Which is more valuable for research, the pyramids or the Chinese Terracotta Warriors?

Architecture and sculpture are materialized entities, and at the same time they are full of rich spiritual sustenance, which is the unity of material and spiritual aesthetics. Architecture and sculpture can be regarded as materialized signs of the cultural spirit of the times. Whenever people talk about ancient Egyptian culture, the first thing that comes to mind is the magnificent buildings such as pyramids, temples and palaces, from which we can appreciate the prosperity and grandeur of ancient Egyptian art. Similarly, the architectural sites in the Qin and Han Dynasties in China also show the heroic and elegant past for future generations. Like the Epang Palace, the front hall alone is the scale of "500 steps from east to west, 50 feet from north to south, 10,000 people can sit on it, and 50-foot flags can be erected under it", which makes people think. Perhaps the literati's description has been exaggerated in art, and the discovery of the magnificent Qin terracotta warriors and horses provides conclusive historical evidence for future generations. The appearance of works of art is not isolated, and its appearance and existence are closely related to the social and cultural environment in which it is produced. 1. Different artistic expressions reflect different cultural values. Compared with the pyramids in Egypt, the Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses are "a great miracle of the world". Its greatness lies in its huge lineup. In the overall layout, there is no artistic treatment, but it is arranged like an avalanche. Secondly, Qin Terracotta Warriors and Horses have obvious realism and realism. On the one hand, each pottery figurine is equivalent to the actual human and horse bodies in form; On the other hand, the appearance of pottery figurines is very close to the actual people and horses. It emphasizes the authenticity and integrity of the image, and most of them are portrayed as realistically as possible from characters and costumes to chariots and horses. However, the lower part of the individual figurine has a feature that is contrary to naturalism, especially the shape of the legs, which is extremely single, and seems to be just to support the weight of the whole human sculpture, which is no different from the legs of a table or stool. The reason is that the purpose of shaping the Terracotta Warriors and Horses in Qin Dynasty is not to shape a statue of a certain person, but to reproduce the overall majesty of a phalanx. Because the whole meaning of their existence is to protect the dead of the emperor for a long time and show the majesty of the empire. At the same time, behind the Terracotta Warriors and Horses, China people's cultural values of "this life is the standard" are reflected. Terracotta Warriors and Horses show Qin Shihuang's strong desire to bring out his outstanding achievements and majestic momentum as an emperor before his death, and even after his death, he should show a great ambition and ambition to be king and dominate the world. Death is inevitable. Fear of death is an instinctive consciousness of human beings, but it is reflected in different human cultures. People in China believe that life is a natural phenomenon. It has a process of gestation, production, growth and decline, which is independent of human will. So there is a natural attitude towards life and death. More attachment and attention to this kind of life makes China people avoid transcending the nothingness of this kind of life. The concern about death is actually the concern about whether everything before death can be preserved. Qin Shihuang was afraid of death, so he sent people to look for the elixir of life, and hoped to complete and continue everything before his death by building an unprecedented mausoleum. Therefore, the terracotta warriors and horses generally show a naturalistic style. In the history of architectural sculpture in China, the Terracotta Warriors and Horses are only a short-lived spectacle, but the value orientation of "this life is the standard" contained in them has been continued in later cultural and artistic works. For example, the figures in pottery figurines and portrait bricks in the Han Dynasty all have exaggerated expressions of "ecstasy", which can also be regarded as another expression of "this life is the standard". The expression of pyramid pier relief is completely opposite to that of terracotta warriors and horses. One reason is that the relief form itself is not suitable for complete realism. The back also reflects the different cultural values of ancient Egypt and China. The pyramid is a mausoleum, so it still has the characteristics of a mausoleum building. Its structure is divided into two parts: one is the underground building as a tomb; One is the building on the pyramid tomb. The Pharaoh's tomb in the pyramid is on the ground. For Pharaoh, life on the ground is incomplete, and the "heaven" referred to in the pyramid-the bright country is what they are concerned about. This is contrary to the value orientation of civilization recognized by Qin Shihuang. For death, which occupies an important position in life, the ancient Egyptians regarded it as an important transition period into another world. The ancient Egyptians believed in the dead and that people could continue to be born again after the dark road of death. Death is not the disappearance of life, but can continue in another world. Death is only a transitional stage of new life, and life can cross the threshold of death. In their concept, there is no absolute boundary between life and death, so we should not only preserve our bodies, but also build cemeteries and luxurious graves to prepare for the afterlife in this world. For this reason, the paintings and reliefs on the walls of ancient Egyptian tombs are not for people to appreciate today, but to record what the dead have in this world for their souls to enjoy in the afterlife. In Egyptian works, what they "know" is more than what they "see". They follow ancient laws and express what they should express, so they ignore movement and expression in their works and have no clear sense of time. The murals in the tomb reproduce the daily life of the deceased before his death, and various objects are placed around the body so that the deceased can continue to enjoy the same life on earth in the spiritual world. In the afterlife carefully prepared by the ancient Egyptians, we saw the persistent pursuit of eternal dreams. This dream is conveyed to the latter by carving buildings. Therefore, it can be imagined that the artistic spirit of Egypt, whether sculpture or architecture, points to the afterlife, guiding Egyptian statues to maintain a firm walking posture and marching on the "road" of an eternal country without hesitation. The pyramids became their only spatial orientation index. The triangle-like wide and powerful plane makes anyone who approaches it from any direction end up on the "road" pointing to it in shock. For example, Kandinsky said, "Spiritual life can be represented by a huge triangle, which moves slowly forward and upward, almost unnoticed by people ... An invisible Moses comes down from above and people can't hear his voice. Only artists can hear it first, and they follow it unconsciously ... "Second, the same theme and different themes show different cultural spirits. Sculpture is the injection of spirit into matter, and the ultimate goal of sculpture behavior is to change matter and become spirit itself completely. Stone, which symbolizes occupying space but has no timeliness, has become the first choice for human beings to create visual art because of its rich symbolism and strong texture hardness. People pour their souls into the stone, so that the stone can be nourished by life and become the image that people pray for. Hegel thinks: "The theme most suitable for sculpture is a quiet, substantial and thoughtful character, and his spirit is completely penetrated into material existence and revealed, and this kind of emotional material of spirit is suitable for expressing spirit through the image itself." In western classical art, the significance of sculpture is obviously to show the sublimity of human nature, and only talents deserve to be the object of the pursuit of sacred art. Therefore, the image of human beings has almost become the only theme in western sculpture art. Different from the west, China's sculptures almost cover various subjects such as animals, plants, people and even nature, because in the eyes of China people, their status is equally important. For example, The Flying Swallow on horseback in the Han Dynasty is not only about horses, but also about its conception. It takes the moment when a three-legged horse flies over the flying swallow as the theme of the sculpture. China people cleverly avoided the problem of "form" and crossed the level of "realm". The ancients in China had no model basis and specific sacred reference modeling standards, which just reflected the world outlook of "harmony between man and nature". Man and nature are integrated, and animals, as the main body of artistic expression, have achieved the same value as people. The style of China's sculpture has gradually realized the transition from realism to freehand brushwork in the improvement of primitive art, which is the unique wisdom of China people and the cultural choice of China art, and has research value.

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