Dong Qichang

Dong Qichang (Chinese董其昌, Pinyin Dǒng Qichang, Tung Ch'i- ch'ang W.-G.; * 1555, † 1636) was a painter, scholar and calligrapher of the late Ming dynasty.

Life

Dǒng Qichang was born in 1555 in Huating ( Jiangxi Province ), the son of a teacher. At the age of twelve years he passed the exam Prefecture. At a subsequent examination at age 17, he landed because of its awkward calligraphy " only " in second place. This spurred Dǒng to such an improvement in this respect his skills, until he eventually became a famous calligrapher. He then rose gradually up by the steps of the official hierarchy, until it reached its highest level at 35. Subsequently, he worked 45 years as an educator of the imperial princes and held important government posts.

Nevertheless Dǒng was not without controversy: in 1605 for example, there was a protest demonstration of exam candidates against his appointment as auditors. On another occasion he is said to have insulted and beaten women who had come to him with complaints, whereupon an angry mob set fire to his house. Also used Dǒng close relations with the palace eunuchs.

Work as a painter

Dǒngs work leans stylistically to the tradition of Yuan painting at, especially on Ni Zan. As the latter decides Dǒng it to populate his landscapes with people; Rather, he lets the nature work alone in their monumentality. Incidentally Dǒng avoided everything Refined or sentimental and gave the expression overrides the faithful representation of the object; he worked with about deliberately falsified spatial relationships and other unwanted dissonances that are charged to him by Western art historians sometimes as a mere expression of technical craftsmanship disability. Dǒngs art had great influence on the so-called individualists of the Qing period.

Art Theory

In addition Dǒng published a large number kunstheoretischer journals and hundreds of colophons to selected images. His dogmatic judgments and attributions image then came to high liability, while the latter in particular are seen critical today.

Moreover Dǒng underwent the entire previous Chinese painting of a comprehensive systematization. In particular, goes to him and the still valid classification of the Ming painter in a northern ( Zhe ) and a southern ( Wu ) back to school; The names are certainly misleading since it does not follows on the geographical location of the artist, but to their proximity to the same directions of Zen Buddhism. The Zhe School consisted mainly of the Dǒng little respected academic professional painters. Headquartered especially in the area of Suzhou and Songjiang Wu School, the Dǒng also imputing themselves, united, however, mainly the higher estimated dilettante literati painters.