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Dragon Strokes: Calligraphy by Scholars 2012 was the brainchild of Chan Hou Seng, the director of the Macao Museum of Art (MAM), and came about when he organized the MAM series of seminars on calligraphy and painting. In these seminars, he watched scholars deliberate on their specialised subjects and present their research on the podium, each seminar brilliant in its own right. Over the years, whilst listening to scholars critiquing classical masters on stage, Chan always wondered when it would be time for him to admire the works of these scholars who were so impressive in talking about others – they must have achieved excellence in their own works.
Dragon Strokes: Calligraphy by Scholars 2012 will be a rare opportunity for us to admire the artistic calligraphic creativity of these aforementioned scholars – namely, Fu Shen, Yang Xin, Xue Yongnian, Xiao Ping, Cao Baolin, Huang Dun, Liu Yiwen and Bai Qianshen – away from the podium and observe how they effortlessly apply their accumulated knowledge and experience wandering around Chinese characters and lines both ‘on-stage’ and ‘off-stage’ to weave their calligraphic magic on us.
This exhibition features various styles in running script, regular script, seal script, clerical script, cursive script and combination styles. These works range from poetry to postscripts to essays to commentaries, embracing a variety of content and styles. In both traditional and non-traditional ways, not only will these works represent the calligraphic attainments achieved by these eight scholars, they will showcase their academic depths in calligraphy, painting and literature.
I cannot help but think that there’s no limit to one’s knowledge; the accumulation of one’s knowledge is not a matter of a day or two, is it? We must have the bearing, just like the ocean that is capable of absorbing hundreds of rivers, to have a universal perspective and not get bogged down in mundane affairs; then perhaps we will live in peace with all creatures in Nature and forget about ourselves when we write or paint. Perhaps in this way the essence of life will be unaffectedly retained on paper through calligraphy or painting?
How wonderful that would be!
Weng Chiao
Exhibition Co-ordinator
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