with the milk will not be stained with color, and that part is If there is a blank space, the snowflakes will come out!” The old man forgot the “difficult to look back” paragraph while laughing, and also “taught” a stupid student.
Qu Shulan taught apprenticeships in Hong Kong, and she still takes several students with her. To worship her as a teacher, there is a strict requirement: to learn painting, you must like it, if you don’t like it, don’t learn it.
3.
How can we better explain the achievements of the elderly in the art world? Participating in art exhibitions is one of them. Qu Shulan made a rough count:
1978-1981 4 joint exhibitions in Hong Kong City Hall; 1990 Kowloon Tsim Sha Tsui Cultural Center Painting exhibition; 1991 Beijing Cultural Palace Group Exhibition; 1991 Kowloon Tsim Sha Tsui Cultural Palace Group Exhibition; 1992 Korea Asia Watercolor Exhibition; 1992 Japan Nagoya Asia Watercolor Exhibition; 1993 Kaohsiung Municipal Cultural Center Group Exhibition; 1993 Japan Osaka Group Exhibition.
Qu Shulan’s paintings were also included in the “Korea Watercolor Society Collection – Asia Watercolor Collection”.
The old man is modest, she said, painting is okay, but my calligraphy is not very good, calligraphy and painting are linked together, so calligraphy still needs to be practiced.
The old man still has his own pursuits, she said: “I am good at painting, some are not good at painting, and some have never painted at all, and those who have never painted always want to give it a try. I want to learn to paint Lang Shining’s horses. “The old man must have seen Lang Shining’s “Hundred Horses” and was fascinated by the horses with different postures. Horses are new “things” for the elderly. Deliberate pursuit, the pen may lose the sound of nature, but the occasional magic pen may be “successful right away”. The horse waiting for the old man Qu Shulan “turned out”.
Some people commented on the level of painting in this way: the first realm of painting is pictographic; the second realm is to learn from predecessors or schools; the highest realm is to flow out of temperament. It is impossible to give the old man Qu Shulan a realm assessment, and he still does not know how to give the old man a name. Literati? Master of Danqing? The emotional life and the sentiment of painting for people are all in the pen. With a pure heart and few desires, he has devoted himself to painting for several decades, without the name of Qiqi, and he does not strive for it.
