Past Issues

Writing with Character

• Byline:OSCAR CHUNG
• Publication Date:09/01/2009

Tong Yang-tze (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)

A female calligrapher is impressing art lovers with characters written in a vigorous and grand style.

The dimly lit exhibition room was designed to recall the old days when learning calligraphy was a more common practice. At the center was a large square pool measuring 10 meters by 11 meters containing pitch-black ink, an impressive sight accompanied by the occasional sound of water dripping and the scent of ink wafting in the air. Pieces of white rice paper and brushes were placed along one side of the pool for visitors who wanted a hands-on experience of the art of calligraphy. "A specific scent is often a strong reminder of past times. I hope this scent of ink can take viewers back to the days when they were young," says Ray Chen, the creator of the large art installation for an exhibition that ended recently at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Taipei.

Chen was one of eight architects and space planners who presented works at the summer show inspired by the art of Chinese calligraphy at the invitation of Tong Yang-tze. Tong is a calligrapher who has become known for works with large-size cursive characters over the past 10 years as well as for her enthusiasm for the revival of the art. "Tong has a strong sense of mission. She is always so worried that few people spend time writing and appreciating calligraphy. I think that's why she pushed for such an exhibition," Ray Chen says.

"I cross boundaries and work with artists from other spheres because I want the art of calligraphy to receive more attention outside its own circle," says Tong, now 67, who created 10 works especially for the MOCA event. Displayed alongside works by Ray Chen and other invited artists, Tong's pieces included nine phrases beginning with the Chinese character wu, meaning "without" or "nothingness," plus one starting with you, meaning "with" or "to exist." Wu refers to the situation before the boundary-crossing, while you indicates the exciting result of dialogue between artists from different areas.     

Tong's eagerness to promote the art has to do with her love for it since childhood. Born in Shanghai in 1942, Tong moved to Taipei several years after the Kuomintang government relocated to Taiwan in 1949. The little girl and her younger brother practiced Chinese calligraphy at the request of their father, a lover of the cultural tradition. The little girl was given a calligraphic copybook of works in the style of Yan Zhenqing, whereas the boy received one in the style of Liu Gongquan. Both Yan and Liu were great calligraphers from the Tang dynasty (618-907), with the former tending to write characters with thicker strokes. As Tong recalls, in general she had to write 200 small-size characters and 100 large-size ones on a daily basis and her father would check the assignment and make comments on her writing. "I loved it from the beginning," says Tong, who kept up the practice until she graduated from the Department of Fine Arts at National Taiwan Normal University.

Compared with the present day, Tong notes that it was easier for children to develop an interest in calligraphy back in the 1950s. "There weren't so many diversions like today, except for listening to radio broadcasts. And you wouldn't receive phone calls from other children asking you to go out to play. The atmosphere was so quiet and calm, favorable to those practicing calligraphy," she says of her childhood in a Japanese-style house in downtown Taipei. 

Her brother eventually quit the practice, however, leaving her alone to embrace the tradition. Meanwhile, Tong developed an increasingly good command of Chinese calligraphy by practicing writing characters in various styles, from the seal script originally appearing on bronzeware in ancient China and seals in modern times, to the cursive script usually adopted for its artistic value. Tong also credits reading Chinese classics as playing a role in her development as a noted calligrapher. "All art forms and literature are related, especially the art of calligraphy since it's often based on the text of a literary work," she says.

Western Inspiration

Interestingly, the calligrapher chose to major in oil painting when studying for a master's degree at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1968. She says the learning experience abroad also benefited her works of calligraphy, however, by familiarizing her with Western aesthetics and giving her inspiration when experimenting in the composition of her works in recent years. She stayed in the United States until 1979 and during her sojourn there, she also saw various art performances and made friends with Lin Hwai-min in New York City, then a young man from Taiwan dedicated to modern dance. When Lin went back to Taiwan and founded Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, now one of the best-known dance troupes in the world, Tong was invited to write the calligraphic form of its Chinese name, which consists of four characters. As the troupe travels around the world, Tong's characters accordingly have wide global exposure. This was the first time Tong established a dialogue with a group in the field of performing arts.

An oil painting major and one-time art editor for a magazine in New York, Tong still looked to the skills she had cultivated since her childhood when she returned to Taiwan. "There were so many people engaged in oil painting, but few were interested in reviving the old tradition of calligraphy," she says of her devotion to the long-ignored cultural legacy. "Most people from the older generations could write Chinese characters well with a brush, but they usually looked at calligraphy as playing nothing but a supplementary role in Chinese ink painting. Teachers of Chinese ink painting and calligraphy usually focus on the painting part, too," she says.

 

Find Work Suitable to Your Talents, 2003, 360 x 873 cm (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)

Tong started to exhibit her works of calligraphy publicly mainly after 1970, mostly in the United States and in Taiwan. But she started to stray from the trodden path of the art form in the late 1990s as the characters she wrote became larger, more abstract in composition, and "more masculine" in the eyes of some viewers. "I felt I couldn't stay on the same path my whole life. I wanted to explore and experiment," she says.

To Dai Li-qing, a professor in the Department of Art at National Changhua University of Education in central Taiwan, Tong's work is reminiscent of Zen calligraphy, which originated in ancient China and then thrived in Japan. As Zen teachings emphasize the combination of mind, body and soul, Zen calligraphers tend to use larger-than-usual brushes and the whole body when practicing the art. Accordingly, like Tong, they rarely write while sitting at a desk. "Qi [which means "energy flow" in traditional Chinese culture] can better flow through my body when I'm on my feet," Tong says.

Break with Tradition

The break with her past has won the artist even more attention from art lovers such as Jenny Chang, the co-founder and chief culture officer of Trend Micro, the single corporate sponsor of the summer exhibition at MOCA. "I like the grandeur, vigor and straightforwardness in the characters she writes," Chang says. She first met the calligrapher in 2004 through The Peony Pavilion, a Kunqu opera adapted by one of Taiwan's best-known fiction writers, Kenneth Hsien-yung Pai and well-received around the world. Trend Micro, a well-known provider of anti-virus software services, sponsored the performances starting that year while Tong's calligraphic works were used as one of the main elements of the backdrop. Last year Tong's works appeared even more widely in another equally popular Kunqu opera adapted by Pai.

 

Tong's work forms part of the backdrop for Cursive, a production by Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan. (Liu Chen-hsiang, courtesy of Cloud Gate Dance Theatre)

The year of 2004 is of great significance also because Tong took another stride in her attempt to seek new horizons for calligraphy. For the first time she cooperated with artists from other fields, working with architect Ray Chen and stage play director Mathias Woo from Hong Kong in an exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. With seven giant calligraphic works by Tong displayed in spaces designed by Chen and presented through multimedia works designed by Woo, the event created a rather unique visual experience.

"I give full support to those who are serious about creativity, and creativity often results from the dialogue between people from different areas," says Jenny Chang of Trend Micro's sponsorship of Tong, who is the only calligrapher the high-tech company has promoted to this day. Trend Micro first offered support to Tong in 2007 when the artist had an exhibition aimed at building a link between calligraphy and music. Chang took two of her friends, who were both American psychologists, to the exhibition without telling them about its subject in advance. "But they said they thought of musicians like Beethoven and Debussy when seeing Tong's works. That really surprised me," she says.

For Dai Li-qing, Tong is unique especially because the calligrapher is a woman while most of the top artists in Taiwan in this field are men. "And she's already 67 and still willing to make breakthroughs," she says.

 

A 2004 work about "form" and "emptiness" is seen rendered in cursive, left, and clerical styles. (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)

Tong said she strays from the traditional path partly because she likes to take on challenges. This not only refers to challenging the mind, but also the body. "You use the wrist when writing small characters, the whole arm when they are large and then the entire body when you try even larger ones," Tong says. The most exhausting writing experience came when she prepared for the 2004 exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, where she put 60 characters from a poem by Yang Shen of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) on 57 sheets of interconnected rice paper with the final piece measuring 1.83 meters by 55 meters in total. "When I finished the work, my legs were nearly giving out on me. I may not be able to create another work like that again," Tong says. "My legs are weak in the first place. I work when they feel better. When they are weak from too much pressure, I feel uncomfortable even while sitting."

The most recent step the calligrapher has taken is to promote a range of calligraphy-themed products. Recently she invited five young designers, including her daughter, to work with her and combine her work with a variety of everyday items such as brooches, shawls and handbags, which went on display in an exhibition of Tong's works starting in July at the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts. "Each of these products is displayed alongside the calligraphic work that was the inspiration for it, so that viewers can really feel the potential of calligraphy in the cultural creative industry," Tong says. "Any kind of art has to link with daily life to remain a living art," she adds.

Great Inspiration

There is already evidence that Chinese calligraphy can be a great inspiration for the industry. In late June Republic of China first lady Chow Mei-ching went to see the MOCA exhibition of Tong's works and soon after appeared on television wearing a black T-shirt printed with abstract, golden characters written by the calligrapher. The museum received so many calls asking about the product the next day it prepared another run of the shirts.

A champion of the art of calligraphy, Tong often talks energetically about the urgent need to save it from oblivion in Taiwan. "Japan and Korea are both quite serious about calligraphy, and Japan is especially good at combining it with commodities. We should do something to promote the art," Tong says. By working with artists from other fields and exploring the possibilities of calligraphy, she is doing her part with great devotion.

Write to Oscar Chung at oscar@mail.gio.gov.tw