Page 223 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

OVERV IEW

Taoism and Chinese art

Does a "Taoist art" exist? We may confidently answer in the affirmative if we
restrict this notion to the liturgical art of Taoism. This category includes various
for,ms of poetry, psalmody, songs, hymns, and instrumental music, as well as
murals and paintings associated with the Taoist liturgy, priests' embroidered
robes, and ritual paraphernalia. Outside the ritual context, however, Taoist
art is more difficult to apprehend. In the architecture and sculpture of Taoist
temples, for instance, there is no specifically Taoist pattern. Like all large
traditional buildings in China, Taoist, Confucian, or Buddhist temples (in
fact, even mosques and synagogues) are based on the single model of palace
architecture, with decorated halls following one another on a south-north
axis, separated by courtyards and gardens. The importance of the halls, which
are usually single-storied, is conveyed through the height of their base, the
width of their fac;ades, and the decorative richness of their roofs and balus-
trades. Indeed, Taoist temples are often called gong '§ or "palaces." The best
known of these structures, due to its long history and its splendid fourteenth-
century murals, is the *Yongle gong or Palace of Eternal Joy in southern
Shanxi.
There is also no identifiably Taoist or Buddhist artistic technique or style, for
the same artists or craftsmen gathered in workshops, which were sometimes
quite large, to build and decorate Taoist and Buddhist temples alike. Chapter
3 of the Lidai minghua ji Hi 1i;;g ID ~t, (Records of Famous Painters of Succes-
sive Generations), compiled by Zhang Yanyuan ~~;ij (ca. 815-ca. 875) with a
preface dated 847, records numerous temples he visited in the area of Chang'an
(Shaanxi) and Luoyang (Henan), shortly before the massive destructions that
occurred due to the state persecution of Buddhism. The mural decorations
of many of these temples, either Buddhist or Taoist, were credited to Wu
Daozi :'R:~ T (?-792) , the most famous figurative painter in China. Wu has
since then been considered a patron saint for all Chinese religiOUS painters.
In Shanxi, with its rich and well-preserved tradition of mural paintings,
some workshops achieved a regional and inter regional development before
modern times. The same lay artists worked on various sites and projects, some
as itinerants traveling from one site to the next according to the command.
This system, still observed in Taiwan only a few decades ago, may explain the
widespread diffusion of iconographic motifs, techniques, and styles throughout
China. Thus, in a Six Dynasties votive stele, carved with a frontal triad of dei-
ties whose model is typically Buddhist, one may recognize a Taoist origin only
from the iconographic form of the figures: in particular, Laozi represented