Composition in Chinese Painting: Beginning, Development, Turn and Resolution
During my five years in China, including studies at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, I became increasingly interested in how a painting guides the eye. My dissertation on Chinese freehand painting gave me another way to approach that question. Here, in the third part of this series, I turn to the relationships that give a composition its movement.
Structure and the Four Phases
A branch enters the sheet, changes direction and reaches into an open area. An inscription takes up its movement. Elsewhere, a small gap allows the eye to continue where the brush has stopped. These relationships can make a painting feel connected even when much of the paper remains untouched.
Pan Tianshou (潘天壽, 1897–1971), the painter and educator closely associated with the academy in Hangzhou, made composition central to his teaching.[1] The diagram below gives us four useful terms: qǐ 起 (beginning), chéng 承 (continuation or development), zhuǎn 轉 (turn) and jié 結 (conclusion or resolution).
I use these terms to follow the structure of an image. They describe functions within the composition, rather than four prescribed stages in making a painting. A “beginning” need not be the first stroke the artist painted, and a “resolution” need not be the last detail added.
Reading the Four Phases in a Lotus Painting
In the paired illustration below, the painting is shown beside a version marked with arrows. The overlay proposes one route through the image. It helps explain how the four terms can operate together, while leaving us free to look along other paths. [Fig. 2]
Qǐ 起 — Beginning. In this reading, the dense forms near the bottom establish an entry into the picture. They give the eye something to take hold of and suggest a direction of movement.
Chéng 承 — Development. The eye follows relationships between the lower leaves and the rising stems. One element takes up the movement of another. The connection depends on direction and spacing as much as on continuous lines.
Zhuǎn 轉 — Turn. Near the flower and upper leaves, that movement changes. The composition opens across the lighter upper area, drawing attention toward the inscription on the right.
Jié 結 — Resolution. The inscription and the shapes below it offer a way back into the picture. The return is largely suggested across unpainted space. It brings the parts into relation without enclosing them in a drawn frame.
Wandering Through a Picture
The bent trunk in Fig. 1 and the lotus stems in Fig. 2 do not provide a smooth, uninterrupted road. Crossings and abrupt changes of direction interrupt the eye. A small twig or blade of grass can then offer another connection. The interruption creates tension; the alternative route keeps it from becoming a dead end.
When I speak here of the movement of qi (氣), I mean the felt continuity and vitality of these relationships. The eye can be led beyond the edge of a sheet by the direction of a line and then brought back by another mark. The imagined extension becomes part of the composition even though it has no painted surface of its own.
The single red lotus in Fig. 3 makes that interplay especially clear. A tall stem rises from the broad dark leaves, while a short diagonal crosses it. Above, the red flower and the inscription establish another relationship across the open paper. The return need not be drawn. This is what I mean by yì dào bǐ bù dào (意到筆不到): the intention reaches where the brush does not.
Establishing Connections in Painting
In the mountain landscape, a small boat gives the eye an entry near the lower left. Its pointed end can be read in relation to the distant marks above and to the broad band of calligraphy across the middle. [Fig. 4] The inscription bridges parts of the picture that might otherwise feel separated.
The writing is arranged in columns within a band across the sheet; it is not simply a horizontally written sentence. Visually, however, its overall shape can suggest a sandbank. It participates in the landscape while remaining legible as calligraphy. The dark mountain above and the lighter river area below are held together through that double role.
Off-Center Composition
Many of the works discussed here place their strongest forms away from the center, but this is a compositional possibility, not a rule for all Chinese painting. More important is the relationship between painted forms and the spaces they create. Even within a dense area, small openings can prevent the image from closing up.
The Fu Baoshi (傅抱石) example makes these openings visible. The diagram isolates spaces between the figure, her sleeves, the tree and the surrounding forms. Their shapes differ, and their directions contribute to the rhythm of the whole. [Fig. 5]
“Dragon’s eyes” (lóngyǎn, 龍眼) is a suggestive name for such enlivening openings. I use it here as a way of looking: a small unpainted interval can give surrounding forms room to breathe. The drawn triangles are an analytical aid, rather than shapes the painter literally outlined.
Empty Space and the Force of a Turn
The board game wéiqí (圍棋), or Go, offers a useful analogy for thinking about relationships across intervals. A position acquires meaning through what surrounds it, including what is left open. The comparison can sharpen our attention to a painting without making its composition a diagram of game strategy.
In the final scroll, attributed to Zhu Da (朱耷), better known as Bada Shanren, the turning bird makes zhuǎn unusually vivid. [Fig. 6] Its body and lowered head establish competing directions. Below, reeds and the grouped geese create another concentration of forms, separated from the airborne bird by an open interval.
For me, the turn is the event that connects the upper and lower parts. The space between them becomes charged by the bird’s posture. It is enough to suggest a movement without describing every part of its course.
Geese and reeds also became a characteristic subject for the later Qing painter Bian Shoumin (邊壽民, 1684–1752).[2] That shared subject is worth noting, although it does not by itself establish a direct quotation of this particular scroll.
Following the Relationships
The four terms give us a way to ask precise questions. Where does a movement begin? What carries it forward? Where does it change, and how are the separated parts brought back into relation? The answers may lie in a stem or a boat, but also in an inscription or an unpainted gap.
What interests me is how freely a painting can use these relationships. An image may set up several beginnings and turns, or leave its resolution largely to the viewer. The structure holds together while giving the eye room to wander.
Illustrations
Fig. 1: Diagram attributed to Pan Tianshou, reproduced in the original article as an illustration from his teaching on composition.
Fig. 2: Pan Tianshou, 映日 (Yìngrì, “In the Sunlight”), lotus painting with analytical overlay.
Fig. 3: Pan Tianshou, lotus painting associated with the phrase 一枝紅艷獨撐天, rendered here as “A Single Red Blossom Holds Up the Sky.”
Fig. 4: Pan Tianshou, 雨後千山鐵鑄成, rendered here as “After Rain, a Thousand Mountains Seem Cast in Iron,” with analytical overlay.
Fig. 5: Fu Baoshi, figure painting, with a diagram of the spaces between forms.
Fig. 6: Bada Shanren (Zhu Da), geese and reeds, vertical scroll. The birds are geese, not ducks.[3]
Footnotes
[1] The China Academy of Art biography documents Pan Tianshou’s work in Hangzhou. Its 2022 exhibition account discusses the relationships between brushwork, composition, empty space and qǐ–chéng–zhuǎn–hé (起承轉合). The diagram reproduced here uses jié 結 for the concluding function. ↩
[2] For Bian Shoumin’s dates and his association with geese, water and reeds, see the Cleveland Museum of Art. Its album is a separate work, not an additional illustration in this article. ↩
[3] Titles and artist identifications follow the original reproduction references. English title renderings are descriptive translations. Exact editions, catalogue entries and dimensions for these reproductions have not all been independently confirmed, so uncertain measurements are not repeated here. The arrows and geometric overlays belong to the analysis, not to the original paintings. ↩
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