Chapter 1877: Point, Line, Square, Circle, Geometric Image
During the Peiligan and Yangshao Culture periods, the Ice Age in China ended and it was a warm climate period that was very suitable for human survival and development.
The settled farmers are happy and content with their fate, and weave hymns of peace peacefully.
They make all kinds of pottery and like to use abstract, concise and general human-mask and fish patterns as well as various geometric patterns for decoration.
People's understanding of formal beauty has been greatly expanded, and plastic arts have also expanded to various fields of sculpture.
The earlier stone carvings of the Neolithic Age in my country can be represented by the stone millstones and grinding rods of the Peiligang Culture.
It is made of sandstone, and its appearance is designed into a shoe-sole-like geometric shape, neat and generous, with a stable center of gravity.
Its processing is very difficult, requiring hammering, cutting, polishing and trimming, which involves various basic techniques of stone carving processing.
Compared with various ground stone tools at the same time, it has a more formal feel.
It is not only a faithful record of the productive labor of primitive people, but also embodies high aesthetic value.
This kind of stone tool, which embodies the dual nature of labor, is often placed next to the deceased as a funerary object. It is the religious appeal that prompts artists to create such rare stone sculptures.
However, in the Stone Age, because pottery sculptures were easy to shape and materials were widely available, they have always been the mainstream of sculpture.
Until the invention of iron tools, stone carvings were still rare works of art, so our attention must turn to stone carvings and rock paintings.
Rock carvings and rock paintings are still the main form of creation by primitive artists in border areas with suitable conditions, and they have endured for a long time.
For example, there are many works from the Neolithic Age in the Yinshan rock paintings.
The expressive style of Yinshan rock paintings has a profound and huge influence.
In fact, most of the rock paintings created by ancient nomads in northern and northwest my country were carved from stone, and their origins should be traced back to the Yinshan rock paintings.
In addition, the description of hunting and animals is always an eternal theme.
The pictorial characters in the Shang and Zhou bronze inscriptions, the realistic patterns on the Warring States bronzes, and the hunting figures on the Qin portrait bricks are all extensions of this technique.
It's just that the latter is becoming increasingly precise, formalized and rhythmic.
It can be seen that the abstract generalization and exaggerated characteristics of the black shadow technique best embody the aesthetic ideal of Chinese classical art that does not emphasize resemblance in form and pursues vivid and expressive charm.
In addition, line carving, another source of ancient stone carving techniques in my country, also appeared in the Neolithic Age.
The stone statues found at Jiangjun Cliff in Lyg, Sujiang are believed to have been carved by primitive ancestors at the end of the Neolithic Age.
This line-engraved stone carving form has been the most widely used in the creation of stone carvings in the past dynasties.
Although not many stone carvings from the Neolithic Age have been unearthed, their style is not simple and is completely different from stone carvings and rock paintings.
Several steatite carvings from Donggou Houwa in Liaoning Province are all round carvings of small human heads. The knife skills appear rough and clumsy, and the images are simple and vivid, indicating that they are symbolic works.
Although the stone carvings of human heads are expressed in a naive and abstract way, it does not mean that the carving techniques at that time were low.
For example, the relief human faces of the Daxi Culture use carving techniques, and their images also have an invisible religious power.
Obviously, the sculptors at that time focused their main energy on creating jade carvings.
Because we have seen many exquisite jade carvings and small stone carvings in Hongshan Culture and Liangzhu Culture.
The Jade Dragon of the Hongshan Culture is a rare masterpiece. It is made of Xiuyan jade with higher hardness.
This is proof that stone carving techniques are applied to jade carving creations.
As we all know, in ancient carvings, it is difficult to distinguish the materials of jade and stone, and experts only have relative opinions in their classification standards.
But one thing we can confirm is that in the Stone Age and Bronze Age, ancient sculptors treated jade and stone equally.
Therefore, in the Hongshan Culture and the Northern Yinyangying Culture, we see fish-shaped stone pendants and rain flower stone decorations coexisting with the five sculptures.
On the other hand, primitive artists also widely applied their skills to the field of practical appliance processing.
They made stone pestles, stone mortars, grinding discs and various stone agricultural tools.
It is also used to carve stone chamber type tombs and stone coffins.
In particular, the emergence of the latter plays a very important role in the history of ancient stone carving and architectural art in my country.
The late Neolithic stone shed discovered in Haicheng, Liao Province is one of the representative works.
In the late Paleolithic Age, megalithic buildings were simple combinations of uncarved natural boulders, which looked steady and powerful.
This is the product of primitive megalithic worship that makes people transcend the world.
It was once popular in the Eurasian steppes, and later spread to the East Asian continent. Later in the civilization era, its relics can still be found in border areas.
In the form of stone sheds in the Liaosheng Sea area, the stone slabs have been carved into regular geometric shapes. The artificial force has been strengthened, while the natural force and religious spirit have obviously been weakened.
It is considered to be the end of megalithic construction, and the stone shed building here is believed to be a tomb.
In the minds of prehistoric people, boulders are usually considered to be the residence of souls or gods, so they are often used as boundary stones, coffins or objects of religious worship.
So far, archaeological discoveries of stone carvings from the Neolithic Age can be roughly divided into several categories.
The first category is traditional stone carvings, including traditional typical fine stoneware and small ornaments;
The second category is ground practical tools, including daily necessities, utensils, production tools, and weapons;
The third category is idols with a religious nature;
The fourth category is animal stone carvings and carved stone rocks with a sense of life.
Among them, the stone sculptures of utensils and animals best represent the highest level of stone sculpture modeling at that time.
Later, in the tomb of Fu Hao in the Shang Dynasty, we could see the existence of numerous sculptures of real animals and fantasy divine animals.
These cannot but be attributed to the Neolithic Age, a stone carving tradition that was keen on praising natural life.
In addition, we can now glean the beauty of the artistic language of geometric shapes from the practical utensils created by our ancestors in the Neolithic Age.
Facts have shown that Neolithic stone artifacts, such as production tools and weapons, all have points, lines and contours that can arouse people's visual beauty.
These constitute an unprecedented geometric art language system in modern decorative forms.
Without rules, there is no way to form a circle. This is the most essential observation and experience of the ancients on the beauty of form.
Therefore, the early hieroglyphics in my country were all exquisite graphics composed of square and circle lines combined with dots and strokes.
These pictographs are artistic creations that combine language and aesthetics.
In fact, it has the same origin as the geometric shape of the original stone carving.
Ancient humans created geometric images such as points, lines, squares, and circles while creating daily utensils.
If you look carefully at the typical stone products of the late Neolithic Age, you can't help but marvel at how the ancient ancestors had such superb modeling skills.