26 把真实的客体转向主体，从视觉真实转向心灵的真实，从客观世界走向主观世界，用一种超越的主观精神支配物质现实，这是由写实具象转型为抽象的关键，是金钥匙，也即“物随心转”。虽然现实世界（也即生活）是艺术的基础，但是具有艺术价值的作品却不是“心随物转”而得。

　　27 物象变形虽然丧失了客体的意义，但却是艺术家表现内心神秘的符号。狂放虽然导致了夸张，怪僻产生了畸形，这都是艺术家心性的不同表现。物象的特征已不存在，色彩也失去纯物质效果，出现了观念上的变化。观者感觉到的是艺术家完全在表现自己的内心。这是西方现代派艺术家的基本共同之处，正在于是用一种特殊的绘画语言表达心灵的表现性艺术。

　　28 画者，言也。自画出自心，自心成“佛”。

　　29 心源者，艺源也。能得心者，才能得心物。心物者，艺物也。艺物者，自然造化也。造化者，化造也，对古不化、对物不化、对景不化、对外艺不化（对于外来艺术），何谈“造”。

　　30 缘道立象，象自立。缘道求法，法自生。缘道构景，景自构。缘道化境，境自存。

　　画山水，有景无境，入俗眼。

　　有景有境，方为高手。无景有境乃巨手也。

　　31 景是器，境是道。

　　所谓景，即非景；非景非非景，是为景。

　　所谓境，即非境；非境非非境，是为境。

　　所谓法，即非法；非法非非法，是为法。

　　32 从宏观（宇宙观照意识）角度讲，艺术的最高境界是文化表现艺术。

　　从某种狭义上讲（艺术本身观照意识），艺术表现文化。

　　33 大音希声。大象无形。大美无颜。并非无声、无形、无颜。而是无声非无声、无形非无形、无颜非无颜，是为声、是为形、是为颜。此声、形、颜者，乃为真的真、形、颜也。画者，不悟通此理，乃俗手俗画矣！

　　34 大笔无痕，非无痕。非痕非非痕，此乃为造化之痕，本真之痕，原态之痕，是为痕。痕者，迹也。迹者，心迹—道迹—神迹。

　　35 从古至今，都是持“以形写神”之观点。我反其道而行之，“以神写形”是也。以“形写神”是再现，“以神写形”是表现。前者重客观；后者重主观。老子曰：“反者道之动”。

　　36 把自然物化，即“物以心迁”、“地随心变”、“貌随心变”、“物以心转”的过程，也是“因心再造”的过程。至“境随心造”、“心随道造”，再到“缘道立象”、“象随心转”、“景象构景”、“景归境象”、“境象归景”全过程。

　　37 山水画品位，层面境界的渐进图式：

　　物化—心化—道化

　　眼中物—心中物—道中物

　　物的迹化—心的迹化—道的迹化

　　38 画家想知道自己是哪一手？对照自己，一看便知。要想成为巨手，必从俗手始，经数十年，努力修炼，才能达到。

　　墨道山水创作几个基本过程：第一步进行宏观的“道境”构思。第二步根据道境的需要，进行宏观的整体画面构成。第三步按构成需要进行立象，所谓“缘道立象”。在立象方面动用多维立象思维方式，集具象、抽象、心象、意象等。第四步进行绘制。在绘制中，以理性为主导，但也有非理性因素存在；有必然的偶然，也有偶然的必然，汇艺术历程所有学养而为之。这种为之是无意识的，但也是有意识的，无为无不为。中国大道精神及民族特色，自然涵蕴其中，加之个性化的笔墨关系、虚实关系、繁简关系、黑白关系等等的运用，那么具体的艺术语言便“顺道而生，缘道而立”。其中有理性的精心创制，也有非理性的随意；有理性超越的概括，也有传统的天人合一，物我两忘的创制心境，正是“天地人化一，道物我通悟”的超越理性状态。第五步是最后的整体收拾。由此，墨道山水已不是传统文人的“诗画”，却有天地的诗心，而且是哲人的诗心。作品浩然磅礴，震人心弦，是主体与本体的高度和谐统一，也是主客观的同化畅神，给人以见仁见智的启迪，又是大道精神的直观显现，实现了中国绘画对于最高灵境的追求，不仅是创作心态，重要的是画面直观境界。

　　39 中国画是中国文化的形态之一，不管过去，现在还是将来，都是在继承延续、拓展创造地发展着具有民族文化精神的艺术形态，这种形态图式随着历史的发展而具有每个历史阶段的时代性。这种时代性多表现在图式表象，即表现形式（也有说笔墨当随时代）。但是，要特别强调的是，不管哪个历史时期的时代性作品，都应贯穿着一条主线，这条主线即是在作品表现“背后”的民族文化精神内涵。这正是民族艺术的根本灵魂，强壮的脊梁。

　　一个民族经历了几千年、近万年的历史发展，它的民族文化精神已形成了一座根深蒂固的丰碑，这座丰碑随着历史的进展，兼收并蓄，融合了各个历史阶段的人类先进文本，强化丰富着这座丰碑。同时本民族的文化精神，也被人类其它民族所吸收，更加固了人类文化精神的共同追求。如果一味地异想天开，用一种乌托邦式的教化、思想、行为甚而强制性地去改变它的话，即便花大力气用几十年的功夫，最终还是宣告失败，成为历史发展的罪人。

　　作为民族文化精神体现之一的中国画，在20世纪界末、21世纪初交汇之际，有人提出中国画“笔墨等于零”，又有人提出要“守住中国画笔墨底线”，引发了交锋争辩。其实质都不过是表现形式的表象而已。我认为最本质最重要的问题是要守住本民族的民族文化精神，健全、丰富民族的脊梁，才是根本。至于等于零也好，守住底线也好，都是为民族文化精神服务的。

　　40 艺术不是哲学，但是艺术可以回答哲学思考的一些问题。这种回答不是图解，也不是某种哲学符号，而是一种哲学精神的内涵。

　　画家，也应是一位思想深刻的哲人。哲学家靠文字语言去阐释自己的哲学思想；艺术家靠自己独特的艺术图式语汇去迹化自己的哲思，也即作品的深层内涵。

Jizi’s Reflections on Art（two）

　　26. Change the real object into the subject, and turn the visual sense of reality into reality as seen by the soul. Go from the objective world to the subjective world by utilizing a type of transcendental subjective spirit to dominate physical reality. This is the key to transforming concrete reality into the abstract, it is the golden key as “the material world is changed by mind.”Although the real world (that is life) is the foundation of art, nonetheless, all artwork that has artistic value is definitely not obtained by a “mind changed by the material world.”

　　While the quote itself (Chinese: wu sui xin zhuan) is attributed to the Buddha in The Lankavatara Sutra (compiled in the fourth century CE), the philosophic idealism expressed in this quote is also a principle of the “Consciousness-only” School (weishi lun) that flourished in the Tang Dynasty.

　　This quote, in Chinese xin sui wu zhuan, is the author’s play on the words of the above quote: wu sui xin zhuan (“the material world is changed by mind”).

　　27. When the form of a physical image is changed, although it forfeits its significance as an object, nonetheless, it symbolizes the artist’s expression of an inner mystery. Although unrestraint leads to exaggeration, and eccentricity produces abnormal forms, these are all different expressions of the artist’s mind. When the special features of the physical image no longer exist, and colors also lose the effect of pure substance, then what emerges is a transformation in concepts. What the viewer feels is that the artist has completely exposed his inner mind.  This is something about which the School of Modern Artists in the West has reached a fundamental consensus and, this being so, they use a special kind of painting language to convey the soul’s artistic expressions.

　　28. A painting is speech. If the painting reveals one’s mind, then that mind is “enlightened.”

　　The Chinese word translated as “enlightened” is fo which literally means the Buddha; the original meaning of the word “Buddha,” and its original Chinese transliteration fotu, however, was “the enlightened one.”

　　29. The source of the mind is the source of art. One who ‘gets’ his mind is then capable of ‘getting’ the objects in his mind. The objects in one’s mind are the objects of art.  Art objects are nature’s creative transformations. Nature transforms creatively.Transforming creatively, however, does not mean transforming the ancient, objects, scenes, or art from outside (that is art from abroad), so how about “creating?”

　　Nature transforms creatively” is the author’s play on the Chinese term: zaohua, which, as a noun, can mean Nature and, as a verb, to create or to nurture.

　　30.  If you follow the Tao to establish the image, then the image establishes itself. If you follow the Tao to seek an artistic method, then an artistic method arises by itself. If you follow the Tao to structure a scene, then the scene structures itself. If you follow the Tao to transform an artistic realm, then the realm itself comes into existence.

　　Painting landscapes, the vulgar eye sees scenes but not realms.

　　If there are both scenes and realms, the painter is competent.

　　If there are no scenes but there are realms,

　　Then the painter is a Master.

　　The Chinese for “follow the Tao” is yuan dao, a term that also has the sense of  “going along with the Tao,’ ‘being on the edge of the Tao,’ and “because of the Tao.”

　　31. The scene is an instrument, the artistic realm is the Tao.

　　What is called the scene is not the scene;

　　The non-scene is not the non-scene; it is the scene.

　　What is called the realm is not the realm;

　　The non-realm is not the non-realm; it is the realm.

　　What is called the method is not the method;

　　The non-method is not the non-method; it is the method.

　　As noted above, the word translated as “instrument” is qi, a word that means “instrument, device, or tool.” Qi is used in The Book of Changes in sharp contradistinction to dao (i.e. the Tao). Cf. Confucius’ remark in the Second Chapter of the Analects of Confucius that “the princely man (i.e. the Confucian humanist ideal) is not a mere instrument (qi).”

　　32. Speaking from a macroscopic perspective (the universe reflects consciousness), the highest artistic realm is where culture expresses art.

　　Speaking in a certain narrow sense (where art itself reflects consciousness), then art expresses culture.

　　33. Great music uses sound sparingly. Great images have no form. Great beauty has no adornment. But it is not that there is absolutely no sound, no form, no adornment.  Rather, silence is not without sound; the formless is not without form; the unadorned is not without adornment; and this is the meaning of sound, form, and adornment. This kind of sound, form, and adornment are authentic truth, form, and adornment. If a painter does not thoroughly comprehend this principle, then that painter is a conventional artist painting conventional pictures.

　　34. A great brush leave no traces. No traces are not non-traces. There are the traces of creativity, of the real, of the original state; these are all traces. Traces are signs; signs that include: signs of the mind, the Tao, and the spirit.

　　Life -- the artist -- artworks (the eye)

　　The artist -- the cultivation of life -- artworks (the mind)

　　The universe -- man’s life -- art (the Tao)

　　35. From ancient times until the present, artists have persisted in the concept of “using forms to paint mysteries.” I do just the opposite and “use mysteries to paint forms.” “Using forms to paint mysteries” is reproducing the subject of the painting while “using mysteries to paint forms” is an artistic expression. The former repeats the object; the latter, the subject. Lao Zi said:

　　“Reversal is the movement of the Tao.”

　　Cf. Chapter 40 of Lao Zi’s Daode Jing.

　　36. Painting natural objects is a process of “objects move with the mind,”“the earth transforms following mind,” “appearances transform following mind,” and “the material word is changed by mind.”  Painting natural objects is also a process of “re-creating according to mind.”It is a process of going from “the realm is created according to mind,” and “mind is created in accord with the Tao,” to “follow the Tao to establish the image,” “the image is changed by mind,”  “the images of the scene constitute the scene,” “the scene returns to the realm of images,” and “the realm of images returns to the scene.”

　　This quote is from the Shishi Tongjian, a work compiled by the Korean Monk known as Caoyi Chanshi (the Grass Cape Chan Monk), (1786-1866).

　　These several quotes about how mind effects changes and transformations are typical of the philosophical idealism of such Buddhist schools of thought as Chan, “consciousness-only,”etc.

　　37. A landscape painting’s qualities and the levels of its artistic realm are displayed in the following schematic:

　　Materialized -- ‘mindized’-- Taoized

　　Eye objects -- mind objects -- Tao objects

　　Indicates the material word -- indicates mind -- indicates the Tao

　　Literally ‘mindized’ (xinhua).

　　Literally ‘Taozied’  (daohua).

　　38. Does a painter want to know how good he is? Let him compare himself to others, and he will know at first glance.  Is the painter thinking of becoming  a Master? Then he must start as a conventional painter, spend several decades striving to cultivate himself and practicing his art, and only then will he achieve it.

　　Several basic processes produced the Tao of Ink Landscapes. The first step was to proceed to the macroscopic conception of “the realm of the Tao.” The second step was to proceed to the overall painting’s macroscopic composition based on the requirements of the realm of the Tao. The third step was to create the image based on the needs of that composition, the so called  “laying hold of the Tao to create the image.” As to the aspect of creating the image, I utilized a mode of thinking that allows for the creation of multidimensional images, sets of concrete images, abstract images, mental images, and so on. The fourth step was to paint a draft. In the draft, the painting should be guided by rationality but there should also be some irrational elements. There should be inevitable accidents, and accidental inevitabilities brought about by the learning and cultivating that is a convergence of artistic processes.  This type of “bringing about” is unconscious, but there are also conscious elements so that “by doing nothing, nothing is not done.”China’s spirit of the great Tao and the characteristics of China’s nationalities are naturally embodied in this, and when we add individualized applications such as the relationships between brush and ink, false and real, complex and simple, black and white, and other such applications, then the the concrete artistic language “avails itself of the Tao to come into being, and lays hold of the Tao to establish itself.” In this there is a rational, meticulous creativity, and also some irrational randomness. There is a rationally transcendent epitome, but also the traditional unity of  Heaven and man, a creative mood in which both the ego and objects are forgotten, and a state that transcends rationality in which “Heaven, man, and earth are one and the Tao, objects, and the ego are fully comprehended.” The fifth step was the last overall putting of things in order. From here, the Tao of Ink Landscapes are not just the traditional literati’s “poetic paintings,”but the poetic mind of Heaven and earth and also of the philosopher. The artworks are awe inspiring and majestic and touch people’s heartstrings. They are a harmonious unity of the subjective and the ontological as well as the smooth assimilation of subject and object. They provide each individual with a different inspiration, and they are also the visual appearances of the spirit of the great Tao. They demonstrate that Chinese paintings striving for the highest spiritual realm are not only a creative state of mind but also, and more importantly, paintings of a realm directly perceived through the visual sense.

　　Cf. Chapter 37 of Lao Zi’s Daode Jing.

　　An allusion to the Song Dynasty poet and painter Su Dongpo’s (1037-1101) famous remark that “in a painting there is a poem; in a poem, a painting.”

　　39. Chinese painting is one form of Chinese culture and, regardless of whether it is the past, present, or future, it is an inheritance that continues, by expansion and creation, to develop artistic forms that possess the people of China’s cultural spirit.These forms of drawing follow the development of history and possess the spirit of the times of each historical period. This spirit of the times is frequently expressed in schematic representations that are expressions of forms (some say that brush and ink paintings ought also to follow the times). What I want especially to stress here, however, is that, regardless of what historical period the artworks of the times represent, there is one main current that permeates them all, and that current is the significance of the people of China’s cultural spirit that is “the backdrop” to all these artworks. This current is the fundamental soul of the people of China’s art; their strength of character.

　　A people that has experienced several thousand years, close to ten thousand years, of historical development, are a people whose cultural spirit has formed a deep seated memorial.  This memorial, following historical developments, is an eclectic mix that synthesizes mankind’s advances in every historical period, and these have both strengthened and enriched this memorial. Simultaneously, the people of China’s cultural spirit is absorbed by other peoples’ consolidating even further the common pursuit of a human cultural spirit.  Even if we engage in wishful thinking, and use a utopian style of education, thought, and behavior to the point of making it mandatory to make changes to this memorial, and even if we were to expend all our energies for several decades on this endeavor, ultimately we would have to admit defeat, and we would be guilty of impeding the progress of history.

　　At the convergence of the end of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty first centuries, Chinese painting, which is one method of demonstrating the people of China’s cultural spirit, was criticized by some people who said that “brush and ink paintings amount to nothing,” and by others who said “hold fast to the bottom line for brush and ink paintings,” a confrontation that sparked heated debate.  In essence, paintings are nothing but the expressions of forms. I believe that the most important matter is to uphold the people of China’s cultural spirit, and that to improve and enrich their strength of character is of the essence.  As to whether Chinese painting “amounts to nothing” or to whether we should “hold fast to the bottom line,” these both serve the people of China’s cultural spirit.

　　The term translated as “people of China” is minzu, literally “a people, a nation, an ethnic community.” Because China is a composite of many different peoples, however, and because the author clearly refers to all of these peoples, I have used “people of China” rather than “Chinese people,” a term often mistakenly thought to refer only to the majority Han nationality.

　　The term is jiliang, literally “backbone” but by extension, and similar to its use in English, “strength of character.”

　　40. Art is not philosophy, but art can answer some of the questions that philosophy raises. These answers are not graphic solutions, nor are they some kind of philosophic symbols; instead, they are a kind of extension of the philosophic spirit.

　　Artists must be deep thinking philosophers. Philosophers depend on language to expound their philosophic thinking. Artists depend on their own unique artistic schematic vocabulary to trace their own philosophic thinking; in other words, the deeper meaning of artworks.