Landscape Change Sequence in Riverside Map of Qingming Festival

The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival is one of the top ten famous paintings handed down by China. It is a national treasure cultural relic and is now in the Palace Museum in Beijing. The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival is 24.8 cm wide and 528.7 cm long, and it is in silk color. In the form of long scroll, the work adopts the scattered perspective composition method, and in the expression technique, the required scene is captured by constantly moving the viewpoint, that is, the scattered perspective method. From the vast Yuan Ye, the vast rivers, the towering battlements, to the nails and rivets on ships and cars, the small commodities on vendors, and the words on the market, they are all harmoniously organized into a unified whole. There are officials, farmers, businessmen, doctors, monks, Taoist priests, petty officials, women, children, teachers, telegraphers and so on, as well as donkeys and cows. There are fairs, trading, hanging out, drinking, parties, pushing boats, pulling carts, riding cars, riding horses and so on. There are many shops, hotels, teahouses and dim sum shops in the street, as well as towers, river ports, bridges, cargo ships, government buildings and thatched cottages.

The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival is roughly divided into three parts: the spring scenery on the outskirts of Bianjing, the scene of Bianhe and the market in the city. It includes exhortation activities.

The first is the suburbs.

Unfolding this picture, we can see a camel team on the road beside the stream. The old horse, who has been walking for many years, came from Bianjing City in the northeast, and five donkeys were carrying loads. The front groom drove the leading livestock to the bridge at the corner, and the back porter drove the pack team forward with a whip.

A boat was tied to a stump by the bridge, and several small farmhouses were scattered among the trees in an orderly way. There are several stone mills on the threshing floor. There are several sheep in the sheepfold, and there seems to be a chicken and duck fold next to the sheepfold, which is a quiet rural scene. A wedding procession slowly turned from the north, followed by the groom riding a bordeaux horse and a porter carrying the bride's dowry.

A farmer near the teahouse has two cows. The seedlings in the distant fields are thriving and farmers are watering and fertilizing them. There is a hotel just across the street in front of the teahouse. The hotel is located in the bulk cargo terminal, and the business is naturally booming. The owner of the dock is counting the goods to be sent somewhere.

Second, Bianhe

Bianhe River was an important transportation hub and commercial artery in the Northern Song Dynasty. As can be seen from the picture, the population is dense and merchant ships gather. Some people are resting in the teahouse, some are reading fortune-telling, and some are eating in the restaurant. There is also the "Wang Paper Horse Shop" selling grave-sweeping sacrifices. Ships in the river come and go, end to end, either pulled by trackers or paddled by boatmen. Some are full of goods, going upstream, and some are nervously berthing to unload. Across the Bianhe River is a large wooden arch bridge with exquisite structure and beautiful shape. Such as flying rainbow, hence the name Hongqiao. There is a big ship waiting to cross the bridge. The boatman is supported by bamboo poles; Hook the bridge with a long pole; Lead the boat with hemp rope; Several people are busy lowering the mast so that the ship can pass. People in the neighboring ship are also pointing, as if shouting something. Both inside and outside the ship are busy crossing the bridge for this ship. People on the bridge are sweating over the tense ferry scene. This is the well-known Hongqiao pier, with knife and scissors stalls, food stalls and various grocery stalls all over the bridge. Two stall owners are scrambling to greet a passer-by to see their goods. It is the intersection of land and water transportation, which is the climax of the picture.

Third, the market

Centered on the tall towers, there are rows of houses on both sides, including teahouses, restaurants, foot shops, meat shops, temples, public halls and so on. Silk, jewelry, spices, incense, paper horses and so on all have specialized businesses. In addition, there are medical clinics, car repair, fortune telling, shaving and plastic surgery, and all walks of life have everything. Large-scale shops are also tied up with "colorful buildings and happy doors", and banners are hung to attract business, and pedestrians in the market are jostling with each other. There are businessmen who do business and people who look at street scenes. There are monks walking around with baskets on their backs, tourists asking for directions from other places, street children who have heard of books, children of rich people who drink heavily in restaurants, disabled elderly people begging on the edge of cities, men, women and children, scholars, farmers, workers and businessmen, and so on. Means of transportation: sedan chair, camel, ox cart, rickshaw, flat car and various vehicles, which vividly show people the bustling scene of a commercial city.

Fourth, Qu Jian

The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival is not only a simple description of people's customs and daily life, but also a hidden mystery under the appearance of commercial prosperity. There is a frightening hidden line under the bright line, and it is also a "prosperous and dangerous map" with a sense of urgency. Through the performance of frightening the horse into the suburbs as a foreshadowing, the visual center of the whole volume, the dangerous situation between ships and bridges and the contradictory climax of the interweaving of civil and military officials on the bridge, as well as the scenes of lax military strength, insufficient fire control, lax city defense, opening of the country, invasion of the street by commerce and trade, hoarding of grain by businessmen, and wine disaster are laid out. Zhang Zeduan raised his worries about many social problems, such as the city defense, security and traffic.

There are many boats in the picture scroll, many of which are private boats carrying grain. Arriving at the city gate, the tax official pointed to the sack and said a desired number, which caused the owner's dissatisfaction. A driver was so anxious that he opened his mouth and shouted that the night watchman on the rostrum looked down. There are two blasphemous tragedies in the painting. Coaches made tarpaulins out of deposed large-character screens written by the old Party, wrapped other books and figures of the old Party, loaded them on the train, and pushed them to the suburbs for destruction at the orders of their owners. It reflects the cruelty of political struggle and the degree of destruction to culture and art at that time. ?

At the end of the volume, the painter described a thrilling scene: two wagons galloped and rampaged, and passers-by had no time to dodge; There is also a temporary phenomenon of street invasion, that is, rich people occupy the road at the gate of the city to kill antelopes and sacrifice to the road gods to see them off, which shows the confusion and randomness of urban management.

Zhang Zeduan wanted to show Song Huizong some social ills through The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival. Because of Song Taizong's political measures to encourage literati to remonstrate, paying attention to social reality and court politics became a general creative tendency of Song Dynasty painters.