The architectural art of the Great Wall

The main aesthetic features of the Great Wall's architectural art

The traditional Chinese cosmology believes that "one yin and one yang are called Tao." This traditional Chinese cosmology is embodied in traditional Chinese aesthetics as elegance and magnificence. In short, the beauty of femininity is the so-called "apricot blossom, spring rain, Jiangnan"; Masculine beauty is the so-called "horse

, autumn wind, northern Hebei". The beauty of the Great Wall belongs to masculine beauty, that is, magnificence. Magnificence is characterized by majesty, strength, grandeur, and ruggedness

and wins with momentum. Beauty is characterized by softness, elegance, quietness, harmony, and is known for its interest. The Great Wall and "Li

Sao", poems by Li Du, Han Yuwen, Su Xin, as well as Wei stele in calligraphy, Qin terracotta warriors in sculpture, Yungang, Longmen and Leshan

Buddha statues, the Forbidden City in architecture, etc., embody a "Heavenly Movement" momentum and strong artistic appeal. If

the process of feeling feminine beauty has the characteristics of "moistening things silently", then works of masculine beauty will shock people's hearts in an instant

. Judging from the functions of these two forms of beauty, it can be said that feminine beauty focuses on affecting the inner world and spiritual and sentimental cultivation of individual personality. It is important for perfecting an independent and complete personality. of great significance. And

masculine beauty is of immeasurable value and significance in inspiring a nation's self-confidence, uplifting its spirit, and thus promoting the progress of history. "No one has died since ancient times, and his loyalty will be remembered by history." Wen Tianxiang's famous poem inspired countless people with lofty ideals to sacrifice their lives for the country. Tragic and hard-working. The masculine beauty represented by the Great Wall has this deep connotation that affects historical creativity. ?

The masculine beauty of the Great Wall, or its magnificence and sublime beauty, comes from the majestic momentum formed by its huge external volume.

The Great Wall has conquered countless admirers with its majesty, majesty and majesty stretching thousands of miles. The discoverer of the Trojans described in Homer's epic "The Iliad" and the famous modern archaeologist Silliman said when he saw the Great Wall of China for the first time

Such amazing praise: whether it is "from the peaks of the volcanoes of Java, from the tops of Sierra Nevada in California, from the tops of the Himalayas in India, from Gotti in South America." "The majestic and majestic scenes I have seen on the plateau" "can never be compared with the beautiful and majestic picture unfolding in front of me now. I am surprised and shocked"

“To me, it is like the mythical creation of the giants before the flood.” The Great Wall is magnificent and majestic “a hundred times more than I imagined

”. The moment everyone sees the Great Wall for the first time, they will be shocked by the way the Great Wall swallows mountains and rivers. This is the main aesthetic feature of the Great Wall's architectural art.

The architectural art of the Great Wall. Judging from the several places I have been to, the architectural art of the Great Wall is very great. First, its architectural types are very complete. Maybe all architectural forms are present, including various types of cities at various levels and towns in various places. city. For example, Datong City, one of the nine towns in the Ming Dynasty, has many city walls, towers, temples, and government offices, and its artistic level is extremely high. The "Dai Wang" of the Ming Dynasty was sealed in Datong. The Dai Wang Mansion is now gone. The color of the Nine Dragon Wall in the Dai Wang Mansion in Datong is faded and inferior to that of the Beijing Nine Dragon Wall, but its artistic value is higher than that in Beijing. Take Shanhaiguan as an example. The tower of "the first pass in the world" is very majestic. Take Xuanhua, Hebei, which was a Xuanfu town in the Ming Dynasty. The architectural art of the Drum Tower and Bell Tower there is remarkable. There used to be many watchtowers in Zhangjiakou and Datong, and the brick carvings on the watchtowers were very exquisite. The enemy tower at Simatai is located on a very small terrain and is built very high and majestic. Yulin, one of the nine towns in the Ming Dynasty, has many buildings, platforms, temples, yamen, etc. Its architectural layout, structure, sculptures, and artistic value are very high. This point still needs to be studied carefully.

Some people say that the Great Wall is just a majestic project and not an art. This is wrong. In fact, the Great Wall has a lot of artistic content.

It should be said: the majestic momentum of the Great Wall, the great engineering, and the exquisite art. Indeed, the Great Wall is not only a project, but also contains great architectural art.

(Compiled based on the recording)

Characteristic forms and styles with aesthetic value in Chinese architecture. From the pre-Qin Dynasty to the mid-19th century, it was basically a closed and independent system.

The style has not changed much for more than 2,000 years, and it is generally called ancient Chinese architectural art.

After the mid-19th century, with the changes in the nature of society and the massive import of foreign architecture, especially Western architecture, Chinese architecture has become more distinguished from world architecture

With more contacts and exchanges, the architectural style has undergone drastic changes, which is commonly known as Chinese modern architectural art.

Ancient Chinese architectural art

Ancient Chinese architectural art developed maturely in feudal society. It is mainly composed of Han

wooden structures, and also includes various minorities. The outstanding national architecture is

a unique art system with the longest history, the widest distribution and a very distinctive style in the world. Ancient Chinese architecture had a direct impact on the ancient architecture of Japan, Korea and Vietnam. After the 17th century, it also had an impact on Europe.

Comparing artistic characteristics with ancient European architectural art, ancient Chinese architectural art

Architectural art has three most basic characteristics: ①Aesthetic value and political and ethical value

of unity. Architecture with high artistic value also plays a role in maintaining and strengthening

social, political, ethical systems and ideology. ② Rooted in profound traditional culture and showing a distinctive humanistic spirit. All the constituent factors of architectural art, such as scale, rhythm, composition, form, character, style, etc., are all based on the aesthetic psychology of contemporary people and can be appreciated by people. Harmony

There are no ups and downs, weird and incomprehensible images. ③The overall character and comprehensiveness are very strong. Excellent architectural works in ancient times were almost all integrated into an overall image by mobilizing all factors and techniques that may constitute architectural art at that time, from the overall environment to a single building. A house, from the exterior sequence

to the interior space, from the color decoration to the ancillary art, every part is not

dispensable. If one of them is removed, it will It damages the overall effect.

These basic characteristics are embodied in the following:

Attach importance to the overall management of the environment. Since the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, China has had the concept of

the overall management of the built environment. Although the planning systems of Ye, Du, Bi, Township, Lu, Li, Yi, Qiu, Dian, etc. in "Zhou Li" may not all become facts, at least they are This shows that there was already a large-area planning concept for systematic planning at that time.

"Guanzi·Chengma" advocates that "any capital must be established not under the mountains, but above Guangchuan", which shows that the environmental relationship must be considered when choosing a city location. China's Kanyu theory originated very early. Apart from the superstition, most of it focuses on the relationship between environment and architecture. Ancient cities paid attention to the unified management of the city

and its surrounding environment. Qin Xianyang encompasses Beiban in the north, runs through the Weishui River in the middle, and reaches Nanshan in the south. At its peak, it reached two to three hundred miles from east to west. It is a super-scale urban environment. Chang'an (now Xi'an, Shaanxi Province), Luoyang (Northern Wei Dynasty), Jiankang (now Nanjing, Jiangsu Province), Beijing (Ming and Qing Dynasties) and other famous capitals have far-reaching business scope. Beyond the city walls; even general prefectures, prefectures, and counties,

also include the suburbs in the overall urban environment and layout them in a unified manner. Important scenic spots

such as the Five Mountains and Five Towns, famous Buddhist and Taoist mountains, gardens in the suburbs, etc. also put

environmental management first; the imperial mausoleum area places an even greater emphasis on it. Feng Shui geography, most of the buildings in these places rely on the environment to show their artistic charm.

The single image is integrated into the group sequence. The single building form in ancient China

is relatively simple, most of which are stereotyped styles. The isolated single building is not

Constitute a complete artistic image, and the artistic effect of the building mainly relies on the group sequence

to achieve it. When a palace is used as a foil in a sequence, its shape will not be too big and its image may be relatively plain, but if it is used as the main body, it may be very tall. For example, there are not many styles of individual buildings in the palaces in Beijing during the Ming and Qing Dynasties. However,

through different spatial sequence transformations, each individual building shows its independence in the whole.

character.

Structural technology and artistic image are unified. The wooden structure of ancient Chinese architecture

The system is highly adaptable. This system consists of four columns, two beams and two beams to form a basic frame called a room. The rooms can be connected left and right, front and back, and can be stacked up and down. They can be randomly combined or modified to form octagonal,

hexagonal, circular, fan-shaped or other shapes. There are two types of roof structures: lifting beam type and bucket type. No matter which type, you can make a curve on the roof surface without changing the structure system, and make a curve at the corner of the roof. Cornered cornices can also be made into double eaves, hooked, interspersed, draped and other styles. The artistic shape of a single building is mainly expressed by the flexible arrangement of spaces and the various styles of curved roofs. In addition

In addition, the components of the wooden structure can be easily carved and painted to enhance the artistic expression

of the building. Therefore, the modeling beauty of ancient Chinese architecture is also reflected in structural beauty to a large extent.

Roof frame styles of ancient Chinese buildings

Standardization and diversification are unified. Chinese buildings are mainly made of wooden structures to facilitate the production, installation and evaluation of components.

Engineering calculations and materials will inevitably lead to component specifications

and also promote modularization of design. As early as the "Kao Gong Ji" in the Spring and Autumn Period, there were the seeds of standardization and modularization, and it was relatively mature in the Tang Dynasty.

By the third year of the Song and Yuan Dynasties (1100), the "Building Code" was completely standardized. The Ministry of Engineering Practice Code

Examples has been further simplified. The standardization of buildings promotes the unification of architectural styles and ensures that each building can reach a certain artistic level. Standardization does not limit the sequence composition too much, so the standardization of single buildings and the diversification of group sequences can go hand in hand. As a space art, it is obviously progress. mature phenomenon. The individual buildings in ancient China

seem to lack a little variety, but the group combinations are varied. The reason is the high degree of unity of standardization and diversity.

Roof structure styles of ancient Chinese buildings

Poetic natural gardens Chinese gardens are an outstanding achievement of ancient Chinese architecture

art, and are also the representative of all gardens in the world. important typical example.

Chinese gardens are based on nature, absorbing the essence of natural beauty, and injecting

the aesthetic taste of people with rich cultural literacy into the architectural space composition

Techniques to typify natural beauty and turn it into garden beauty. The sentiment contained in it is poetic and picturesque; the spatial composition technique used is a sequence design of free

flexibility and smooth movement. Chinese gardens pay attention to "the skill lies in the borrowing of causes, and the essence lies in the appropriateness." It attaches great importance to the subtle calculation of the scenery and the scenery, so as to organize rich ornamental scenes. At the same time, it also simulates natural landscapes to create special techniques of stacking mountains and clearing water. No matter whether it is earth, mountains, rocks, or connected mountains and rivers, it can make the painting more profound and interesting. Meaningful.

Attach importance to expressing the character and symbolic meaning of architecture.

The political and ethical content of ancient Chinese architectural art requires it to show a distinctive character and specific

symbols. Meaning, there are many techniques used for this purpose. The most important thing is to use the environment

to render different moods and atmospheres, so that people can get a variety of aesthetic feelings;

The second is to stipulate different building levels, including volume, color , styles, decorations, etc., are used to express social systems and architectural contents; at the same time, we also try our best to use many concrete ancillary arts, as well as the words on plaques, couplets and inscriptions, to reveal

Indicate and explain the character and content of the building. Important buildings, such as palaces, altars, temples, temples, etc., also have specific symbolic themes. For example, Qin Shihuang created Xian Yang, used the palace to symbolize Ziwei, the Wei River to symbolize Tianhan, and the dug pond in Shanglin Garden to symbolize Penglai in the East China Sea. Emperors Kangxi and Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty built the Old Summer Palace, the Summer Resort and the Eight Outer Temples in Chengde to simulate important buildings and scenic spots across the country and symbolize the unity of the inner and outer worlds. Mingtang

The upper circle and the lower circle have five rooms and twelve halls, symbolizing all things in the world. The compositions of some □Ma temples

symbolize the Buddhist world of Mount Xumi and so on.

Art form The art form of ancient Chinese architecture is composed of the following factors

:

The unfolding spatial sequence. Chinese architectural art is mainly group composition

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The art of cooperation, the connection, transition and conversion between groups constitute a rich

spatial sequence. Most of the wooden structure houses are low-rise (mainly single-story), so the group sequence is basically laid out horizontally. The basic unit of space is the

courtyard, which has three forms: ①The cross axis is symmetrical, and the main building is placed in the

center. This kind of courtyard is mostly used for high-standard, memorial buildings. There are not many ritual buildings and religious buildings with strong character; ② The vertical axis is the main one, the horizontal axis is the supplement, and the main building is placed at the rear. Siheyuan or three-heyuan are formed, which are widely used in everything from palaces to small residences, with the largest number; ③ The axis is zigzag, or there is no obvious axis, and it is mostly used in garden space. Sequences are divided into regular and free forms

. The most outstanding representative of the existing regular sequence is the Beijing Palace of the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

In the free-style sequence, some courtyards are integrated into the environment, and the rhythm of the sequence changes

Slower, such as the buildings in imperial cemeteries and natural scenic areas; there are also courtyards

It blends into the landscape, flowers and trees, and the rhythm of sequence changes is tight, like an artificially managed garden

Forest. But no matter what kind of sequence, it is composed of a preface, transition, climax, and conclusion

with a coherent flow of ups and downs.

Group types of ancient Chinese buildings

Single shapes with fixed specifications There are more than a dozen names for single buildings in ancient China

but most of them are different in form Not big, there are three main types: ① Hall, the basic plane is rectangular, there are also a small number of squares, perfect circles, rarely appear alone; ② Pavilion, the basic plane It is a square, perfect circle, hexagonal, octagonal, etc.

Shape, can be independent from the group; ③Corridor, mainly serves as a connection between individual buildings. Halls or pavilions stacked one above the other are pavilions or towers. In the early days, there was also a kind of pavilion with a large rammed earth platform in the center, and multi-story houses were built along the platform, but

it was no longer built after the Eastern Han Dynasty. The size of the hall is distinguished by the number of rooms on the front and the number of purlins (or rafters) on the sides. Before the Han Dynasty, there were odd and even numbers in the rooms, and all the rooms in the rear were odd. In the Qing Dynasty, 11 rooms were the largest on the front, 3 were the smallest, and 13 purlins were the largest on the side. , 5 purlins are the minimum. There are several levels of spacing between bays and purlins, and there are several stereotyped arrangements of the inner column grid. If the number of rooms on the front and side is equal, it can be transformed into a square hall. The rooms can also be arranged staggered left, right, front and back, resulting in many variations of the palace plane.

Chinese Architecture - The Great Wall:

The Great Wall is an unprecedentedly majestic military defense project in ancient my country more than 2,000 years ago. It is a rare and great feat in the history of human architecture. Miracle. For thousands of years, the Great Wall has been proud of the people of China and praised by international friends. The majesty of the Great Wall and the spirit of the Great Wall are precious cultural heritages dedicated to mankind by our Chinese nation.

The long years cannot block the eternal majesty of the Great Wall; the vast space cannot block the immortal charm of the Great Wall.

"Mang Kunlun was born out of nowhere." More than 2,000 years ago, a giant dragon with a body of earth and stone suddenly rose across the land of China, spanning mountains, ridges, grasslands, and deserts. Because it crisscrossed and stretched for more than 100,000 miles, it was called the "Great Wall of China." ". Due to its majestic momentum, arduous engineering and long history, the Great Wall is not only rare among construction projects in my country, but also rare even in the history of construction projects in the world. Therefore, the Great Wall was listed as one of the seven medieval wonders of the world as early as a hundred years ago. In 1961, it was designated as the first batch of national key protected cultural relics by our country. In 1987, it was included in the World Cultural Heritage List.

According to Armstrong, the first American astronaut to land on the moon, he reported: “In space and on the moon, only two major projects on the earth can be identified, one is the Great Wall of China and the other The item is the sea dike in the Netherlands. "Someone has made rough statistics. If the masonry of the Great Wall is used to build a large wall 5 meters high and 1 meter wide, or to pave a road 5 meters wide and 30 centimeters thick, then This big wall can circle the earth more than ten times, and this road can circle the earth thirty or forty times. This is just the city wall itself. If you add in the costs of various gates, guards, towers, beacon towers, castles, piers, camps and other projects, the wall and road will be even longer...

That year, Armstrong, the American Apollo II spacecraft astronaut, successfully landed on the moon for the first time. According to him, when you see the big and luminous Earth from space, you can only identify two projects on the Earth with the naked eye. One is the sea dike in the Netherlands, and the other is the Great Wall of China.

The Great Wall is the greatest defense project in ancient China and a wonder in the history of world architecture.

The construction of the Great Wall lasted for two thousand years from the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period BC to the late Ming Dynasty in the 17th century AD. It spans mountains and ridges from east to west, passes through grasslands and deserts, and lies across the land of northern China.

As a military defense project, the Great Wall's grandeur, arduous construction and long duration are rare not only in Chinese history, but also in world history. Therefore, hundreds of years ago, it was listed as one of the seven wonders of the world along with the Colosseum, Leaning Tower of Pisa, Sophia Cathedral of Constantinople, etc.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, seven vassal states emerged simultaneously along the Yellow River Basin. In order to defend against foreign enemies, the Chu State built its first city wall, and other princes followed suit. Among them, the three kingdoms of Yan, Zhao and Qin were adjacent to the powerful Huns in the north and were often invaded. For this reason, they all built city walls on the northern border and stationed troops for defense. This was the beginning of the construction of the Great Wall.

In 221 BC, Qin Shihuang destroyed the six kingdoms and established the first unified and centralized empire in Chinese history. In order to consolidate the territory and defend against the Huns, the Qin Great Wall was built from Liaodong in the east to Lintao, Gansu in the west, with a total length of more than 5,000 kilometers. China's first Great Wall stands in the north.

Before and after, more than 20 vassal states and dynasties in China built the Great Wall. Among them, the length of the Great Wall built by the Han Dynasty and the Ming Dynasty exceeded 5,000 kilometers.

The Great Wall built in the Han Dynasty is the longest in history. On the original scale of the Qin Dynasty, it extends westward through the Hexi Corridor to Xinjiang, with a total length of 10,000 kilometers. This section of the Hexi Great Wall played a major role in ensuring the smooth flow of the "Silk Road" to countries in the Western Regions and developing economic, trade and cultural exchanges with Eurasian countries. Like the Great Walls of many dynasties, most of the Great Wall of the Han Dynasty has been eroded by the wind and sand, leaving only the remains of many earth structures and reeds and gravels.

The Ming Dynasty was the last dynasty in Chinese history to build the Great Wall. It was also an era when the development of Great Wall defense engineering technology reached its peak. During the Ming Dynasty for more than 200 years, construction projects continued uninterrupted. The Great Wall we see now is mainly built in the Ming Dynasty.

In order to achieve the purpose of military defense, the ancient people built the Great Wall, and the design became more and more sophisticated. The main project was a tall city wall that stretched thousands of miles. These thousands of miles of city walls connect hundreds of great passes, passes, and thousands of enemy towers and smoke piers into one, making it a wonder in the history of ancient architecture. Yandun is also called a beacon tower. It is a separate tower built on or inside the Great Wall. It is separated by a certain distance. Most of them are built on the top of the mountain or in a place that can be easily seen in the distance. It is a signal station used to convey military information. If there is an enemy situation, smoke will be burned during the day and fire will be lit at night to send signals. The stations echoed each other from afar, leading directly to the capital and the large defensive area, forming a complete communication network. The enemy tower, that is, the wall-riding platform, is higher than the city wall and has two and three floors. The defenders of the city can live inside and store weapons and ammunition to fight against the invading enemy. This kind of wall-mounted enemy platform was created by Qi Jiguang, a general who fought against the Japanese in the Ming Dynasty, and played an important role in military defense.

The construction of the Great Wall accompanied the rise and fall of China's feudal society and lasted more than 2,700 years. The Great Wall is more than ten thousand miles long. There are remains of the Great Wall in sixteen provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions in Northeast China, North China, Northwest China and the Yellow River Basin. If the length of the Great Wall built by various dynasties is added up, it exceeds 50,000 kilometers. The scale of its work is unmatched by any other project. If the masonry and earthwork of these projects were used to build a human wall one meter wide and five meters high, it could circle the earth more than ten times. The Great Wall is one of the wonders of the human world.

The Great Wall is another historical monument. The Great Wall records the political, economic, military and cultural history of each dynasty. Attached are the deeds of valiant generals and clever craftsmen. It also embodies the blood and sweat of countless soldiers and people. According to legend, during the reign of Qin Shihuang, Meng Jiangnu’s husband was ordered to build the Great Wall and did not return for three years. Meng Jiangnu sent her husband cold clothes and traveled around for the night. After going through a lot of hardships, when she arrived at Shanhaiguan, she learned that her husband had died of overwork and his bones were buried under the Great Wall. Meng Jiangnu was extremely sad and cried bitterly. The Great Wall suddenly collapsed eight years ago. After hundreds of miles, Meng Jiangnu finally found her husband's body. This story tells people about thousands of years of heavy corvee and the sorrow of the people.

Today, the Great Wall is a famous tourist attraction in China. People from all over the world regard the Great Wall as an important part of their visit to China. It also allows Chinese and foreign friends to learn more about China through understanding the history, culture, art, architecture and other precious values ??of the Great Wall.

With the erosion of ups and downs, the development and changes of society, the Great Wall has lost its original appearance. After the founding of New China, protective measures were taken to protect the Great Wall. In 1961, the Great Wall was designated as a key national cultural relic protection unit by the Chinese government, and the state carried out key repairs on Badaling, Shanhaiguan, and Jiayuguan.

In 1987, the Great Wall was officially included in the World Heritage List by UNESCO, becoming a unique treasure of mankind.

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The Wall of History: "Reconstructing Memory: The Great Wall in Contemporary Art"

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: (1) Culture and aesthetics; (2) Architecture and urbanism; (3) Exhibition and creation; (4) ) Criticism and History.