Chinese books state that between the fourth and the eighth centuries "the
art of painting _man and things_ underwent a vital change." By this they
alluded to the intervention of Buddhist art, which made its appearance in
China toward the fifth century in the form of the Graeco-Indian art of
Gandhara, already modified by its transit across Eastern Turkestan. This
by no means indicates that purely Indian origins might not be found for
it. At Sanchi, as well as in Central India and at Ajanta such
characteristics are preserved. But the Greek dynasties which had settled
in northwestern India in the train of Alexander, had carried with them the
canons of Hellenistic art. The technique and methods of this art were
placed at the service of the new religion. They gave to Buddhist
art--which was just beginning to appear in the Gandharian provinces--its
outward form, its type of figures, its range of personages and the greater
part of its ornamentation.[9]
[9] See Foucher, "L'Art greco-bouddique du Gandhara." Paris, Leroux.
Buddhism found the expiring Hellenistic formula which had been swept
beyond its borders, ready at hand at the very moment the new religion was
gathering itself together for that prodigious journey which, traversing
the entire Far East, was to lead it to the shores of the Pacific. Once
outside of India, it came into contact with Sassanian Persia and Bactria.
With Hellenistic influences were mingled confused elements springing from
the scattered civilizations which had reigned over the Near East. Thence
it spread to the byways of Eastern Turkestan.
We know today, thanks to excavations of the German expeditions of
Gruenwedel and von Lecoq, the two English expeditions of Sir Aurel Stein
and the French expedition of M. Pelliot, that in that long chain of oases
filled with busy cities, Buddhist art was gradually formed into the
likeness under which it was to appear as a finished product in the Far
East. Here it developed magnificently. The enormous frescoes of Murtuq
display imposing arrangements of those figures of Buddhas and Bodhisatvas
which were to remain unchanged in the plastic formulas of China and Japan.
Meanwhile conflicting influences continued to be felt. Sometimes the
Indian types prevailed, as at Khotan, at others there were Semitic types
and elements originating in Asia Minor, such as were found at Miran, and
at length, as at Tun-huang, types that were almost entirely Chinese
appeared.
The paintings brought from Tun-huang by the Stein and Pelliot expeditions
enable us to realize the nature of the characteristics which contact with
China imposed upon Buddhist art. It had no choice but to combine with the
tendencies revealed in the painting of Ku K'ai-chih. The painter trained
in the school of Hellenistic technique drew with the brush. He delighted
in the rhythmic movement of the line and the display of a transcendent
harmony and elegance of proportion such as are seen in the frescoes of
Eastern Turkestan. Perhaps through contact with China--herself searching
for new expressions--but probably through a combination of the two
influences, Buddhist painting, at the opening of the T'ang dynasty, gives
us heavier types in which compact and powerful figures take on a new
character.
From then on we perceive the nature of the great change to which the early
books refer. Chinese painting had already known the genii and fairies of
Taoism, the Rishi or wizards living in mountain solitudes, the Immortals
dwelling in distant isles beyond the sea. It now knew gods wrapped in the
ecstatic contemplation of Nirvana, with smiling mouth and half-closed
eyes, revealing mystic symbols in a broad and apostolic gesture. It had
more life-like figures, attendants, benign and malignant, terrifying
demons. Before these impassive gods, in a fervor of devotion it bent the
figures of donors, men and women, sometimes veritable portraits. With even
greater breadth it portrayed the disciples of Sakyamuni, those anchorites
and hermits who under the name of Lohan[10] have entered into Chinese
Buddhist legend. Indian priests with harsh, strongly marked features and
wrinkled faces, preachers of a foreign race, disfigured by scourging or
else the calm full visage of the ecstatic in contemplation,--such are the
types that appeared. Chinese painters took up the new subjects and treated
them with a freedom, an ease, and a vitality which at once added an
admirable chapter to the history of art.
[10] Indian _Arhat_; Japanese _Rakan_.--TRANSLATOR.