Traditional Chinese Painting Research Articles

SAS: Painting Detection and Recognition via Smart Art System With Mobile Devices

Artwork recognition is an important research direction in the field of image processing. However, most of the current proposed methods are not designed for the demand of real-time analysis with mobile devices. Moreover, existing methods usually rely on high quality images and require large amounts of computing consumption. Based on the deep learning technology, in this paper, we propose a Smart Art System (SAS) with mobile devices. Our SAS mainly consists of two parts, i.e., painting detection unit and recognition unit. The detection module adopts a new painting detection algorithm called Single Shot Detection with Painting Landmark Location (SSD-PLL). SSD-PLL can effectively eliminate the influence of complex background factors on recognition. Considering the limited computing capacity of the mobile devices, our recognition module adopts a new ultra-light painting classifier. The classifier adopts MobileNet as the backbone and owns extra operation for Local Features Fusion (LFF). With our SAS, users can use mobile phone to take a photo of any paintings, then SAS would analyze the paintings and report the relevant information in real time. In order to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method, we have established two large scale image databases. The databases include 7,500 Traditional Chinese paintings (TCPs) and 8,800 Oil paintings (OPs), respectively. We evaluate our method and compare with the relevant algorithms, and our method achieves the highest performance and better real-time performance. Extensive experimental results on these databases show the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

A Study of the Spiritual Expression of Corridors in Literati Gardens

Chinese ancient literati drew inspiration from traditional paintings and pursue picturesque scene in terms of artistic expression in constructing gardens. Using the method of image analysis, literature review, field investigation, and logical analysis, an important element of literati garden construction -- corridor, as the research object, was studied. As the important element of traditional Chinese gardens, corridors in the garden are not only the connection of the buildings, but also act as the guide line of the scenery, which make garden buildings connected into a harmonious whole landscape. Clearly, the interaction between the traditional Chinese painting and garden space were probed from three aspects, spatial order, spatial level and spatial imagination and reality. In sum, spatial-temporal integration, fusion of feelings with the natural setting, interdependence of being and non-being are three levels of the spiritual expression of corridors. Meanwhile, by analyzing the spiritual expression of corridors in the picturesque scene creation of garden space, the paper tries to probe into literati’s aesthetic ideals of unity between man and nature and spiritual pursuit of seclusion and detachment. What’s more, further studies according to the connotation culture of literati gardens and corridors were probed, in order to provide a reference for contemporary garden practice.

An Analysis of Interactive Technology’s Effect on the Appreciation of Traditional Chinese Painting: A Review of Case Studies

From a perspective of safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage, this paper discusses how to enhance the appreciation of traditional Chinese painting through the support of interactive technology. The author analyses extensive yet current case studies based on the findings from the interactive appreciation of and engagement with paintings. The author then summarises four aspects of how to design interactive technology in order to support the appreciation of and engagement with traditional Chinese paintings: (1) deepening the aesthetic understanding of traditional Chinese paintings should not be a neglected aspect during the design process; (2) current case studies have not considered distinguishing the user experience between professional artists and amateurs (who are unskilled at painting); (3) it is vital to exploit interactive technology to improve the originality and subtlety of traditional Chinese painting; and (4) employing interactive systems to engage users in participatory appreciation (through encouraging them to talk about art or discussing their understanding of it) could provide potential design insights for future studies.

Chromaticity changes of inorganic pigments in traditional Chinese paintings due to narrowband spectra in four-primary white light-emitting-diodes

Chromaticity changes of inorganic pigments in traditional Chinese paintings due to narrowband spectra in four-primary white light-emitting-diodes

DCT–CNN-based classification method for the Gongbi and Xieyi techniques of Chinese ink-wash paintings

Different from the western paintings, Chinese ink-wash paintings (IWPs) have own distinctive art styles. Furthermore, Chinese IWPs can be divided into two classes, Gongbi (traditional Chinese realistic painting) and Xieyi (freehand style). The extraction of Chinese IWP features with good classification results is challenging because of similar content. This paper presents a novel framework by combining a discrete cosine transformation (DCT) and convolutional neural networks (CNNs). In this framework, a CNN automatically extracts Chinese IWP features from a small subset of the DCT coefficients of an image instead of raw pixels commonly because of its good performance. We evaluate the proposed framework on a dataset including 1400 Chinese IWPs. Experimental results show that the proposed framework achieves competitive classification performance compared to existing benchmark methods.

Bilingual and intersemiotic representation of distance(s) in Chinese landscape painting: from yi (‘meaning’) to yi (‘freedom’)

AbstractThis paper studies cross-modal distance representation in traditional Chinese landscape painting in a contemporary museum context with special reference to the classic three axes of distance, i.e. level, deep, and high “distance.” It observes how an artwork’s “meaning” can be perceived through the bilingual presentation of the “distances” to bring about the realization of a “meditative distance,” or the artist’s aesthetic aspiration for a spiritual “freedom.” Informed by the theory of three meta-functions in Systemic Functional Linguistics and Arnheim’s discussion about distance cues, the study has closely examined a classical landscape painting in conjunction with its Chinese and English bilingual museum captions, with a view to tracing out their discursive meta-functions based on the visual-verbal coherence of distance representation. In so doing, the study takes museum discourse as a holistic multimodal interactive process of different sign systems at three levels of communication (i.e. extratextual, intersemiotic, and intertextual) to enable the modern viewer to better appreciate the aesthetic aspiration nursed by the meaning of the pictorially depicted distance(s) in an ancient landscape painting. The findings of the study will not only contribute to a better aesthetic contextualization of the traditional Chinese visual arts but also, in a practical vein, to the construction of a more informed museum discursive environment conducive to a spiritual journey, or a mental transcendence, that keeps the mundane world at a “meditative distance.”

The Application of Traditional Chinese Painting Technique and Stroke Effect in Digital Ink Painting

The Application of Traditional Chinese Painting Technique and Stroke Effect in Digital Ink Painting

Specific Synergy of Content and Form in Huang Ji’s Vocal Miniature to Liu Xiang’s Poem «Going Through the Snow»

The aim of the article is to reveal the specific synergy of content and form in Huang Ji’s vocal miniature to Liu Xiang’s poem “Going through the Snow”.Research methodology. The comparative analysis applied in the article made it possible to establish morphogenetic and meaningful links between music and poetic text of Huang Ji’s vocal miniature to Liu Xiang’s poem “Going through the Snow” and traditional Chinese painting. The leading intonemes of the vocal miniature have been determined by the intonational analysis, among which the intoneme of the bell holds a unique place.Results. The author examines the specific performance character of the comprehensive content in the small form typical of Huang Ji’s vocal miniature to Liu Xiang’s poem “Going through the Snow”. The syntheses of signs of expressiveness inherent in music, poetry and painting, the principle of allegorical presentation of the plot have contributed to the concentration of the volumetric content in the small form. The embodiment of the poetic text of a song of national painting, which is defined as a moving perspective, has led to the emergence of moving landscapes and plot. The Chinese vocal miniature genre is defined as a song-scroll by the type of content development. The journey from winter to spring is interpreted as a symbolic reflection of the path of cognition of the world. It has been established that intonemes of the song drama have affirmative and symbolic significance. The intoneme of the bell is inherent in the unity of symbolic and realistic functions.Novelty. An attempt is made at identifying a song-scroll as the genre type of the Chinese vocal miniature, arising from the infusion of the features of classical national painting to the song drama.The practical significance is determined by the expediency of using its provisions both in further scientific developments regarding the genre specific character of the Chinese vocal miniature, and in the process of implementing the interpretative versions of the song masterpiece by Huang Ji.

Scientific analysis of tie luo, a Qing Dynasty calligraphy artifact in the Palace Museum, Beijing, China

Tie luo (affixed hanging) was an expressive form of traditional Chinese calligraphy or paintings, and popular in the imperial palaces for interior decorations in Qing Dynasty (1644–1911 C.E.). A piece of calligraphic tie luo, written by an eminent calligrapher Gu Gao (1763–1832 C.E.), was restored recently in the Palace Museum, Beijing, China. The paper with pigment coating specially made for this calligraphic piece was named as fenjian. This article presented results from materials identification prior to the restoration. Multianalysis with scientific approaches revealed how tie luo was manufactured. It could be concluded that the investigated tie luo used a paper made from bast fibers of mulberry trees. And the decorative ground layer for the piece was also studied, which indicated that a type of organic red pigments were used for the masterpiece. White lead was considered as the main pigment, mixed with a red dye extracted from sappanwood. Meanwhile, animal glue, drying oils and beeswax were confirmed as the organic binding media. In dye analysis, protosappanin B and brazilin as well as brazilein were identified, which implied that sappanwood was used for the organic manufacture of pigments. In addition, both Nowik type A and C were found in the research, which were characteristic of sappanwood for identification.

Identification of Relevant Images from Ancient Paintings using Statistical Distribution

Objectives: This article highlights a novel concept of identifying the ancient images along with the artists by proposing a model based on a Generalized Bivariate Laplacian Mixture Model (GBLMM) approach for this purpose. Methods/Statistical Analysis: Conservative Chinese paintings emulate the exquisiteness of Chinese sculpture. Most of these descriptions are digitized and are available in the internet. One of challenging task is to retrieve the images of significance more efficiently and proficiently. This article highlights a pioneering idea to spot these ancient images along with the artist by proposing a model based on a Generalized Bivariate Laplacian Mixture Model (GBLMM) approach. Findings: The methodology is subjected to the application of ancient Chinese paintings. The results derived are evaluated against quality metrics such as image fidelity, peak signal noise ratio, structured coefficients, average difference and mean squared error. The proposed model accomplished over 97% of classification accuracy over a dataset containing 3750 traditional Chinese paintings. Application/Improvements: In order to ascertain the quality of segmentation, metrics like Image Fidelity (IF), Mean Squared Error (MSE) and Peak Signal Noise Ratio (PSNR) are considered. This model can be very much useful for the archeologists to identify the ancient paintings. Keywords: Ancient Paintings, GBLMM, Mixture Model, Quality Metrics, Retrieval

Enhancing the Appreciation of Traditional Chinese Painting Using Interactive Technology

In this paper, we present a two-part study. The first part was a cultural appreciation study. Through this study, we explored the specific approach of cross-cultural aesthetic appreciation and mapped out the potential insights for a prototype design. In the second part, we carried out a design-led study. We designed a tablet application and conducted focus group studies to explore the interactive technology that assists in the support of cross-cultural audiences’ aesthetic appreciation and engagement of traditional Chinese painting. Based on these findings, we went on to further explore an approach of interactive engagement which is specific to supporting cross-cultural appreciation, while also reflecting upon the interactive design suggestions for the development of aesthetic appreciation to offer various transferable insights to the Human–Computer Interaction (HCI) community.

Influence of illumination on inorganic pigments used in Chinese traditional paintings based on Raman spectroscopy

Taking colour difference as the damage indicator for evaluating light sources used for lighting Chinese traditional paintings means we can only judge the photochromic phenomenon, but cannot evaluate the mechanical damage such as cracking, cannot solve the problem that the material has been damaged without any colour change and cannot analyse non-staining cultural relics. In order to solve these problems, this study conducted a long-term illumination experiment on pigment specimens of Chinese traditional painting with light sources commonly used in museums. The Raman spectra of specimens before and after illumination were tested. By analysing the variations of Raman characteristic peak intensity ratios, the quantitative influence and relative influence coefficients of different light sources on the microscopic molecular structure of paintings were studied. Finally, the results of this study were compared with the results of previous research on colour, to determine whether the two sets of results were consistent which would verify the credibility of the research method adopted.

Chromaticity changes of inorganic pigments in Chinese traditional paintings due to the illumination of frequently‐used light sources in museum

AbstractOptical radiation can cause permanent damage to the color of Chinese traditional paintings, which have extremely high responsivity in the museum illumination. In order to obtain quantitative influence laws of artificial illumination on inorganic pigments in Chinese traditional paintings and provide basis for choosing light sources, a long periodic illumination experiment was carried out to examine how prolonged exposure of three light sources (tungsten halogen, metal halide and white light emitting diodes), frequently‐used in museums, affect the chromaticity of five inorganic pigments [azurite (blue), cinnabar (red), orpiment (yellow), ancient graphite (black), clam shell powder (white)], commonly used in Chinese traditional paintings. Through the experiment, we found that the illumination causes a color change to inorganic pigments, and the degree of which is related to the photochemical stability of pigments and the high energy shortwave radiation in the light source spectrum. We also obtain the color change laws of the five pigments and the quantitative relationships of color damage for different painting types. These results can provide data basis for related research on Chinese traditional painting illumination and choice basis for light sources in museum lighting designs.

Brief Analysis of Chinese Traditional Portrait Painting Development

Brief Analysis of Chinese Traditional Portrait Painting Development

Works of Chinese traditional painting in the Soviet museums: to a question of studying and updating

Works of Chinese traditional painting in the Soviet museums: to a question of studying and updating

Conceptul de vid in arta modernă şi contemporană / Concept of Void in Modern and Contemporary Art

e Void is a fundamental notion in the tradition of milenary wisdom that dessignates Nothingness, Non-being or those determinations that are opposed to existence. Vacuity or the Void is a central ontological category to many philosophical sistems and spiritual traditions (budism, platonism, early mystical christianity, Hegel’s philosophy). Many physicists including Harold Aspen, Paul Dirac, Shiuji Inomata and omas Bearden have postulated the existance of void as a real energetic "eld. is article o#ers a short description of the traditional chinese painting that was viewed as a philosophy that combines symbols and cosmic elements to express the soul and inner movements of creation. e void in chinese paintings represents the space that is not created, or the space that was not touched by ink, often depicted as clouds, fog, water Fig.1. Artists of the artistic avangard of XX century are included, such as: Kazimir Malevici, Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee, Mark Rothko, Yves Klein, Barnett Newman, contemporary artist Anish Kapoor, Lee Ufan. ey explored new ways, new regions, they found new possibilities to create and express the unseen and the space that is behind existence and sustains it. ese are part of the artists that have created works of art by destroing the object into art, with the purpose to bring closer the art to the inner truth of conscience, reaching to total abstraction the art is absorbed by the life of spirit that animates all creation. ey had the intuition that reality is not what is seems, and it is much more than we are able to perceive, it is mysterious, animated by the vital breaths1, and so the painting becomes a microcosmos that mirrors the macrocosmos.

Book Review - François Jullien, The Great Image Has No Form, or On the Nonobject through Painting: A Review

Creative Arts Educ Ther (2017) 3(1):79–86DOI: 10.15212/CAET/2017/17/9 Book Review – François Jullien, The Great Image Has No Form, or On the Nonobject through Painting: A Review 弗兰科瓦·于连 《大象无形，或从绘画论非客体》读后感 Nadia Chaney European Graduate School, Switzerland Abstract In The Great Image Has No Form, or On the Nonobject through Painting, François Jullien attempts to find a way to describe the meaning of undifferentiation in traditional Chinese painting. In every chapter, he re-examines the relationship of the painter to the arising-essence of the object and the painter’s desire to go upstream from the arising in order to paint with the object as the object would come to appear in the world. He describes the tradition of Chinese literati painting as an unbroken search for the non-object and the “foundation-font” of existence. In particular, the idea of the non-object is obscured, he says, by the dichotomy of presence and absence. Rather than this dichotomy, he tells us that presence and absence are a continuum in Chinese thought, and that they indicate the arising from and returning to (which is constantly occurring) of the world to an undifferentiated fount. This book may point toward a way out of the subject-object dichotomy, by offering access to a philosophy and creative tradition that does not compartmentalize time in terms of what is gone and what does not exist, but is in a constant state of emergence and transformation, so that time is part of space, and part of matter, and is not imaginary, but is material. 摘要 在《大象无形，或从绘画论非客体》一书中，弗兰科瓦·于连意在描述中国国画中“无分别”的用意。在书本的章节中，作者一次次剖析画家与物体所浮现的本质间的关系以及他想追随这种浮现至其发源处并与浮现一同来到世上的渴望。于连把中国文学界的作画传统比作一次不间断的对非客体和存在的“基础本质”的探寻。他说，有和无之间的对立掩盖了非客体这一观点。于连告诉我们，在中国哲学思想中，有和无并非对立，而是一个连续体。有和无指示这个世界接连不断地从混沌中浮现而又回到混沌中去的现象。本书向我们介绍了这样一个哲学和创作的传统，它也许能解决主体与客体间的对立：它不把时间放在过去和不存在的束缚中，而把它看作不断发生和衍化的，使时间成为空间、物质的一部分：它有实体，而非想象。

Time-Space Alterations: A New Media Abstraction of Traditional Chinese Painting and Calligraphy Aesthetics

The artist and scholar Keung Hung argues that traditional Chinese manners of approaching art can be abstracted through digital media, forging new interdisciplinary correlations. He posits that digital media can be used to shift the notions of time and space from traditional Chinese aesthetics into the contemporary art context.

Authentication and inference of seal stamps on Chinese traditional painting by using multivariate classification and near-infrared spectroscopy

Chinese traditional paintings occupy an important position in Chinese cultural heritage and it is very important for archeologist and artist to identify their authenticity, which is difficult to be realized. Near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) coupled with multivariate models was used for authenticating stamps of 12 seals on a Chinese traditional painting in this work. The robustness of linear and nonlinear multivariate models, i.e. partial least squares-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) and support vector machine (SVM), were evaluated by adding 5 different levels of noise (from 1% to 5%) into 3 original NIR spectra of each the stamps. These spectral data with noise added were fused together with original spectra to establish identification models and then to evaluate the abilities of the two models to tolerate noise disturbance. Accuracies of 92.6% and 100% were yielded by linear PLS-DA and nonlinear SVM methods respectively. The results demonstrate the feasibility of multivariate approaches in authenticating stamps of seals on the Chinese traditional painting. It is also important and necessary to infer the approximate eras of seal stamps on Chinese traditional painting in archeological study. By comparing the Mahalanobis distances between the 12 stamps on the painting, hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) was adopted to assist the inference of eras for those unknown seal stamps on the Chinese traditional painting. This work demonstrates that NIR spectroscopy combined with multivariate models can be utilized as a non-destructive approach for authentication of stamps on Chinese traditional painting. HCA can also provide useful information to speculate the time period of the stamps of unknown seals on the Chinese traditional painting.

Establishing a new scopic regime: the new landscape painting of Mao’s era

ABSTRACTAfter 1949, with ‘serving the people’ established as the basic guideline of art, the reform of traditional landscape painting, which had been appropriated by the cultural elites for thousands of years, was put on the agenda as well. Beginning from the early of 1950s, there were continual debates on the reform of traditional Chinese painting within the art field, through which many artists gradually reached a consensus on the development direction of Chinese painting. At the same time, stimulated by the large-scale xiesheng movement sponsored by the government, Chinese landscape painting changed dramatically in subject, theme, and brushstroke technique, and developed a new style which has its own signifying system. Blending both Chinese and western drawing skills, the new landscape painting successfully created a unique scopic regime, which can establish an organic relationship between personal aesthetic experience and collective historical experience. As a prominent cultural achievement of Mao’s era, the new landscape painting embodies the cultural politics and the technologies of the self at that time.