Painting is not singing after all.

It's not a trick of turning into a goldfish, a juggling of spitting fireballs.

All the pen and ink articles that are stained with writing and painting are more or less also the elegant movement of cultural people and doctors, and they are also contaminated with the unique "tone" of some literati and doctors. ”

It doesn't matter if it's magnanimity, or it's hypocrisy.

Anyway, in ancient times, everyone in the painting world had some "idol baggage" when dealing with people.

In front of people, you have to hold a shelf and hold a demeanor.

Don't talk about the noble minister.

Even in the old society in the past, looking for those down-and-out scholars with family backgrounds or failing to pass the old test in Liulichang, and not talking about the poor people who were not easy to live in the capital.

Ask someone to draw a plum orchid bamboo chrysanthemum, write a pair, and ask a fan.

According to the old rules, the exquisite gentlemen must first arch their hands, and first say verbally, "The literati intersect a piece of paper." ”

Meaning, I didn't buy the paintings.

Vulgar, too vulgar.

We're not talking about hundreds of big boys, a few dollars and broken silver, we are all readers.

Therefore, we are talking about the friendship of "a piece of paper".

You can't open a restaurant with the down-and-out Eight Banners, what is the business? You call people "the shopkeeper", and they think that you are pointing your nose and scolding the street.

Our Lord Belle is kind enough to open a "private dish".

It's a treat.

It is to invite everyone to come to the house, taste a fresh, and give the money that is a gift for you to come to the door.

Feudal societies often have two skins that are separated.

Yangchun Baixue is Yangchun Baixue, and the Lower Riba people are the Lower Riba people.

If the snow is stained with the "rustic" of the peddler's pawn, then there is no tune.

The great literati built a garden by themselves, and three or five friends exchanged dot painting skills, which was elegant and interesting. Under the luxurious crystal chandelier of the hotel, he drank whiskey and ate Shanghai-style Western food, which is called decent. Being able to have a cup of coffee with Mr. Xu Shenru is called foreign.

In other words, under the public of the hall, people painted like monkeys, and from time to time they were yelled at by the peddlers and pawns to comment and talk about small things...... Even with the spread of Western learning, I heard that foreigners do have a drawing board and collect style in the open air, or the vast majority of art practitioners make a living by collecting money to paint for others.

But as a descendant of the painting sect.

This kind of thing was still a bit out of the ordinary in the eyes of people at the time.

"Not exquisite" and "unseemly".

So.

When Cao Xuan's teacher actually accepted the invitation of the owner of Xin'an Department Store for him, he was able to smash the gold-rimmed glasses in the critics' circle.

At that time, the editor of the well-known literary and entertainment newspaper "Xianshi" used a witty tone unique to the literary circles in the southeast coastal area to joke: "Painting, Cao Zhongtang's descendants are like singing singers." ”

Of course, Cao Xuan, who was a child, didn't understand these particularities.

Even.

He may not have been aware of the rights and wrongs of the outside world.

The senior brothers of the same sect called this junior brother who came out of the house and had "three nos".

No crying, no fussing, no joking.

It's like a little monk who practices closed-mouth meditation.

When Cao Xuan was a child, he was really the so-called "congenital painting holy body".

Love only one person, hold a brush, take a charcoal stick, write and draw there.

For him, this is much more interesting than flying a kite and pushing an iron hoop.

But the night before Cao Xuan was about to come to Nanjing Road to paint, the master specially called him to him and said something like this-

"Xuan'er, you know what? Shanghai is a very fascinating city. It's petty and accommodating. Both stingy and generous. It can make a person happen in an instant, and it can also destroy a person with a raised hand. How big it can make you in the limelight, it can also make you see how big your eyes are. ”

"No matter what line of work, as long as it is related to literature and art, there are people who are out of the limelight here, Yu Dafu, Ding Wei, Li Yaotang (Ba Jin)...... There are also big celebrities who are mixed up in other places, and when they come here, it is like a small pebble thrown into the Huangpu River, and in a blink of an eye, they are swept away by the waves and swallowed cleanly. ”

The teacher took a sip of tea, and his face showed some of the little cunning that had been brewed over the years.

"I can see clearly, in the next 100 years, this will be one of the art palaces of the East and Xia, and if a painter wants to conquer Italy, he must first conquer Fei Leng Cui. If a painter wants to win the hearts of the French, he must first win the hearts of the Parisians. ”

"And if you want to become my successor in the future, you can take over my mantle and become the successor of the spirited Nanzong School of painting. Then Shanghai is the link you can't bypass. ”

The painter scraped the teacup with the lid of the cup.

"The people of Modu have a lot of energy, and they want the best in everything - to praise movie stars, to praise the most fashionable movie stars. For dinner, you have to eat Wang Jiahe's crab roe bun and Yangzhou restaurant's egg yolk fried rice. To eat steak, you have to go to the second floor of the Tak Grand Hotel. Listening to the play, I also want to listen to Mei Lanfang's play. After a little owe, they suddenly don't love it. ”

"So even if you chase prodigies, people in Shanghai will only chase the most divine prodigies. It's only 50,000 yuan, let's be honest in private, not to mention that it was originally disaster relief. Even if it only costs 50,000 yuan alone, you can buy the name of a famous prodigy in the southeast. ”

"It's a good deal!"

The old man smiled, but his face became serious again.

"But the people of the Demon Capital have a sense of arrogance. From south to north, what a novelty, they have no shortage of them. What a mysterious story, they have all heard it, what a bull's horn, everyone has also praised it. The common people in Shanghai are the most discerning and well-informed, and the so-called most difficult to 'serve'. ”

"Everybody's staring at you with wide eyes, they don't believe what the newspapers say, they don't believe what the critics say, they only believe what they see."

"Teacher, you use 50,000 yuan to send your name into everyone's after-dinner conversation. The critics are more or less willing to sell the teacher a share or two of face, but whether the city can really fall in love with you or not, the teacher can't help much, and the only thing you can rely on is yourself. ”

"This is a city where desires flow, and you have to fall in love with the city with your heart before the city will really love you with your heart."

"Teacher, what do you mean by heart?"

The boy still had a stiff face, like a little monk, and asked dryly.

The old painter was amused by Cao Xuan's youthful and old-fashioned appearance, but it was very contrasting and cute.

"All hearts are non-minds, they are called hearts, and Avalokiteshvara is also."

The old painter was dumbfounded, patted Cao Xuan's head three times, and then paced to the hotel room to sleep with his hands behind his back.

It is unfathomable as in "Journey to the West", Bodhi Ancestor knocked on the head of the senior brother.

……

Cao Xuan used the charcoal in his hand to outline the outline of the corner of the girl in front of him.

He lifted his pen.

Unconsciously bit the bare end of the willow charcoal strip, ignoring the noise of the outside world, thinking about what the teacher said.

If it's a portrait of a man and a woman who is painting now.

This is the one hundred and thirty-seventh painting that Cao Xuan painted in front of the Xin'an Department Store during this time.

Every time Cao Xuan completed five works, he used charcoal to write a small orthography on the edge of the drawing board, and now he has written exactly twenty-seven and a half orthography.

"All hearts are non-minds, they are called hearts, and Avalokiteshvara is also."

He pondered in his mind what that meant by that sentence.

Cao Xuan was born in poor health, suffered from pneumonia once, and at that time, it happened to be reported in the newspaper that there was cholera in Weihaiwei, and the teacher was afraid that he would not live long.

In the past, people were superstitious, so they sent him to the Yuantong Monastery next door to his residence, and sat down in "Lotus Treasure for the Buddha to watch, and the little ghost couldn't touch his body".

So in addition to learning to draw.

The textbooks of other little boys' enlightenment are often "Hundred Family Names", "Qianziwen", "Di Zi Gui", "Caigen Tan" or something.

But Cao Xuan was in a bunch of small novices, following the mysterious and magical stories in the old monk's Buddhist scriptures.

"All hearts are non-minds, they are called hearts" - these are the words in the "Diamond Sutra", Cao Xuan vaguely heard the bald abbot say that all the minds of all living beings are in change, they are impermanent, and they are not the original mind.

It's already a mystical chatter.

followed by the brainless sentence "Guanyin Bodhisattva", which is even more incomprehensible, "Diamond Sutra" is not "Guanyin Heart Sutra", mainly the scriptures explained by Shakyamuni Buddha.

He couldn't understand what that meant.

"Xuan" - this is an important feature of Oriental Zen Buddhism, every word and deed, every move, is Zen.

Finger Zen, stick drink Zen, crazy Zen, variety...... Just like in the famous stand-up comedy "Fighting Law" during the Republic of China, the master casually stretches out his finger, which represents "the immeasurable Buddha, a Buddha bows", and patting the heart casually represents "the Buddha sits in the heart".

"Zen" and the whole of modern art actually have a very similar temperament.

The same Zen has a hundred understandings, a thousand understandings, and ten thousand understandings.

The solution that conforms to the teacher's mind and can be regarded by the teacher as a real successor is the only one in the teacher's heart.

It's like a guessing game on the lights.

Throughout Cao Xuan's long life.

He had never met a dumb fan who was so important, but difficult to understand.

Ordinary children guessed correctly for lantern fans, and the prize was a few large hawthorn pills.

He guessed the riddle correctly.

The prize is the entire millennium painting sect - it must be the most expensive lantern festival game in the entire world ever.

Cao Xuan wanted to know if he was good enough to draw.

Did it meet Master's expectations?

He's not a kid anymore, (though no one sees it that way except himself).

But at the age of six or seven, it is indeed the age when poor families have begun to help their parents share their worries and take on family responsibilities.

In Jiangsu and Shanghai, the industrial and commercial atmosphere is heavier, and children are in charge of the house early.

Since ancient times, there has been a saying that "when you are born to the age of seven, you will be thrown away". Many young people of the same age have already begun to work as apprentices in shops, and even into Japanese-funded yarn factories as child laborers.

He followed Master so far.

At least I have begun to gradually understand what the meaning of being the other party's closed disciple has to the entire Southern School of Painting, and I have gradually understood what the meaning of the 50,000 fiat currency has.

Master's words are light.

But the floods in the south of the Yangtze River, the cholera in Weihaiwei, and the fall of the Northeast...... Those who listen to the adults frowning and talk about what they see.

Among displaced refugees, the price of 100 yuan is enough to sell children and daughters.

Fifty thousand yuan, which is the salary of an ordinary dock worker for a hundred years.

One of his paintings.

Even if it's twenty years later...... Can you really bear such a weight?

Cao Xuan, who is young and old, has the calm of an old monk and the sorrow of an old monk at the age of a young man.

Master said.

Shanghainese people only look at the reddest horn in the world, and only praise the most divine prodigy in the world.

From this point of view.

He may have probably earned the approval of the city at his feet.

Even as the clouds of war continued to approach, there was never a moment of real peace in the world, but in the so-called golden decade of the Republic of China from 1927 to 1937.

On the whole, the wealthy people of Shanghai still have a lot of excitement and love for literature and art.

In front of the Xin'an Department Store, the price of selling sketches is 20 yuan, which is naturally a sky-high price for ordinary painters, but for Cao Million, who is "50,000 years old at the age of 50,000 and 100 years old".

The price is still acceptable.

At least the people in Shanghai approve of the price.

There is an endless stream of people queuing every day, and even because he is small, it is easy to be blocked by people sitting there.

There was a long-term worker at the dock who queued up for an hour, and he didn't buy paintings, just to come over to see what Cao Xuan looked like, and then to see what the legendary painting of a shop that could change half a street looked like, and finally took a cold look to touch Cao Xuan's head and get a touch of the fairy spirit of a prodigy.

and departed satisfied.

But has he really won the city's heartfelt "love" for him?

I can't seem to explain this anymore.

After all, he is just a child, not Zhang Daqian.

Cao Xuan was clear.

Those who queued up to buy his paintings were credited with six of the novelties in the newspaper, and the remaining three were the ones that his teacher first taught him, combining Soviet-style sketches, European-style lines, gongbi painting methods, and Shanghai-style charcoal line drawing.

Even the well-informed people of Modu have rarely seen such a combination of Chinese and Western paintings.

So the picture is fresh, and it is good.

Only then did he give eight or nine points to the names of Cao Shentong and Cao Million, and the rest of the part that belonged to his real painting skills did not account for a single point?

He didn't know.

It seems that this painting method can also have a similar effect if it is replaced by any senior brother.

After all, he is just a child, after all, he is not a fairy stone produced by the world, he has been conceived by the aura of heaven and earth for thousands of years, and he has seen the Monkey King who is born, old, sick and dead in the world, and he understands the ability of the Bodhi Patriarch to think about it after a second thought.

The teacher didn't have three scriptures in the middle of the night, and came over to teach him the secrets of the heart method that could make the whole city fall in love with him, this question was really a bit too difficult, and the weight of the heir of the painting sect was too heavy.

Maybe it's not a child of his age who can solve it and catch it.

"Hey, have you listened to me, the Japanese are coming, kid, you have to paint this painting to the earth?"

At least Xiao Kai on the other side looked a little impatient, obviously not falling in love with him.

(End of chapter)