text:
Chinese painting

Chinese painting is one of the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world. Painting in the traditional style is known today in Chinese as guó huà, meaning "national painting" or "native painting", as opposed to Western styles of art which became popular in China in the 20th century. It is also called danqing. Traditional painting involves essentially the same techniques as calligraphy and is done with a brush dipped in black ink or coloured pigments; oils are not used. As with calligraphy, the most popular materials on which paintings are made are paper and silk. The finished work can be mounted on scrolls, such as hanging scrolls or handscrolls. Traditional painting can also be done on album sheets, walls, lacquerware, folding screens, and other media.

The two main techniques in Chinese painting are:
 * Gongbi (工筆), meaning "meticulous", uses highly detailed brushstrokes that delimit details very precisely. It is often highly colored and usually depicts figural or narrative subjects. It is often practiced by artists working for the royal court or in independent workshops.
 * Ink and wash painting, in Chinese shuǐ-mò (水墨, "water and ink") also loosely termed watercolor or brush painting, and also known as "literati painting", as it was one of the "four arts" of the Chinese Scholar-official class. In theory this was an art practiced by gentlemen, a distinction that begins to be made in writings on art from the Song dynasty, though in fact the careers of leading exponents could benefit considerably. This style is also referred to as "xieyi" (寫意) or freehand style.

Landscape painting was regarded as the highest form of Chinese painting, and generally still is. The time from the Five Dynasties period to the Northern Song period (907–1127) is known as the "Great age of Chinese landscape". In the north, artists such as Jing Hao, Li Cheng, Fan Kuan, and Guo Xi painted pictures of towering mountains, using strong black lines, ink wash, and sharp, dotted brushstrokes to suggest rough stone. In the south, Dong Yuan, Juran, and other artists painted the rolling hills and rivers of their native countryside in peaceful scenes done with softer, rubbed brushwork. These two kinds of scenes and techniques became the classical styles of Chinese landscape painting.

Specifics and study
Chinese painting and calligraphy distinguish themselves from other cultures' arts by emphasis on motion and change with dynamic life. The practice is traditionally first learned by rote, in which the master shows the "right way" to draw items. The apprentice must copy these items strictly and continuously until the movements become instinctive. In contemporary times, debate emerged on the limits of this copyist tradition within modern art scenes where innovation is the rule. Changing lifestyles, tools, and colors are also influencing new waves of masters.

Early periods
The earliest paintings were not representational but ornamental; they consisted of patterns or designs rather than pictures. Early pottery was painted with spirals, zigzags, dots, or animals. It was only during the Eastern Zhou (770–256 BC) that artists began to represent the world around them. In imperial times (beginning with the Eastern Jin dynasty), painting and calligraphy in China were among the most highly appreciated arts in the court and they were often practiced by amateurs—aristocrats and scholar-officials—who had the leisure time necessary to perfect the technique and sensibility necessary for great brushwork. Calligraphy and painting were thought to be the purest forms of art. The implements were the brush pen made of animal hair, and black inks made from pine soot and animal glue. In ancient times, writing, as well as painting, was done on silk. However, after the invention of paper in the 1st century AD, silk was gradually replaced by the new and cheaper material. Original writings by famous calligraphers have been greatly valued throughout China's history and are mounted on scrolls and hung on walls in the same way that paintings are.

Artists from the Han (206 BC – 220 AD) to the Tang (618–906) dynasties mainly painted the human figure. Much of what we know of early Chinese figure painting comes from burial sites, where paintings were preserved on silk banners, lacquered objects, and tomb walls. Many early tomb paintings were meant to protect the dead or help their souls to get to paradise. Others illustrated the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius or showed scenes of daily life.

During the Six Dynasties period (220–589), people began to appreciate painting for its own beauty and to write about art. From this time we begin to learn about individual artists, such as Gu Kaizhi. Even when these artists illustrated Confucian moral themes – such as the proper behavior of a wife to her husband or of children to their parents – they tried to make the figures graceful.

.

Six principles

The "Six principles of Chinese painting" were established by Xie He, a writer, art historian and critic in 5th century China, in "Six points to consider when judging a painting" (繪畫六法, Pinyin: Huìhuà Liùfǎ), taken from the preface to his book "The Record of the Classification of Old Painters" (古畫品錄; Pinyin: Gǔhuà Pǐnlù). Keep in mind that this was written circa 550 CE and refers to "old" and "ancient" practices. The six elements that define a painting are:

 * 1) "Spirit Resonance", or vitality, which refers to the flow of energy that encompasses theme, work, and artist. Xie He said that without Spirit Resonance, there was no need to look further.
 * 2) "Bone Method", or the way of using the brush, refers not only to texture and brush stroke, but to the close link between handwriting and personality. In his day, the art of calligraphy was inseparable from painting.
 * 3) "Correspondence to the Object", or the depicting of form, which would include shape and line.
 * 4) "Suitability to Type", or the application of color, including layers, value, and tone.
 * 5) "Division and Planning", or placing and arrangement, corresponding to composition, space, and depth.
 * 6) "Transmission by Copying", or the copying of models, not from life only but also from the works of antiquity.

Sui, Tang and Five dynasties (581–979)

During the Tang dynasty, figure painting flourished at the royal court. Artists such as Zhou Fang depicted the splendor of court life in paintings of emperors, palace ladies, and imperial horses. Figure painting reached the height of elegant realism in the art of the court of Southern Tang (937–975).

Most of the Tang artists outlined figures with fine black lines and used brilliant color and elaborate detail. However, one Tang artist, the master Wu Daozi, used only black ink and freely painted brushstrokes to create ink paintings that were so exciting that crowds gathered to watch him work. From his time on, ink paintings were no longer thought to be preliminary sketches or outlines to be filled in with color. Instead, they were valued as finished works of art.

Beginning in the Tang dynasty, many paintings were landscapes, often shanshui (山水, "mountain water") paintings. In these landscapes, monochromatic and sparse (a style that is collectively called shuimohua), the purpose was not to reproduce the appearance of nature exactly (realism) but rather to grasp an emotion or atmosphere, as if catching the "rhythm" of nature.

A considerable amount of literary and documentary information about Tang painting has survived, but very few works, especially of the highest quality. A walled-up cave in the Mogao Caves complex at Dunhuang was discovered by Sir Aurel Stein, which contained a vast haul, mostly of Buddhist writings, but also some banners and paintings, making much the largest group of paintings on silk to survive. These are now in the British Museum and elsewhere. They are not of court quality, but show a variety of styles, including those with influences from further west. As with sculpture, other survivals showing Tang style are in Japan, though the most important, at Nara, was very largely destroyed in a fire in 1949. The rock-cut cave complexes and royal tombs also contain many wall-paintings. Court painting mostly survives in what are certainly or arguably copies from much later.

Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan dynasties (907–1368)

Painting during the Song dynasty (960–1279) reached a further development of landscape painting; immeasurable distances were conveyed through the use of blurred outlines, mountain contours disappearing into the mist, and impressionistic treatment of natural phenomena. The shan shui style painting—"shan" meaning mountain, and "shui" meaning river—became prominent in Chinese landscape art. The emphasis laid upon landscape was grounded in Chinese philosophy; Taoism stressed that humans were but tiny specks in the vast and greater cosmos, while Neo-Confucianist writers often pursued the discovery of patterns and principles that they believed caused all social and natural phenomena. The painting of portraits and closely viewed objects like birds on branches were held in high esteem, but landscape painting was paramount. By the beginning of the Song dynasty a distinctive landscape style had emerged. Artists mastered the formula of intricate and realistic scenes placed in the foreground, while the background retained qualities of vast and infinite space. Distant mountain peaks rise out of high clouds and mist, while streaming rivers run from afar into the foreground.

There was a significant difference in painting trends between the Northern Song period (960–1127) and Southern Song period (1127–1279). The paintings of Northern Song officials were influenced by their political ideals of bringing order to the world and tackling the largest issues affecting the whole of society; their paintings often depicted huge, sweeping landscapes. On the other hand, Southern Song officials were more interested in reforming society from the bottom up and on a much smaller scale, a method they believed had a better chance for eventual success; their paintings often focused on smaller, visually closer, and more intimate scenes, while the background was often depicted as bereft of detail as a realm without concern for the artist or viewer. This change in attitude from one era to the next stemmed largely from the rising influence of Neo-Confucian philosophy. Adherents to Neo-Confucianism focused on reforming society from the bottom up, not the top down, which can be seen in their efforts to promote small private academies during the Southern Song instead of the large state-controlled academies seen in the Northern Song era.

Ever since the Southern and Northern dynasties (420–589), painting had become an art of high sophistication that was associated with the gentry class as one of their main artistic pastimes, the others being calligraphy and poetry. During the Song dynasty there were avid art collectors that would often meet in groups to discuss their own paintings, as well as rate those of their colleagues and friends. The poet and statesman Su Shi (1037–1101) and his accomplice Mi Fu (1051–1107) often partook in these affairs, borrowing art pieces to study and copy, or if they really admired a piece then an exchange was often proposed. They created a new kind of art based upon the three perfections in which they used their skills in calligraphy (the art of beautiful writing) to make ink paintings. From their time onward, many painters strove to freely express their feelings and to capture the inner spirit of their subject instead of describing its outward appearance. The small round paintings popular in the Southern Song were often collected into albums as poets would write poems along the side to match the theme and mood of the painting.

Although they were avid art collectors, some Song scholars did not readily appreciate artworks commissioned by those painters found at shops or common marketplaces, and some of the scholars even criticized artists from renowned schools and academies. Anthony J. Barbieri-Low, a professor of early Chinese history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, points out that Song scholars' appreciation of art created by their peers was not extended to those who made a living simply as professional artists:

"During the Northern Song (960–1126 CE), a new class of scholar-artists emerged who did not possess the tromp l'œil skills of the academy painters nor even the proficiency of common marketplace painters. The literati's painting was simpler and at times quite unschooled, yet they would criticize these other two groups as mere professionals, since they relied on paid commissions for their livelihood and did not paint merely for enjoyment or self-expression. The scholar-artists considered that painters who concentrated on realistic depictions, who employed a colorful palette, or, worst of all, who accepted monetary payment for their work were no better than butchers or tinkers in the marketplace. They were not to be considered real artists."

However, during the Song period, there were many acclaimed court painters and they were highly esteemed by emperors and the royal family. One of the greatest landscape painters given patronage by the Song court was Zhang Zeduan (1085–1145), who painted the original Along the River During the Qingming Festival scroll, one of the most well-known masterpieces of Chinese visual art. Emperor Gaozong of Song (1127–1162) once commissioned an art project of numerous paintings for the Eighteen Songs of a Nomad Flute, based on the woman poet Cai Wenji (177–250 AD) of the earlier Han dynasty. Yi Yuanji achieved a high degree of realism painting animals, in particular monkeys and gibbons. During the Southern Song period (1127–1279), court painters such as Ma Yuan and Xia Gui used strong black brushstrokes to sketch trees and rocks and pale washes to suggest misty space.

During the Mongol Yuan dynasty (1271–1368), painters joined the arts of painting, poetry, and calligraphy by inscribing poems on their paintings. These three arts worked together to express the artist's feelings more completely than one art could do alone. Yuan emperor Tugh Temur (r. 1328, 1329–1332) was fond of Chinese painting and became a creditable painter himself.

Late imperial China (1368–1895)
Beginning in the 13th century, the tradition of painting simple subjects—a branch with fruit, a few flowers, or one or two horses—developed. Narrative painting, with a wider color range and a much busier composition than Song paintings, was immensely popular during the Ming period (1368–1644).

The first books illustrated with colored woodcuts appeared around this time; as color-printing techniques were perfected, illustrated manuals on the art of painting began to be published. Jieziyuan Huazhuan (Manual of the Mustard Seed Garden), a five-volume work first published in 1679, has been in use as a technical textbook for artists and students ever since.

Some painters of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) continued the traditions of the Yuan scholar-painters. This group of painters, known as the Wu School, was led by the artist Shen Zhou. Another group of painters, known as the Zhe School, revived and transformed the styles of the Song court.

During the early Qing dynasty (1644–1911), painters known as Individualists rebelled against many of the traditional rules of painting and found ways to express themselves more directly through free brushwork. In the 18th and 19th centuries, great commercial cities such as Yangzhou and Shanghai became art centers where wealthy merchant-patrons encouraged artists to produce bold new works. However, similar to the phenomenon of key lineages producing, many well-known artists came from established artistic families. Such families were concentrated in the Jiangnan region and produced painters such as Ma Quan, Jiang Tingxi, and Yun Zhu.

It was also during this period when Chinese trade painters emerged. Taking advantage of British and other European traders in popular port cities such as Canton, these artists created works in the Western style particularly for Western traders. Known as Chinese export paintings, the trade thrived throughout the Qing dynasty.

In the late 19th and 20th centuries, Chinese painters were increasingly exposed to Western art. Some artists who studied in Europe rejected Chinese painting; others tried to combine the best of both traditions. Among the most beloved modern painters was Qi Baishi, who began life as a poor peasant and became a great master. His best-known works depict flowers and small animals.

Modern painting

Beginning with the New Culture Movement, Chinese artists started to adopt using Western techniques. Prominent Chinese artists who studied Western painting include Li Tiefu, Yan Wenliang, Xu Beihong, Lin Fengmian, Fang Ganmin and Liu Haisu.

In the early years of the People's Republic of China, artists were encouraged to employ socialist realism. Some Soviet Union socialist realism was imported without modification, and painters were assigned subjects and expected to mass-produce paintings. This regimen was considerably relaxed in 1953, and after the Hundred Flowers Campaign of 1956–57, traditional Chinese painting experienced a significant revival. Along with these developments in professional art circles, there was a proliferation of peasant art depicting everyday life in the rural areas on wall murals and in open-air painting exhibitions.

During the Cultural Revolution, art schools were closed, and publication of art journals and major art exhibitions ceased. Major destruction was also carried out as part of the elimination of Four Olds campaign.

Since 1978
Following the Cultural Revolution, art schools and professional organizations were reinstated. Exchanges were set up with groups of foreign artists, and Chinese artists began to experiment with new subjects and techniques. One particular case of freehand style (xieyi hua) may be noted in the work of the child prodigy Wang Yani (born 1975) who started painting at age 3 and has since considerably contributed to the exercise of the style in contemporary artwork.

After Chinese economic reform, more and more artists boldly conducted innovations in Chinese painting. The innovations include: development of new brushing skill such as vertical direction splash water and ink, with representative artist Tiancheng Xie, creation of new style by integration traditional Chinese and Western painting techniques such as Heaven Style painting, with representative artist Shaoqiang Chen, and new styles that express contemporary theme and typical nature scene of certain regions such as Lijiang Painting Style, with representative artist Gesheng Huang. A 2008 set of paintings by Cai Jin, most well known for her use of psychedelic colors, showed influences of both Western and traditional Chinese sources, though the paintings were organic abstractions.

Contemporary Chinese art
Chinese painting continues to play an essential role in Chinese cultural expression. Starting in the mid-twentieth century, artists begin to combine traditional Chinese painting techniques with Western art styles, leading to the style of new contemporary Chinese art. One of the representative artists is Wei Dong who drew inspirations from eastern and western sources to express national pride and arrive at personal actualization.

Water Mill
As the landscape painting rose and became the dominant style in North Song dynasty, artists began to shift their attention from jiehua painting, which indicates paintings of Chinese architectural objects such as buildings, boats, wheels and vehicles, towards landscape paintings. Intertwining with the imperial landscape painting, water mill, an element of jiehua painting, though, is still used as an imperial symbol. Water mill depicted in the Water Mill is a representation for the revolution of technology, economy, science, mechanical engineering and transportation in Song dynasty. It represents the government directly participate in the milling industry which can influence commercial activities. Another evidence that shows the government interfered with the commercial is a wineshop that appears beside the water mill. The water mill in Shanghai Scroll reflects the development in engineering and growing knowledge in hydrology. Furthermore, a water mill can also be used to identify a painting and used as a literature metaphor. Lately, the water mill transform into a symbolic form representing the imperial court.

A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains by Wang Ximeng, celebrates the imperial patronage and builds up a bridge that ties the later emperors, Huizong, Shenzong with their ancestors, Taizu and Taizong. The water mill in this painting, unlike that is painted in previous Shanghai scroll to be solid and weighted, it is painted to be ambiguous and vague to match up with the court taste of that time. The painting reflects a slow pace and peaceful idyllic style of living. Located deeply in a village, the water mill is driven by the force of a huge, vertical waterwheel which is powered by a sluice gate. The artist seems to be ignorance towards hydraulic engineering since he only roughly drew out the mechanism of the whole process. A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountainspainted by Wang Ximeng, a court artist taught directly by Huizong himself. Thus, the artwork A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountainsshould directly review the taste of the imperial taste of the landscape painting. Combining richness bright blue and turquoise pigments heritage from Tang dynasty with the vastness and solemn space and mountains from Northern Song, the scroll is a perfect representation of imperial power and aesthetic taste of the aristocrats.

Image as Word: Rebus
There is a long tradition of having hidden meaning behind certain objects in Chinese paintings. A fan painting by an unknown artist from North Song period depicts three gibbons capturing baby egrets and scaring the parents away. The rebus behind this scene is interpreted as celebrating the examination success. Since another painting which has similar subjects—gibbons and egrets, is given the title of San yuan de lu三猿得鹭, or Three gibbons catching egrets. As the rebus, the sound of the title can also be written as 三元得路, meaning "a triple first gains [one] power." 元represents "first" replaces its homophonous 猿, and 路means road, replaces 鹭. Sanyuan is firstly recorded as a term referring to people getting triple first place in an exam in Qingsuo gaoyi by a Liu Fu, and the usage of this new term gradually spread across the country where the scenery of gibbons and egrets is widely accepted. Lately, other scenery derived from the original paintings, including deer in the scene because in Chinese, deer, lu is also a homophonous of egrets. Moreover, the number of gibbons depicted in the painting can be flexible, not only limited to three, sanyuan. Since the positions in Song courts are held by elites who achieved jinshi degree, the paintings with gibbons, egrets or deer are used for praising those elites in general.

Emperor Huizong personally painted a painting called Birds in a blossom wax-plum tree, features with two "hoary headed birds," "Baitou weng" resting on a tree branch together. "Baitou" in Chinese culture is allusion to faithful love and marriage. In a well-known love poem, it wrote: "I wish for a lover in whose heart I alone exist, unseparated even our heads turn hoary." During Huizong's rule, literati rebus is embedded in court painting academy and became part of the test routine to enter the imperial court. During Song dynasty, the connection between painters and literati, paintings and poem is closer.

The Donkey Rider
"The country is broken; mountains and rivers remain." The poem by Du Fu (712–770) reflects the major principle in Chinese culture: the dynasty might change, but the landscape is eternal. This timelessness theme evolved from Six Dynasties period and early Northern Song. A donkey rider travelling through the mountains, rivers and villages is studied as an important iconographical character in developing of landscape painting.

The donkey rider in the painting Travelers in a wintry forest by Li Cheng is assumed to be a portrait painting of Meng Haoran, "a tall and lanky man dressed in a scholar plain robe, riding on a small horse followed by a young servant." Except Meng Haoran, other famous people for example, Ruan Ji, one of the seven sages of the Bamboo Grove and Du Fu, a younger contemporary of Meng are also depicted as donkey rider. Tang dynasty poets Jia Dao and Li He and early Song dynasty elites Pan Lang, Wang Anshi appears on the paintings as donkey rider. North Song poets Lin Bu and Su Shi are lately depicted as donkey rider. In this specific painting Travelers in a wintry forest, the potential candidates for the donkey rider are dismissed and the character can only be Meng Haoran. Meng Haoran has made more than two hundred poems in his life but none of them is related with donkey ride. Depicting him as a donkey rider is a historical invention and Meng represents a general persona than an individual character. Ruan Ji was depicted as donkey rider since he decided to escape the office life and went back to the wilderness. The donkey he was riding is representing his poverty and eccentricity. Du Fu was portrayed as the rider to emphasis his failure in office achievement and also his poor living condition. Meng Haoran, similar to those two figures, disinterested in office career and acted as a pure scholar in the field of poem by writing real poems with real experience and real emotional attachment with the landscape. The donkey rider is said to travel through time and space. The audience are able to connect with the scholars and poets in the past by walking on the same route as those superior ancestors have gone on. Besides the donkey rider, there is always a bridge for the donkey to across. The bridge is interpreted to have symbolic meaning that represents the road which hermits depart from capital city and their official careers and go back to the natural world.

Realm of the Immortals
During Song dynasty, paintings with themes ranging from animals, flower, landscape and classical stories, are used as ornaments in imperial palace, government office and elites' residence for multiple purposes. The theme of the art in display is carefully picked to reflect not only a personal taste, but also his social status and political achievement. In emperor Zhezong's lecture hall, a painting depicting stories form Zhou dynasty was hanging on the wall to remind Zhezong how to be a good ruler of the empire. The painting also serves the purpose of expressing his determination to his court officers that he is an enlightened emperor.

The main walls of the government office, also called walls of the "Jade Hall," meaning the residence of the immortals in Taoism are decorated by decorative murals. Most educated and respected scholars were selected and given the title xueshi. They were divided into groups in helping the Instituted of Literature and were described as descending from the immortals. Xueshi are receiving high social status and doing carefree jobs. Lately, the xueshi yuan, the place where xueshi lives, became the permanent government institution that helped the emperor to make imperial decrees.

During Tang dynasty reign of Emperor Xianzong (805–820), the west wall of the xueshi yuan was covered by murals depicting dragon-like mountain scene. In 820–822, immortal animals like Mount Ao, flying cranes, and, a kind of immortal birds were added to the murals. Those immortal symbols all indicate that the xueshi yuan as eternal existing government office.

During Song dynasty, the xueshi yuan was modified and moved with the dynasty to the new capital Hangzhou in 1127. The mural painted by Song artist Dong yu, closely followed the tradition of the Tang dynasty in depicting the misty sea surrounding the immortal mountains. The scenery on the walls of the Jade Hall which full of mist clouds and mysterious land is closely related to Taoism tradition. When Yan Su, a painter followed the style of Li Cheng, was invited to paint the screen behind the seat of the emperor, he included elaborated constructed pavilions, mist clouds and mountain landscape painting in his work. The theme of his painting is suggesting the immortal realm which accord with the entire theme of the Jade Hall provides to its viewer the feeling of otherworldliness. Another painter, Guo Xi made another screen painting for emperor Shenzong, depicting mountains in spring in a harmonized atmosphere. The image also includes immortal elements Mount Tianlao which is one of the realms of the immortals. In his painting, Early Spring, the strong branches of the trees reflects the life force of the living creatures and implying the emperor's benevolent rule.

Images of women
Female characters are almost excluded from traditional Chinese painting under the influence of Confucianism. Dong Zhongshu, an influential Confucian scholar in the Han dynasty, proposed the three-bond theory saying that: "the ruler is Yang and the subject is Yin, father is Yang and son is Yin…The husband is Yang, and the wife is Yin," which places females in a subordinate position to that of males. Under the three-bond theory, women are depicted as housewives who need to obey to their husbands and fathers in literature. Similarly, in the portrait paintings, female characters are also depicted as exemplary women to elevate the rule of males. A hand roll Exemplary Womenby Ku Kai Zhi, a six Dynasty artist, depicted woman characters who may be a wife, a daughter or a widow.

During the Tang dynasty, artists slowly began to appreciate the beauty of a woman's body (shinu). Artist Zhang Xuan produced painting named palace women listening to music that captured women's elegance and pretty faces. However, women were still being depicted as submissive and ideal within male system.

During the Song dynasty, as the love poem emerged, the images associated with those love stories were made as attractive as possible to meet the taste of the male viewers.

Paradigm shift in representation
Northern Song landscape painting differs from Southern Song painting because of its paradigm shift in representation. If Southern Song period landscape painting is said to be looking inward, Northern Song painting is reaching outward. During the Northern Song period, the rulers' goal is to consolidate and extend the elites value across the society. Whereas Southern Song painters decided to focus on personal expression. Northern Song landscapes are regarded as "real landscape", since the court appreciated the representation relationship between art and the external world, rather than the relationship between art and the artists inner voice. The painting, A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains is horizontally displayed and there are four mountain ranges arranged from left to right. Similar to another early Southern Song painter, Zhou Boju, both artists glorified their patrons by presenting the gigantic empire images in blue and green landscape painting. The only difference is that in Zhou's painting, there are five mountain ranges arranged from right to left. The scenes in the Southern Song paintings are about north landscape that echo the memory of their lost north territory. However, ironically, some scholars suggested that Wang Ximeng's A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains depicts the scenes of the south not the north.

Buddhist and Taoist influences
The Chinese landscape painting are believed to be affected by the intertwining Chinese traditional religious beliefs, for example, "the Taoist love of nature", and "Buddhist principle of emptiness," and can represent the diversification of artists attitudes and thoughts from previous period. The Taoist love of nature is not always present in Chinese landscape painting but gradually developed from Six Dynasties period when Taoists Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu, the Pao-p'u tzu's thoughts are reflected in literature documents. Apart from the contemporary Confucian tradition of insisting on human cultivation and learning to be more educated and build up social framework, Taoist persist on going back to human's origin, which is to be ignorant. Taoists believe that if one discard wise, the robbery will stop. If people abandon expensive jewelry, thieves will not exist. From the Han dynasty, the practice of Taoism was associated with alchemical and medicine made. To better pursuit Taoism belief, Taoist need to go on pilgrim into specific mountains to connect themselves with the spirits and immortals that lived in those mountains. In the third and fourth century, the practice of escaping society and going back to nature mediating in the countryside is further enhanced by a group called Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove who would like to escape from the civil unrest. The wise men fleet the world and wonder in the countryside and enjoy the tranquil landscape and forgot to return. The Taoism ideology of forgetfulness, self-cultivation, harmonizing with nature world, and purifying soul by entering the isolated mountains to mediate and seek medicine herbs create the scene of landscape painting.

During the Han dynasty, the mountains appeared in the design of the artworks shows the prevalence role of mountain in Han society. The emperor would climb on to the mountain to sacrifice and religion practice because mountains are thought to have connection between earth and heaven and can link human with spirits and immortals. And sometimes, mountains are depicted as mystical mountains" (shenshan), where sages and legendary animals settled. Hence, landscape painting is used as an object for Taoism practice which provide visualize form for religious ritual. During the Six Dynasties period, the landscape painting experienced a stylistic change which myth and poem depiction were introduced into the painting. For example, in Ku Kai-chih's "Nymph of the river" scroll and "The Admonitions of the Court Preceptress", audience are able to read narrative description and text accompanied by visualized images.

Furthermore, in Buddhism, the mountain also has an important role in religious practice. From an iconographical point of view, a Buddha's image is used in helping a believer to practice meditation. For instance, Buddha's reflection image, or shadow, is assimilated with the image of a mountain, Lushan. This assimilation is also recorded in a poem by poet from the Six Dynasties period who pointed out that the beauty and numinosity of the mountain can elevate the spiritual connection between human being and the spirits. Thus, the landscape painting come into display Buddha's image in people's everyday ritual practice. Hui-yuan described in his poem that "Lushan seems to mirror the divine appearance" which unifies the two images—the true image and the reflection of Buddha. Moreover, spiritual elevation can be achieved by contemplating in front of landscape painting which depict the same mountain and path those old sages have been to. The painting contains both the spiritual force (ling) and the truth (li) of Buddha and also the objects that no longer physically presence. Hui-Yuan's famous image is closely relation with its landscape scene indicating the trend of transformation from Buddha image to landscape painting as a religious practice.

Early landscape painting
In Chinese society, there is a long-time appreciation of natural beauty. The early themes of poems, artworks are associated with agriculture and everyday life associates with fields, animals. On the other hand, later Chinese painting pursuits majesty and grand. Thus, mountain scenery become the most popular subject to paint because it's high which represent human eminence. Also, mountain is stable and permanent suggests the eminent of the imperial power. Furthermore, mountain is difficult to climb showing the difficulties human will face through their lives.

Landscape painting evolved under the influence of Taoist who fled from civil turbulence and prosecution of the government and went back to the wilderness. However, the development of Taoism was hindered by Han dynasty. During Han dynasty, the empire expanded and enlarged its political and economic influence. Hence, the Taoism's anti-social belief was disfavored by the imperial government. Han rulers only favored portrait painting which enabled their image to be perpetuate and their civilians to see and to memorize their great leaders or generals. Landscape at that time only focus on the trees for literary or talismanic value. The usage of landscape painting as ornament is suspects to be borrowed from other societies outside Han empire during its expansion to the Near East. Landscape and animal scene began to appear on the jars, but the decoration has little to do with connection with the natural world. Also, there is evidence showing that the emerging of landscape painting is not derived from map-making.

During the Three Kingdoms and Six Dynasties, landscape painting began to have connection with literati and the production of poems. Taoism influence on people's appreciation of landscaping deceased and nature worshipping superseded. However, Taoist still used landscape painting in their meditation just as Confucius uses portrait painting in their ritual practice. (Ku Kai Chih's admonitions) During this time period, the landscape painting is more coherence with variation trees, rocks and branches. Moreover, the painting is more elaborated and organized. The evolution in landscape painting during the Six Dynasties is that artists harmonized sprit with the nature. (Wu Tao-tzu) Buddhism might also contribute in affecting changes in landscape painting. The artists began to show space and depth in their works where they showed mountain mass, distanced hills and clouds. The emptiness of the space is helping the believers meditating to enter the space of emptiness and nothingness.

The most important development in landscape painting is that people came to recognize the infinity variation of the nature world, so they tended to make each tree individualized. Every landscape painting is restricted by storytelling and is dependent on artists memory.

Dyads
Chinese landscape painting, "shanshui hua" means the painting of mountains, rivers, and cliffs which are the two major components that represents the essence of the nature. Shanshui in Chinese tradition is given rich meaning, for example mountain represents Yang and river indicates Yin. According to Yin Yang theory, Yin embodies Yang and Yang involved in Yin, thus, mountain and river is inseparable and is treated as a whole in a painting. In the Mountains and rivers without end, for example, "the dyad of the mountain uplift, subduction, and erosion and the planetary water cycle" is consistent with the dyad of Buddhism iconography, both representing austerity and generous loving spirit.

Art as cartography
"Arts in maps, arts as maps, maps in arts, and maps as arts," are the four relationships between art and map. Making a distinction between map and art is difficult because there are cartographic elements in both paintings. Early Chinese map making considered earth surface as flat, so artists would not take projection into consideration. Moreover, map makers did not have the idea of map scale. Chinese people from Song dynasty called paintings, maps and other pictorial images as tu, so it's impossible to distinguish the types of each painting by name. Artists who paint landscape as an artwork focus mainly on the natural beauty rather on the accuracy and realistic representation of the object. Map on the other hand should be depicted in a precise manner which more focus on the distance and important geographic features.

The two examples in this case:

The Changjiang Wan Li Tu, although the date and the authorship are not clear, the painting is believed to be made in Song dynasty by examining the place names recorded on the painting. Only based on the name of this painting, it is hard to distinguish whether this painting is painted as a landscape painting or as a map.

The Shu Chuan Shenggai was once thought as the product done by North Song artist Li Gonglin, however, later evidence disapproved this thought and proposed the date should be changed to the end of South Song and artist remains unknown.

Both those paintings, aiming to enhance viewers appreciation on the beauty and majesty of landscape painting, focusing on the light condition and conveying certain attitude, are characterized as masterpiece of art rather than map.

title: Chinese painting


text:
Talk:Bubble tea

About the sales of Bubble tea in Canada, Milk Tea Alliance and is tapioca mainly produced in Asia or South America?
LilGoober4u (talk) 20:16, 30 January 2023 (UTC)
 * 1) So in the section of Popularity#United States, it mentioned this; "A massive shipping and supply chain crisis on the U.S. West coast, coupled with the obstruction of the Suez Canal in March 2021, caused a shortage of tapioca pearls for bubble tea shops in the U.S. and Canada. Most of the tapioca consumed in the U.S. is imported from Asia, since the critical ingredient, tapioca starch, is mostly grown in Asia." So it is mainly grown in Asia, does it come from South America or Asia? In addition to that, can we add a footnote about the production of tapioca starch in Asia and South America? Also, can we add the section for the popularity in Canada? I have proof that it is from South America:http://www.berkeleyinternational.net/tapioca_introduction.htm#:~:text=Tapioca%20is%20a%20root%20crop,%2C%20Guatemala%2C%20Honduras%20and%20Brazil.
 * 2) So in the section of Popularity#Taiwan, it also mentioned this; "Bubble tea is used to represent Taiwan in the context of the Milk Tea Alliance." Since the Milk Tea Alliance consists of Taiwan, Hong Kong(which also has a section), Thailand, and Myanmar/Burma. Can we add a section for Thailand and Myanmer/Burma?

Semi-protected edit request on 16 June 2023
Change subsection title 'China' to 'Mainland China' to avoid political disputes Lrq571 (talk) 14:33, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

 * ❌. In my opinion, we shouldn't change this as the sources and text included provide a general overview of China that does include other republic-controlled areas.  Coco bb8  (💬 talk to me! • ✏ my contributions) 15:35, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

"Naicha philippines" listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Naicha_philippines&redirect=no Naicha philippines] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached. -  C HAMPION  (talk) (contributions) (logs) 14:10, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 June 2024
Temperatures are in degrees F only - please also add degrees C to improve understandability 217.14.186.54 (talk) 15:43, 1 June 2024 (UTC)
 * ✅, thanks. --Belbury (talk) 16:00, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:Bubble tea


text:
Harold Ramis

Harold Allen Ramis (November 21, 1944 – February 24, 2014) was an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. His film acting roles include Egon Spengler in Ghostbusters (1984) and Ghostbusters II (1989), and as Russell Ziskey in Stripes (1981); he also co-wrote those films. As a director, his films include the comedies Caddyshack (1980), National Lampoon's Vacation (1983), Groundhog Day (1993), Analyze This (1999) and Analyze That (2002). Ramis was the original head writer of the television series SCTV, on which he also performed, as well as a co-writer of Groundhog Day and National Lampoon's Animal House (1978). The final film that he wrote, produced, directed, and acted in was Year One (2009).

Ramis's films influenced subsequent generations of comedians, comedy writers and actors. Filmmakers and actors including Jay Roach, Jake Kasdan, Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, and Peter and Bobby Farrelly have listed his films among their favorites. Along with Danny Rubin, he won the BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay for Groundhog Day.

Early life
Ramis was born on November 21, 1944, in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Ruth (née Cokee) (1919–2001) and Nathan Ramis (1915–2009), who owned the Ace Food & Liquor Mart on the city's West Side. Ramis had a Jewish upbringing. In his adult life, he did not practice any religion. He graduated from Stephen K. Hayt Elementary School in June 1958 and Nicholas Senn High School in 1962, both Chicago public schools, and in 1966 from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where he was a member of the Alpha Xi chapter of Zeta Beta Tau fraternity.

Afterward, Ramis worked in a mental institution in St. Louis for seven months. He later said of his time working there that it:

"…prepared me well for when I went out to Hollywood to work with actors. People laugh when I say that, but it was actually very good training. And not just with actors; it was good training for just living in the world. It's knowing how to deal with people who might be reacting in a way that's connected to anxiety or grief or fear or rage. As a director, you're dealing with that constantly with actors. But if I were a businessman, I'd probably be applying those same principles to that line of work."

Early years
Ramis began writing parodic plays in college, saying years later, "In my heart, I felt I was a combination of Groucho and Harpo Marx, of Groucho using his wit as a weapon against the upper classes, and of Harpo's antic charm and the fact that he was oddly sexy—he grabs women, pulls their skirts off, and gets away with it." He avoided the Vietnam War military draft by taking methamphetamine to fail his draft physical.

Following his work in St. Louis, Ramis returned to Chicago, where by 1968, he was a substitute teacher at schools serving the inner-city Robert Taylor Homes public housing development. He also became associated with the guerrilla television collective TVTV, headed by his college friend Michael Shamberg, and wrote freelance for the Chicago Daily News. "Michael Shamberg, right out of college, had started freelancing for newspapers and got on as a stringer for a local paper, and I thought, 'Well, if Michael can do that, I can do that.' I wrote a spec piece and submitted it to the Chicago Daily News, the Arts & Leisure section, and they started giving me assignments [for] entertainment features." Additionally, Ramis had begun studying and performing with Chicago's Second City improvisational comedy troupe.

Ramis's newspaper writing led to him becoming joke editor at Playboy magazine. "I called…just cold and said I had written several pieces freelance and did they have any openings. And they happened to have their entry-level job, party jokes editor, open. He liked my stuff and he gave me a stack of jokes that readers had sent in and asked me to rewrite them. I had been in Second City in the workshops already and Michael Shamberg and I had written comedy shows in college." Ramis was eventually promoted to associate editor.

National Lampoon, SCTV, and The Top
After leaving Second City for a time and returning in 1972, having been replaced in the main cast by John Belushi, Ramis worked his way back as Belushi's deadpan foil. In 1974, Belushi brought Ramis and other Second City performers, including Ramis's frequent future collaborator Bill Murray, to New York City to work on The National Lampoon Radio Hour.

During this time, Ramis, Belushi, Murray, Joe Flaherty, Christopher Guest, and Gilda Radner starred in the revue The National Lampoon Show, the successor to National Lampoon's Lemmings. Later, Ramis became a performer on, and head writer of, the Canadian sketch-comedy television series SCTV during its first three years (1976–1979). At this juncture, SCTV was seen mainly in Canada, and also via syndication in scattered markets in the US. He was soon offered work as a writer at Saturday Night Live but chose to continue with SCTV. Characterizations by Ramis on SCTV include weaselly, corrupt and constantly sweating Dialing for Dollars host/SCTV station manager Maurice "Moe" Green, outwardly amiable (but thoroughly fascist) cop Officer Friendly, exercise guru Swami Bananananda (whose real name was Dennis Peterson), stern board chairman Allan "Crazy Legs" Hirschman and home dentist Mort Finkel. His celebrity impressions on SCTV included Kenneth Clark and Leonard Nimoy.

In 1984, Ramis executive produced a music/comedy/variety television show called The Top. The producer was Paul Flaherty and the director was David Jove. Ramis got involved after the mysterious death of his friend Peter Ivers, who had hosted Jove's underground show New Wave Theatre. He called Jove and offered to help. Flattery and Jove pitched him the idea for The Top, and Ramis was instrumental in getting it on the air.

The show was a mixture of live music, videos, and humor. Performers on the show included Cyndi Lauper, who performed "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" and "True Colors"; the Hollies, who performed "Stop in the Name of Love"; and the Romantics, who performed their two hits at the time, "Talking in Your Sleep" and "What I Like About You".

Guest stars included Rodney Dangerfield, Chevy Chase, and Dan Aykroyd. Ramis got Bill Murray to host but, because Ghostbusters filming ran late, he did not make it to the taping. Chase came out dressed as a "punk" of the time and somehow got into a physical altercation with an audience member (also a punk) during the opening monologue. He immediately left the taping. Flattery and Jove carried on with the show.

Ramis then got Andy Kaufman to fill in for Chase and recorded the host segments at a separate, later, session; it would be Kaufman's final professional appearance.

The Top aired on Friday, January 27, 1984, at 7 p.m. It scored a 7.7% rating and a 14% share. This represented a 28% rating increase and a 27% share increase over KTLA's regularly scheduled Happy Days/Laverne and Shirley.

Film career
Ramis left SCTV to pursue a film career and wrote a script with National Lampoon magazine's Douglas Kenney, which eventually became National Lampoon's Animal House. They were later joined by a third collaborator, Chris Miller. The 1978 film followed the struggle between a rowdy college fraternity house and the college dean. The film's humor was raunchy for its time. Animal House "broke all box-office records for comedies" and earned $141 million.

He also had a voice part as Zeke in the "So Beautiful & So Dangerous" segment of Heavy Metal in 1981.

Ramis next co-wrote the comedy Meatballs, starring Bill Murray. The movie was a commercial success and became the first of six film collaborations between Murray and Ramis. His third film and his directorial debut was Caddyshack, which he wrote with Kenney and Brian Doyle-Murray. It starred Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight, and Bill Murray. Like Ramis's previous two films, Caddyshack was a commercial success.

In 1982, Ramis was attached to direct the film adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. The film was to star John Belushi and Richard Pryor, but the project was aborted. In 1984, Ramis collaborated with Dan Aykroyd on the screenplay for Ghostbusters, which became one of the biggest comedy hits of all time, in which he also starred as Dr. Egon Spengler. He reprised the role for the 1989 sequel, Ghostbusters II (which he also co-wrote with Aykroyd). His later film Groundhog Day has been called his "masterpiece".

His films have been noted for attacking "the smugness of institutional life…with an impish good [will] that is unmistakably American." They are also noted for "Ramis's signature tongue-in-cheek pep talks." Sloppiness and improv were also important aspects of his work. Ramis frequently depicted the qualities of "anger, curiosity, laziness, and woolly idealism" in "a hyper-articulate voice".

Ramis also occasionally acted in supporting roles in acclaimed films that he did not write or direct, such as James L. Brooks's Academy Award-winning As Good as It Gets (1997) and Judd Apatow's hit comedy Knocked Up (2007).

In 2004, Ramis turned down the opportunity to direct the Bernie Mac-Ashton Kutcher film Guess Who, then under the working title "The Dinner Party", because he considered it poorly written. That same year, he began filming the low-budget The Ice Harvest, "his first attempt to make a comic film noir." Ramis spent six weeks trying to get the film greenlit because he had difficulty reaching an agreement about stars John Cusack's and Billy Bob Thornton's salaries. The film received mixed reviews. In 2004, Ramis's typical directing fee was $5 million.

In an interview in the documentary American Storytellers, Ramis said he hoped to make a film about Emma Goldman (even pitching Disney with the idea of having Bette Midler star) but that none of the film studios were interested and that it would have been difficult to raise the funding.

Ramis said in 2009 that he planned to make a third Ghostbusters film for release either in mid-2011 or for Christmas 2012. A reboot to the franchise, also called Ghostbusters, was eventually made and released in 2016, directed and co-written by Paul Feig. In this film, a bronze bust of Ramis can be seen when Erin Gilbert leaves her office at Columbia University. Later, the second sequel to the original film, Ghostbusters: Afterlife, was released in 2021 and posthumously dedicated to him.

Personal life
Ramis was married twice and had four children. On July 2, 1967, he married San Francisco artist Anne Plotkin, with whom he had a daughter, Violet Ramis Stiel. Actor and Ghostbusters co-star Bill Murray is Violet's godfather. Ramis and Plotkin separated in 1984 and later divorced.

Ramis' daughter Mollie Israel (known professionally as Mollie Heckerling) was born in 1985 to him and director Amy Heckerling, while Heckerling was married to actor-director Neal Israel.

In 1989, Ramis married Erica Mann, daughter of director Daniel Mann and actress Mary Kathleen Williams. Together they had two sons, Julian Arthur and Daniel Hayes in 1990 and 1994.

Although Ramis maintained humanist beliefs, Erica's Buddhist upbringing greatly influenced his philosophies for the rest of his life, and he became friends with the Dalai Lama.

Ramis was a Chicago Cubs fan, and when he moved back from Los Angeles to Chicago in the late 1990s, he would attend games at Wrigley Field, sometimes taking part of the seventh-inning stretch of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game". His pastimes included fencing, ritual drumming, acoustic guitar, and making hats from felted fleece; additionally, he taught himself to ski by watching skiers on television.

Illness and death
In May 2010, Ramis contracted an infection that resulted in complications from autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis and lost the ability to walk. After relearning to walk he suffered a relapse of the disease in late 2011.

He died of complications of the disease on February 24, 2014, at his home on Chicago's North Shore, at age 69. A private funeral was held for him two days later with family, friends, and several collaborators in attendance, including Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas, David Pasquesi, Andrew Alexander, and the widows of John Belushi and Bernard Sahlins. He is buried at Shalom Memorial Park in Arlington Heights.

Upon Ramis's death, then-President Barack Obama released a statement, saying, "When we watched his movies—from Animal House and Caddyshack to Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day—we didn't just laugh until it hurt. We questioned authority. We identified with the outsider. We rooted for the underdog. And through it all, we never lost our faith in happy endings." He ended his statement by saying he hoped Ramis "received total consciousness", in reference to a line from Caddyshack.

Ramis and longtime collaborator Bill Murray had a falling out during the filming of Groundhog Day, which Ramis attributed to problems that Murray had in his own life at the time, plus creative differences between the two about the overall direction and mood of the film. They did not speak for more than 20 years. Shortly before Ramis's death, Murray, encouraged by his brother Brian Doyle-Murray, visited him to make amends with a box of doughnuts and a police escort, according to Ramis's daughter Violet. At that point, Ramis had lost most of his ability to speak, so Murray did most of the talking over several hours. Murray gave a tribute to Ramis at the 86th Academy Awards.

Stephen Colbert paid tribute to Ramis on an episode of his show The Colbert Report. Colbert said that "as a young, bookish man with glasses looking for a role model, I might have picked Harold Ramis." He ended the show by thanking him.

Awards and honors
In 2004, Ramis was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame. In 2005, he received the Austin Film Festival's Distinguished Screenwriter Award. In 2010, he received a lifetime achievement award from the Chicago Improv Festival. In 2015, the Writers Guild of America posthumously honored him with their lifetime achievement award, the Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement.

In 2016, two years after his death, The Second City founded the Harold Ramis Film School, the first film school to focus solely on film comedy, in his honor.

The 2016 film Ghostbusters, a reboot of the series Ramis co-created and starred in, was posthumously dedicated to him. A bust of Ramis appears in the film. In the 2021 movie Ghostbusters: Afterlife, the age-progressed image of Ramis appears as the ghost of Egon Spengler; a dedication before the end credits also reads "for Harold."

On February 2, 2024, Chicago declared every February 2nd going forward to be "Harold Ramis Day".

Collaborations
Ramis frequently collaborated with director Ivan Reitman. He co-wrote National Lampoon's Animal House, which Reitman produced, then co-wrote the Reitman comedy Meatballs; he co-wrote and appeared in the Reitman films Stripes, Ghostbusters, and Ghostbusters II.

Film
Executive producer
 * The First $20 Million Is Always the Hardest (2002)
 * I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With (2006)
 * Archie's Final Project (2009)

title: Harold Ramis


text:
Helmut Sturm

Helmut Sturm (21 February 1932 – 20 February 2008) was a German painter.

He was born in Furth im Wald. From 1952 to 1958, he studied at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste, Munich. After this he joined Heimrad Prem, Lothar Fischer and Hans-Peter Zimmer in founding Gruppe SPUR, which in 1959 entered the Situationist International. He had a six-month scholarship in Paris before returning to Munich for the SPUR exhibition in Galerie van de Loo. He collaborated with Hans Platschek, Asger Jorn, Jørgen Nash, Constant, Maurice Wyckaert, Giuseppe Pinot-Gallizio and Guy Debord. In 1961 he stayed with Nash at Oerkelljunga, Sweden with Prem, Zimmer and Dieter Kunzelmann.

After the SPUR group was expelled from the Situationist International, they continued to do collaborative work, linking up with Wir in 1966 to form Geflecht. Sturm developed colorspatial anti-objects and had his first solo exhibition in the Galerie van de Loo, Munich.

From 1970 he worked as an Art educator, developing a Child Forum with Galerie van de Loo. In 1975 he set up the Kollektiv Herzogstrasse with Prem. From 1980 to 1982, he was guest professor at the Hochschule der Künste, Berlin, taking over Hann Trier's class. He continued to exhibit across Germany and from 1985 to 1998 was professor at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste, Munich. He died in February 2008 in Munich.

title: Helmut Sturm


text:
Talk:The Invisible Man

This page contains an error that I cannot correct as I do not know how to create a new page. The error lies in the statement that "The Invisible Man" is also the title of a book by Ralph Ellison. However, a quick perusal of any credible list of his works will reveal that the book's title is, in fact, "Invisible Man." The article 'the' is not included in the title of Ellison's novel. A small but important point.

 * Details on creating new pages are listed here. - Hephaestos 06:37 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Book
This article doesn't mention any thing about the book by H. G. Wells.

The first name Hawley is an attribution of Alan Moore in the "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", not from the Wells scientific romance.

Quite right -- I've removed the reference after checking the book -- he's just "Griffin" in the original. AxS 15:07, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It's true that this article doesn't talk about the book itself. Very odd, as the book should be the primary focus of such an article. Sheehan 10:45, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

It's my opinion that this page needs to be fleshed out. (No pun intended.) A full plot synopsis should be created, among references to other literary creations, like "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen". Also, a separate page should be created for the movies/TV series. It doesn't do justice to one of science fiction's classics to be briefly mentioned in one paragraph, then devote the rest of the page to the video creations.

And if no one else will do it, then I will when I have time. JiangWei23 21:30, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

The 1970s BBC TV series starring David McCallum seems not to be not mentioned here. Even though this article is linked from the David McCallum article in Wikipedia! I leave it to those maintaining to look into this and update as appropriate.

"Project Quicksilver"
What exactly is the ridiculous article Project Quicksilver about? I'm removing the link; if it's about a TV show, book or movie, it should make that clear instead of this false document stuff. -DynSkeet (talk) 14:35, August 29, 2005 (UTC)

"Reign of Terror"
Is this phrase capitalized in the novel? It seems to me it should be lower case, as Reign of Terror capitalized generally refers to the bloody reprisals of the revolutionary government under Robespierre in the French Revolution. Canonblack 01:07, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I believe it is, though I'm not sure. I know at one point he refers to his reign as "the Terror", with the word capitalized. JiangWei23 07:18, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

It is capitalized. "Not wanton killing, but a judicious laying. The point is, they know there is an Invisible Man--as well as we know there is an Invisible Man. And that Invisible Man, Kemp, must now establish a Reign of Terror. Yes; no doubt it's startling. But I mean it. A Reign of Terror," (p. 135). MelissaDRuhl (talk) 20:57, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Invisible Man characters
There are a number of Wikipedia articles about characters from the novel--there are 13 in the category "The Invisible Man characters", though some of them are from the movie version. Many of these are very minor characters, as indicated by the fact that a bunch of them don't need to be mentioned in the main article's plot summary. For those characters that are mentioned, including Griffin (The Invisible Man), the articles are mostly plot summary, leading to considerable duplication.

I'm thinking that most if not all of these articles can't really justify their independent existence--that they should be turned into a character section in this article, or if that seems awkward, perhaps a separate Invisible Man characters article. Nareek 04:50, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

 * I agree. I am a fan of the film and the book but I think that the separate character articles are prime candidates indeed for 'articles for deletion'. Colin4C 09:17, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, in Chapter 6 Mr. Hall is refered to as "George" by his wife, while Mrs. Hall is refered to as "Janny' (likely an unconfirmed 'dialect' spelling of Jenny). --RedKnight (talk) 17:20, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

The Invisible Man's eyes
Apologies, I just reverted the statement about the Invisible Man's eyes remaining visible. I was under the impression that only that cat upon which he performed the experiment retained visibility in the eyes, but I just checked the book and he does indeed state that an 'attenuated pigment' still remains. Sorry for the confusion. Mosquitor Saturday 14 October 2006, 1.43 pm (UTC)

After reviewing the passages in the book in which Griffen speaks of the state of his/the cat's eyes after turning invisible, it seems that only the Tapetum lucidum (which is a a reflecting layer behind the retina) remains. Yes, the tapetum. It didn't go. After I'd given the stuff to bleach the blood and done certain other things to her, I gave the beast opium, and put her and the pillow she was sleeping on, on the apparatus. And after all the rest had faded and vanished, there remained two little ghosts of her eyes. He refers to it as iridescent (which it is, like the Blue Morpho's wings which the tapetum article refers to), and I would assume that the 'attenuated pigment' also refers to the tapetum. Note that Griffen states that the 'attenuated pigment' still remained behind the retina of my eyes, fainter than mist. And thus, not synonymous with the retina.

Also, the quote/phrase "colored part of the back of his eyes" does not appear anywhere in the book to my knowledge. Where did it come from? I'm removing these statements about Griffen being able to see (scientifically). -Spike (I don't have an account) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.70.10.187 (talk) 23:48, 6 January 2007

Characters
There's no need for each minor character to have their own section, or even for them to be detailed at all. For example, there's little value in stating Mrs. Hall is a very friendly, down-to-earth woman who enjoys socializing with her guests. Virtually all articles about novels that have become Featured Articles don't have these character details, and neither do other articles about H.G. Wells novels, so they should be removed to bring this article into line with other novel articles and allow for improvement in other areas. Any relevant character information should be mentioned in the plot summary. Magiclite 20:30, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

 * The whole bio section on Griffin is just additional plot details. Since there is already a main article, that needs to be gutted and rewritten. --Tysto (talk) 14:39, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
 * I went ahead and did this. --Tysto (talk) 15:08, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

 * There's still too much duplicated plot information in the character descriptions. There are also a lot of irrelevant references to Alan Moore and the various adaptations of the book, all of which have their own articles.  The film and television serial sections about Kemp belong in the 'Adaptations' heading if they belong anywhere. --90.214.206.203 (talk) 11:34, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

278 pages?
That's a lot of pages for a novella. The version I read was 150 pages and I doubt it was abridged. On Amazon.com, Signet Classics' version has 192 pages and Dover Thrift Editions' version has 112 and neither are abridged.70.225.37.67 (talk) 22:32, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Different size distinctions for works of text are defined by number of words, not number of pages. The number of words is invariable (barring condensation or revision).  The number of pages is dependent upon all of the following:

"* the size of the paper
 * the size of the margins
 * the size of the type face used
 * the chosen kerning (space between characters and words, which is variable)
 * the chosen leading (space between lines of text, also variable)
 * the style of paragraph formatting used (is the first line indented, is a line of space left between paragraphs, how is the text justified, etc.)
 * the use and number of interstitial or blank pages within the layout, including flyleafs, prefaces, introductions, dedications, tables of contents and title pages, not all of which are present in all editions"

 * The notation of 149 pages in the infobox is presumably for the first hardcover edition, a fairly trivial factoid that is certainly not accurate for all subsequent editions. 12.233.147.42 (talk) 21:22, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

The Introduction Paragraphs
I think that to reveal that the main character "********* ************** *** ****** *** *******" at the end of the history is a massive spoiler to the book, i'm deletimg that part. Nicrorus (talk) 04:04, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Plot mistake blood visible is not a plot mistake
I've removed the line about it being a plot mistake that you can see the invisible man's blood. He himself explains "Gets visible as it coagulates, I see." That is to say it is made visible by a chemical change — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.21.0.203 (talk) 17:34, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

Redundancy
Shouldn't In other media and Adaptations be the same section?  Dark Knight  2149  02:56, 25 May 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on The Invisible Man. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070813041828/http://www.horror-wood.com/iman.htm to http://www.horror-wood.com/iman.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 22:28, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

An Invisible man epilogue
A fictional retelling of what happened to Griffins note books involving Sherlock Holmes! https://archiveofourown.org/works/12837075?view_adult=true — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.5.88.201 (talk) 14:34, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

English
Title 2409:4051:2E9E:699A:AD9F:65AF:B8BB:CD8E (talk) 10:18, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:The Invisible Man


text:
Common ringed plover

The common ringed plover or ringed plover (Charadrius hiaticula) is a small plover that breeds across much of northern Eurasia, as well as Greenland. The genus name Charadrius is a Late Latin word for a yellowish bird mentioned in the fourth-century Vulgate. It derives from Ancient Greek kharadrios a bird found in ravines and river valleys (kharadra, "ravine"). The specific hiaticula is Latin and has a similar meaning to the Greek term, coming from  hiatus, "cleft" and -cola, "dweller" (colere, "to dwell").

Description
Adults are 17 – in length with a 35 – wingspan. They have a grey-brown back and wings, a white belly, and a white breast with one black neckband. They have a brown cap, a white forehead, a black mask around the eyes and a short orange and black bill. The legs are orange and only the outer two toes are slightly webbed, unlike the slightly smaller but otherwise very similar semipalmated plover, which has all three toes slightly webbed, and also a marginally narrower breast band; it was in former times included in the present species. Juvenile ringed plovers are duller than the adults in colour, with an often incomplete grey-brown breast band, a dark bill and dull yellowish-grey legs.

This species differs from the smaller little ringed plover in leg colour, the head pattern, and the lack of an obvious yellow eye-ring.

Breeding, range and habitat
The common ringed plover's breeding habitat is open ground on beaches or flats across northern Eurosiberia and in Arctic northeast Canada. Some birds breed inland, and in western Europe they nest as far south as northern France. They nest on the ground in an open area with little or no plant growth.

If a potential predator approaches the nest, the adult will walk away from the scrape, calling to attract the intruder and feigning a broken wing. Once the intruder is far enough from the nest, the plover flies off.

Common ringed plovers are migratory and winter in coastal areas south to Africa. In Norway, geolocators have revealed that adult breeding birds migrate to West Africa. Many birds in Great Britain and northern France are resident throughout the year.

Feeding
These birds forage for food on beaches, tidal flats and fields, usually by sight. They eat insects, crustaceans and worms.

Subspecies
There are three weakly defined subspecies, which vary slightly in size and mantle colour; they intergrade where their ranges meet:
 * C. h. psammodroma – Salomonsen, 1930 : breeds in Iceland, Greenland, northeast Canada; winters in west Africa. It is intermediate in size and colour.
 * C. h. hiaticula – Linnaeus, 1758 : breeds from temperate western Europe north to central Scandinavia; resident or short-distance migrant to southwest Europe. It is the largest and palest subspecies.
 * C. h. tundrae – (Lowe, 1915) : breeds in Arctic northern Scandinavia and Asiatic Russia; winters in Africa and southwest Asia. It is the smallest and darkest subspecies.

C. h. hiaticula and C. h. tundrae are among the taxa to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies.

title: Common ringed plover


text:
Talk:The Hundred Flowers Movement

This page is now redirected to Hundred Flowers Campaign. It's the same thing; the info from here has been incorporated there. That name seems to be more common. --Jiang 06:39 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)

title: Talk:The Hundred Flowers Movement


text:
Tristan

Tristan (Latin/Brythonic: Drustanus; Trystan), also known as Tristram, Tristyn or Tristain and similar names, is the hero of the legend of Tristan and Iseult. In the legend, he is tasked with escorting the Irish princess Iseult to wed Tristan's uncle, King Mark of Cornwall. Tristan and Iseult accidentally drink a love potion during the journey and fall in love, beginning an adulterous relationship that eventually leads to Tristan's banishment and death. The character's first recorded appearance is in retellings of British mythology from the 12th century by Thomas of Britain and Gottfried von Strassburg, and later in the Prose Tristan. He is featured in Arthurian legends, including the seminal text Le Morte d'Arthur, as a skilled knight and a friend of Lancelot.

The historical roots of Tristan are unclear; his association with Cornwall may originate from the Tristan Stone, a 6th-century granite pillar in Cornwall inscribed with the name Drustanus (a variant of Tristan). He has been depicted in numerous historical and modern works of literature, music, and cinema.

Tristan

In the story of Tristan and Iseult, Tristan is the nephew of King Mark of Cornwall, sent to fetch Iseult from Ireland to wed the king. He and Iseult accidentally consume a love potion while en route and fall helplessly in love with each other. The pair then undergoes numerous trials that test their secret affair, before the tragic end.

Tristan made his first recorded appearance in the 12th century in British mythology circulating in the north of France and the Kingdom of Brittany, which had close ancestral and cultural links with Wales, Cornwall and Devon by way of the ancient British kingdom of Dumnonia, as made clear in the story itself, and the closely related Cornish and Breton languages, both of which are P-Celtic like Welsh. Although the oldest stories concerning Tristan are lost, some of the derivatives still exist.

Most early versions fall into one of two branches: the "courtly" branch represented in the retellings in Thomas of Britain's Tristan and his German successor Gottfried von Strassburg, and in the Folie Tristan d'Oxford; and the "common" branch, including the works of medieval French literature.

Arthurian romancer Chrétien de Troyes mentioned in his poem Cligès that he composed his own account of the story; however, there are no surviving copies or records of any such text. In the 13th century, during the great period of prose romances, Tristan en prose or Prose Tristan became one of the most popular romances of its time. This long, sprawling, and often lyrical work (the modern edition takes up thirteen volumes) follows Tristan from the traditional legend into the realm of King Arthur where Tristan participates in the Quest for the Holy Grail. Its great success spawned many Italian (such as the Tavola Ritonda) and other rewrites. Among these was the French Post-Vulgate Cycle that combined it with a shortened version of the Vulgate Cycle, elements of which itself had been earlier used in the Prose Tristan.

Name
The ancient Brittonic name Tristan appears to mean "clanking swords of iron". The more recent Romance languages version, including French, has been paretymologically associated with "sadness" (compare Latin tristis "sad", Old French triste "sad"). In Gottfried von Strassburg's Tristan, when his mother, Blanschfleur, learns that her husband has been killed in battle, she dies in childbirth. The orphaned baby is named "Tristan" because of the sorrowful circumstances of his birth.

The quasi-historical, semi-legendary Pictish Chronicle (probably late 10th century) presents several ancient Pictish kings by the name of Drest or Drust. The Picts are believed to have lived in present-day Scotland far to the northwest of Cornwall. The form Drustanus is merely Drust or hypocoristic Drustan rendered into Latin. The name may have originated with an ancient legend regarding a Pictish king who slew a giant in the distant past, which had spread throughout the Isles, it may come from a 6th-century Pictish saint Drostan who bore another form of the name, or it may have migrated northwards from the southwest due to the fame of the legends of Arthur. There was a Tristan who bore witness to a legal document at the Swabian Abbey of Saint Gall in 807.

The philologist Sigmund Eisner came to the conclusion that the name Tristan comes from Drust, son of Talorc. This Drust is probably otherwise unknown to us, because the sons of Pictish kings never became kings themselves. According to Eisner, the legend of Tristan as we know it was gathered together by an author living in North Britain around the early 8th century and associated with early Celtic monasticism. Eisner explains that Irish monks of this time would have been familiar with the Greek and Roman narratives that the legend borrows from, such as Pyramus and Thisbe. They would also have been familiar with the Celtic elements of the story such as in The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne. Eisner concludes that "the author of the Tristan story used the names and some of the local traditions of his own recent past. To these figures he attached adventures which had been handed down from Roman and Greek mythology. He lived in the north of Britain, was associated with a monastery, and started the first rendition of the Tristan story on its travels to wherever it has been found."

In Le Morte d'Arthur
Thomas Malory later shortened and incorporated the Prose Tristan into his own English-language The Book of Sir Tristram de Lyones (The Fyrste and the Secunde Boke of Syr Trystrams de Lyones), a part of Le Morte d'Arthur in which Tristan (Tristram) plays the role of a counter-hero to Lancelot. Of all the knights, Tristram most resembles Lancelot as he too loves a queen, the wife of another. Tristan is even considered to be as strong and able a knight as Lancelot, including the fulfillment of Merlin's prophecy for the two of them to engage in the greatest duel between any knights before or after, although neither kills the other and they become beloved friends. "[T]he depiction of their chivalric prowess eclipses, for large sections of the narratives, their love for their respective queens." His other friends and companions include Dinadan and Lamorak.

In Malory's telling, following the Prose Tristan, the mother of Tristan, Queen Elizabeth, dies during childbirth while desperately searching for his father King Meliodas after he was kidnapped by an enchantress (of a fairy kind in the original, unspecified by Malory) to be her lover. The young Tristan meets and falls in love with Isolde (Iseult) early on. His uncle, King Mark, jealous of Tristan and seeking to undermine him, seeks marriage to Isolde for just such a hateful purpose, going so far as to ask Tristram to go and seek her hand on his behalf (which Tristran, understanding that to be his knightly duty, does). Because of Mark's treacherous behaviour, Tristran takes Isolde from him and lives with her for some time in Lancelot's castle Joyous Gard, but he then returns Isolde to Mark. Nonetheless, Mark ends up ambushing and mortally injuring Tristram while he is harping (Tristan is noted in the book as one of the greatest of musicians and falconers), using a lance that had been given to him by the vengeful enchantress Morgan, whose lover had been slain by Tristan.

Differences between versions
Thomas of Britain draws on the Roman de Brut for historical details, and follows its example in matters of style. Gottfried draws more on the learned tradition of medieval humanism than on the chivalric ethos shared by his literary contemporaries.

Tristan was originally the son of Queen Blancheflor and King Rivalen. In later versions since the Prose Tristan, his parents are Queen Isabelle (Malory's Elizabeth, known as Eliabel or Eliabella in Italy) and King Meliodas of Lyonesse.

At the end of Joseph Bedier's The Romance of Tristan and Iseult, a pair of flowers grow over the graves of Tristan and Iseult, symbolizing their love, and possibly embodying their souls.

Historical roots
Béroul's Norman French Romance of Tristan and Iseult, possibly the earliest extant version, is notable for its very specific geographical locations in Cornwall. Another strange aspect is Tristan's home-kingdom, Lyonesse, for whose existence there is no evidence. However, there were two places called Leonais: one in Brittany, the other the Old French transcription of Lothian. Regardless, Tristan being a prince of Lothian would make his name more sensible, Lothian being on the borderlands of the Pictish High-Kingship (and once a part of Pictish territory; Tristan may in fact have been a Pictish prince under a British king). There are also records of a Turstan Crectune, whose name gave the Lothian village of Crichton its name. King David I of Scotland granted lands to Turstan Crectune in 1128. One other suggestion sees Tristan as adopted into the family of Mark of Cornwall – a historical practice attested in Roman law.

The Tristan Stone

Possible evidence for his roots in South West England is the 6th-century inscribed granite pillar known as The Tristan Stone, or The Longstone (Menhir, meaning long stone), set beside the road leading to Fowey in Cornwall. It measures some 2.13 m (7 feet) in height and has been set in a modern concrete base. Until the 1980s it was in its original position some yards from the coastal road in a field near the turn down to the small harbour of Polkerris. It was then closer to Castle Dore and may have been the origin of the association of this site with the story of the tragic love of Tristan and Iseult. There is a Tau cross on one side and a Latin inscription on the other side, now much worn, reading:

DRVSTANVS HIC IACIT CVNOMORI FILIVS [Drustanus lies here, son of Cunomorus]

It has been suggested, and is confidently asserted on the plaque by the stone, that the characters referred to are Tristan, of which Drustan is a variant and Cynvawr Latinized to Cunomorus. Cynvawr, in turn, is said by the 9th-century author Nennius, who compiled an early pseudo-historical account of King Arthur, to be identified with King Mark known in alias 'QVONOMORVS'. Around 1540, John Leland recorded a third line now missing: CVM DOMINA OUSILLA ('with the lady Ousilla': Ousilla is conceivably a latinisation of the Cornish Eselt), but missed the badly weathered first line ('DRUSTANVS HIC IACIT') which has led Craig Weatherhill to speculate that this third line could have been lost by stone fracture, but which has also led Goulven Peron to propose to see 'OUSILLA' as a particular reading of 'DRUSTANVS'.

Modern works

 * From 1857 to 1859, Richard Wagner composed the opera Tristan und Isolde, now considered one of the most influential pieces of music of the 19th century. In his work, Tristan is portrayed as a doomed romantic figure.
 * I due Tristani ("The Two Tristans") was a 1555 adaptation of the Spanish Don Tristan de Leonis, featured Tristram's son ("Tristram the Younger"), and emphasized romantic themes - following a trend of interest in more sentimental novels.
 * Algernon Charles Swinburne published the epic poem Tristram of Lyonesse in 1882.
 * The legend of Tristan has been represented through the song of the same name by English singer-songwriter Patrick Wolf, and was the lead single from his 2005 album, Wind in the Wires.
 * Tristan plays a prominent role in the comic book series Camelot 3000, in which he is reincarnated in the year 3000, as a woman and subsequently struggles to come to terms with his new body, sexuality, and identity, reconciling them in turn with his previous notions of gender roles.
 * In 1983, Russian composer Nikita Koshkin wrote a classical guitar solo entitled "Tristan Playing the Lute", evoking the spirit of Tristan from the legend of "Tristan and Isolde", initially set in a playful adaptation of traditional English lute music.
 * In The Warlord Chronicles novel series by Bernard Cornwell, Tristan is the young heir to Kernow and the son of King Mark. He is the best friend of the protagonist Derfel Cadarn and a loyal ally of Arthur. Eventually, however, in an agonising decision for the sake of peace and out of his deep belief in royal legitimacy, Arthur betrays Tristan and Iseault when they seek refuge and leaves them to be killed by King Mark.
 * In the 2004 film, King Arthur, based on the Sarmatian connection theory of origin for the Arthurian legends, Tristan (Mads Mikkelsen) is a prominent member of the knights, who are Sarmatians serving under a half-Roman Arthur in the 5th century. Tristan is a cavalry archer, able to make amazing shots with his Parthian/Eurasian-style reflex composite bow. He uses a Chinese sword and holds true to the style, armour, and weapons, of a Sarmatian mounted archer. After many injuries, he dies a heroic death at the hand of the Saxon king Cerdic in single combat at the Battle of Badon Hill.
 * The 2006 film Tristan & Isolde starred James Franco as Tristan, Thomas Sangster as the child Tristan and Sophia Myles as Isolde, written by Dean Georgaris and directed by Kevin Reynolds.
 * The 2008 TV show Merlin depicts Tristan and his partner Isolde as smugglers in the Season 4 finale "The Sword in the Stone" parts 1 & 2. They help Arthur, Merlin, and the Knights regain Camelot after Morgana takes over. In the end, Isolde is killed by Helios, Morgana's henchman, but nothing is said of what happens with Tristan.
 * In the manga series Four Knights of the Apocalypse, Tristan is one of the titular knights, son of Meliodas and Elizabeth of Liones.
 * Tristan is also a playable character in the mobile game Fate/Grand Order as an Archer class Servant who uses a harp as his bow.
 * In Guy Ritchie's 2017 film King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, Kingsley Ben-Adir plays Wet Stick, Arthur and Back Lack's childhood friend; who is later knighted by Bedivere under his real name as Sir Tristan.

title: Tristan