The Year of the Horse was supposed to be about horses, but those who painted horses were led by Xu Beihong, a master of Chinese painting. Xu Beihong had in-depth and meticulous research on the appearance and habits of horses, painting more than a thousand sketches of horses. He was able to use Western painting methods and Chinese painting strokes to express realistic horses, and in his pen created the image of a horse with a distinct personality.
However, today, let's talk about the painting of pigs by the master of horse painting, Xu Beihong.
In the painting world, there is a custom that pigs do not enter the painting world. Throughout the history of painting, famous paintings of cattle, horses, chickens, dogs, tigers, etc. have all been popular in the world, but pig paintings have not been passed down to this day. Pig objects give people a dirty and lazy vision, although their sense of smell is not bad, the brush is difficult to reflect. What's more, if someone asks for a painting and draws a pig as a gift, wouldn't that be a curse? There are many reasons for famous paintings of pigs, but there are none.
Even so, in the painting world, not everyone has not painted pigs. The famous Chinese painting master Xu Beihong once painted pigs three times.
Xu Beihong's first ink pig was published in the late winter of 1934. At that time, "China Times - Picture Weekly" asked Xu Beihong to draw a pig for the upcoming Year of the Pig. Beihong agreed, and a few days later, Beihong used a large amount of light ink and fine strokes to draw, and then used a large amount of inkjet on the back of the pig's head, and erased it with random strokes to draw a black pig coming from the opposite side. When Beihong finished writing, he faced the painting, and after a little thought, he picked up the pen and wrote on the painting, "Beihong painted a pig, it is a strange story." Immediately signed "Yihai year old, " Beihong wrote, and put a round "Xu" character seal.
Not long after, Master Beihong painted a second ink pig. The composition and brush and ink of this painting are basically similar to the first. To say what is different, there is a wonderful poem inscribed on the upper right of the second ink pig painting: "The little one has also been stabbed, and he does not walk the rivers and lakes with his bare hands. The gods have no skills for Zhang Huangji, bathing in incense and painting ink pigs."
About 10 years after the first pig ink painting was published, Master Beihong painted the third pig ink painting when he returned to Chongqing from Guiyang. This painting is the erection of an inkjet cloud mountain. On the shady road near the bottom, there are two coolies carrying a big fat pig with a sliding rod. The pig is a black and white pig with all its feet in the sky and sleeps firmly on the sliding rod. On the top of the painting, Beihong inscribed two intriguing poems: "Two people carry a pig, and the pig comes from the depths of white clouds." The signature is "I wrote it back in the first month of spring in Beihong." Obviously, this painting and this poem contain strong irony. As people say, painting pigs has the meaning of scolding people. At that time, the phenomenon in the painting was often seen in many scenic spots.
It is a pity that the first ink pig by Mr. Xu Beihong has been lost. Fortunately, the second and third pigs are now preserved in the "Xu Beihong Memorial Hall" in Beijing and published in the collection "Xu Beihong Color Ink Paintings".