In Chinese culture, Tao has continuously changed all the time, as the Book of Changes·Xi Ci Zhuan said:
The Yi is a book which should not be let slip from the mind. Its method (of teaching) is marked by the
frequent changing (of its lines). They change and move without staying (in one place), flowing about into
any one of the six places of the hexagram. For the process which has rhythm variation and moves without
end, how can we see it with our naked eyes? Chinese art basically doesn’t like Western art which opens
picture through visible and invisible opposition under the influence of the metaphysics and theology of
Guang, therefore, it doesn’t have obvious chiaroscuro, but in Qi’s functional activity of Tao, weaken
visual effects by the differences between the touchable and the untouchable, and move towards the
experiences of affection and taste.

If Tao is as things change in countless ways, then vision is no longer important, whether it is affection
or not is most concern, and in Chinese culture, the affection is reflected by the functional activity of
Qi（Qi-ification）, which is also the correlation between Tao and Qi, Tao is formalized in the affection
of Qi-ification, the formalizing is reflected as the mode of flowing change, and art is the formalization
for the changing process. However, because both Tao and Qi are flowing, the formalization can’t be stiff
and can’t have fixed and definite form, therefore, it can’t be the Western geometric form and the Western
abstract form, it also leads to that many people consider that in Chinese tradition, there is no abstract
art, in fact, they don’t understand that Chinese people have different forms for manifesting absoluteness,
because form must always keep changing in the chaos of Qi-ification. That’s the moiré and fictitious moiré
which can be largely seen on the unearthed sacrificial vessels, pottery etc. since ancient three generations
in the aspect of Chinese art, in the Han Dynasty, with the prosperity of Taoism, the Qi stripe obtains most
definite form, for instance, both the Qi stripe on coffin with painted design on black lacquer coating which
is unearthed in Mawangdui tomb No.1 of Han dynasty in Changsha and the fictitious moiré on lacquer painting
are the secret written form for Tao, divinities, ghosts, human beings and animals are dancing and singing
together in swirling floating clouds, with the emergence of mortal body, the Tao of Qi-ification also
obtains concrete lifeline, the so called S-shaped line in diagram of Yin-Yang supreme ultimate which
appears afterwards actually make the lifeline clear.

While in the much richer evolution of latter Chinese art, no matter the ruffles on clothes or the clouds
and mists on Shanshui Painting is the manifestation for the posture of lifeline. So the figure painting
of Chinese painting is not to portray body texture and skeleton shape, but to display the ruffles of clothes
only by lines, especially the swing rhythm of the contour line at the edge of clothes when walking, which
has charm and lasting appeal as waving in the wind, it is also the formalization of vigor of style and sense
of Qi. The misty clouds on Shanshui Painting are all around, stones are also considered as cloud roots,
which make the whole rockery, trees etc. have rolling vigor as clouds and become misty stones, misty water
and misty trees in the flowing of misty cloud, it is also to show the stretch of lifeline. The extension
of lifeline in fact is Chinese people’s experiences for freedom and the self-form which is related to the
breath of life entity and opening to possible space.

Related to the mortal body of life, the strong innervation is not dissipated and drastic, but is gradually
controlled, slowing down the speed and transforming into the quiet emotional appeal of individual life, which
is related to Chinese people’s attitude to body: although, the atmosphere of universe is unlimited fullness,
the individual life is temporary and limited, therefore, how to gather infinite energy by finite body, without
being merged by limitlessness, and also embody the current life form of singularity, that’s how to open a new
lifeline and how to realize utmost self-reservation in the way of the least behavior act and the least energy
consumption by the body, that’s the root for the emergence of the artistic conception of fadeur and airy and
humble, the artistic conception of fadeur lies in that it weakens all passion and catharsis, while the airy
and humble cools off the affection of body so as to approach to the void and lonesome of universe and enter
into the cold memory for the beginning of remote antiquity.

There are Chinese people’s experiences for freedom here, In the Carefree Roam of Chuang Tzu, after opening
chaotic space, lives in it can freely variate, variating from fish to bird is to open a new space, in the
space, fishes as themselves change into birds representing the others, the birds are only the formal index
of otherness, the birds are only a embodiment for the life image of flying dance, because Qi-ification breaks
down the boundary of all the laws during rolling, Chinese people’s sense for freedom is the affection for
the mutual touching between one’s own body and the world, touching others and changing into others with the
least and the weakest way can become the most artistic way of Chinese people.

Corresponding to it, Chinese traditional culture’s attitude to body, along with of the inner alchemy of Taoism
and the ethereality of Buddhism, gradually takes seeking tranquility as leading role, in the form of gathering
the sense of Qi, not only require vividness, at the same time, it also must reflect the inner tranquility, and
the move of the stillness itself reversed from this is not the mutual confrontation between the move and the
stillness and the exterior transformation way between each other, but to make the stillness carry out movement.
How does the form which seems so contradictory become possible? It is by the way of blank-empty and stay
white: the blank-empty of the painting which needn’t be painted requires to be set aside in advance or be
considered in prior time--the priority is also dual respect for the remote antiquity and future in time, but
it is absolutely not to leave a blank automatically, but to repeatedly paint on the margin of the possible
blank-empty by incessantness, in this sense, the blank-empty margin of later development, such as flowing misty
clouds etc., seems more vivid than the blank-empty which is set aside in prior time because of the artful
handling for margin: sometimes, the vividness of blank-empty is reflected through the thickness of branches or
the jagged form of arrangement mode and the conjunction between the stay white of rockery’s stone facing and
blank misty cloud at the boundary, but not the formalist stillness, that’s to handle peripheral chromatic
halo by the so called art of using contrasting effect, bringing the blank-empty periphery which is impossible
and in the state of future to life so as to make the motionless blank-empty seem to be also in vivid movement,
that’s the move of stillness itself.

Why dose Chinese culture need to pursue blank-empty? Is it to present motional breath of misty cloud in the way
of stay white? That’s the balance of the relationship between fadeur and passion, the flowing of misty cloud
is consumption, while the blank-empty is tranquility, making movement present in form of quietness, it is the
job of artists and the presence of artists’ bodies in the way of absence: finite body plays a part in it,
because the body is weighty, it is impossible to become lightness as misty cloud, only through the experience
for blank-empty can enter into the feeling of lightness. The blank-empty, which doesn’t exist in universe,
only can be presented on the works created by artists, the waving lifeline in the periphery of blank-empty is
the form gathered by universe energy, and aura is formed. Painting is to open the aura for body. Chinese
traditional art doesn’t lay stress on the presence of body in painting, that’s because no matter breath
or pen and ink is adjusted by breath, the adjustment for breathing when wielding the pen, the vigor of natural
landscape which should be displayed and the vividness of artistic conception on the picture are all related
to body breath, then, how dose contemporary Chinese painting make body have something to do with breath once
more? That’s the drift of picture!

How will the art in our times face body? In an era which desires is fully confirmed and is also exaggerated,
body is particularly impossible to be free, how dose art make the body which is restricted by requirement
and desire flow once more? We will see that the works of Lao Dan (Ren Jie) has touched those most important
problems.

It is not that easy to make life rise lightly and create new lifeline, especially realize it on canvas.
Chinese contemporary painting has experienced so many heavy spiritual baptisms, no matter the hellbent copy
of cultural symbol for Western art tradition of several hundred years, or the absorbing for Western various
spiritual heritages of several thousand years and the craving for making individuality grow up under the
control of the ideology of authoritarian states all need quickly concentrate, powerfully squeeze, extremely
distort and also the strength for accommodating. In the works of Lao Dan, that’s the presence of dense
picture with heavy ink effect in creation, he seems to pour thick ink on the materials as rice paper and
seems to pour out the whole resting body of his own.

Repeatedly erasure on the picture with dignified black, the experiences for Chinese ink actually returns to the
experiences for metaphysics, when the Chinese ink returns to chaotic breath state, the Chinese ink is not black,
but colorless dark black, covered by such dense Chinese ink layer upon layer, expose a little white ventilated
space, that’s not to draw picture, but to eat picture! It seems to make the thick ink eat off, submerge and
swallow the whole picture. Therefore, there is only a little space on the picture--that’s a little chance for
breathing difficultly acquired by mortal body, that’s the experiences for remnant life.

Only having had enough heavy experiences, life can adequately become lightsome rise. Make low and deep things
become lightsome and agile, which also requires the relaxation of body, artist Lao Dan is not an artist in
general sense, he is also a gymnosophist, he has cultivated his morality and fostered the spirit of nobility
for many years, persistent za-zen make him have the mysterious experiences of constant distraction said by
Chuang Tzu, after getting into a groove, body begins to fluctuate rhythmically, and there is a vast of space
before eyes, immensurable blue makes ascetic carefree and happy, that’s to enter into the state of magical
ideas, and the magical ideas in fact is also Chinese people’s unique experiences for free instant. How dose
picture admit the rhythm of breath and the magical ideas of freedom?

I believe that the process of monasticism influences on his painting creation. He has to make dense Chinese
ink lightsome rise and dance. At first, he carries on ink and wash experiment on rice paper so as to find
out the way to dissolve thick ink, that’s not so easy, because the chaos of thick ink is tore apart, that’s
burnt ink, thick ink is not simply diluted, what is left on the works is still the brush stroke as burnt ink,
while the burnt ink is the experience for ash fire, that’s the manifestation for the rest-exceptional state
of life! The upper part of the picture is dense and the lower part of the picture is sparse, that’s the
weight sense brought by the drift from up to down, all the works around the year of 2005 have such breath,
sometimes, it is airtight, the picture gathering lines together dazzles people’s eyes and also fascinates
people very much, calling us to have thorough grasp of the mystery of change in it.

The lines drawn with burnt ink sometimes are with syncopated cadence and some times is in pieces, picture is
clearing up itself, artists seem to make dying embers glowing again, fragmentized lines begin to turn round
and raise difficultly, the lines seem to look back upon the shape of flames which once burnt. Diverse lines
look for paces in different directions, begin to throw about rhythmically and break away from the entanglement
of nightmarish ghost. Sometimes, those rolling lines have the shape of human body, that’s the body of ghost
and the experiences of magical change for integrative ghost, god and human being in the Han dynasty, the
waving opens the world, looses the outlines of all things on earth and makes everything enter into simulacre,
but the simulacre doesn’t become certain religious idea with denomination, but the prayer of form itself,
the generated lifeline is dancing, rolling and quivering all the time, the dance is dance, that is the divinity
of movement, thus enter into magical ideas, in the capturing for momentary magical ideas, the picture formed
by the lifeline of those dances can be windfall and valley, can be sportfishing and waterfowl and can be blade
and skull, those names with poetic flavor are only the momentary direction of magical ideas, what’s artists
most want to express is the magical, the void limit and the instant which can’t be grasped.

The waving of lifeline is the dance of world itself, a great work which is as long as 7 meters named as the
Dance of World by the artist is the lifeline of dance jumping forward rapidly, as if just separating from
body, only the lines themselves sing in white, while a long scroll works named China Dragon also restores
the dragon image full of the characteristics of Chinese culture to primary scrolling and waving lifeline.

Related to fostering the spirit of nobility and cultivating one’s morality for life, that’s to make body
tremble and fluctuate, keeping the rhyme of fluctuation and changing into painting creation, that’s joggling,
make Chinese ink joggle and flow on rice paper with brush stroke, produce the sense of form which is difficult
to size up and achieved without effort, sometimes, it is the lines with strong decoration, but without
definite image, only the strong and weak contrast among brush strokes, making Chinese ink generate image
spacing and set apart interval in drift and in free flowing, that’s new way of stay white: it is not to keep
out blank-empty on margin as traditional painting, but the drift with lyricism, flowing irregularly and the
floating of atonality, don’t form melody and form, drift lines bring to the change of density, between them,
there are stay white and ventilation, drifting ink and wash on picture in such way, that’s the embodiment
of the sense of freedom.

The sense of freedom is the lifeline of art, without the form of freedom, it is still only mannerism or
stylized extant form, the sense of freedom is the formal experience of freedom, freedom is freedom, as
Kant said, it is not only the graceful freedom which matches up sensibility and intellectuality, also
the noble freedom with exceeding imagination and even the transcendent freedom with absoluteness, that’s
the sense of symbiosis for the whole universe, Chinese culture urgently need enter into the noble and
integral sense of freedom, otherwise, the culture will lose itself and involve in chaos in rest-exceptional
state. Drift has already been the way to break the harmony of boundary, the drift has already been the
experience for uncertainty, the noble experience, however, in the uncertain moment of eminence, how to
enter into a kind of holistic sense of world? Freedom is freedom, Chinese traditional experience is through
stay white, in blank place and in the place of vanity, life can freely breathe, in vacant place, life can
travel leisurely.

Chinese contemporary artists are attached to manifest drift, making the drift display in various ways on
picture, that’s free lifeline continuously derives, changes and extends itself and the stretching of the
breath of mortal body. Those interlaced lifelines grow up sometimes in bitterness and sometimes in patience,
which is the most definite form for seeking freedom by Chinese people. Even Zeng Fanzhi paints the landscape
contrasting Guang and Qi with different brushes and the random brush stroke with very strong freehand
brushwork, it also gives utterance to his own sense of freedom. While the paintings of Lao Dan erases from
any forms, although what’s the names of his paintings implied have strong directivity as the works of
Pollock and have secret affinity with the Qi sensation of universe, just as Lao Dan attempts to translate
the characters of aliens in sudden enlightenment and inspiration, the compatibility with heterogeneity and
universalness energy makes the works of Lao Dan recover traditional mysticism of Qi-ification (Just as
Western Gnosticism) and also reserves individual life’s desire for eternal life in technological era.

Those lifelines which grow intermingled with each other still leave space for blank-empty, there is huge
agglomerate aura in blank space, it is the blank-empty which gathers the affection of aura, gathering
sensible power in imperceptibility and making picture breathe freely, in an oppressed or depressed times,
drift opens the possibility of free imagination of body.

However, only the drift is not enough, because it still drifts externally, how to enter into an interior
space and settle one’s life in it? That’s the body is desiring to tranquility, Lao Dan spends nearly
4 years to attempt lonesomely, transform from rice paper to canvas, the sense of penetration and the sense
of profundity for picture are produced by acrylic or oil painting materials, that’s to open depth on the
surface of painting. The transforming process is extremely difficult, although traditional rice paper
have dispersion and penetrability for absorbing Chinese ink, oil painting materials only can drift up
and down on canvas and can’t penetrate into canvas surface, Chinese traditional painting way in plane
way also can bring the sense of penetration, how to open the interior space of penetration? Artists have
to repeatedly attempt, it need activate the notion of traditional blank-empty and black-white and borrow
ideas from Western contrast between shadow and color, however, the black-white contrast is not the contrast
in normal meaning.

Black-white: although firstly it is the contrast of color, Chinese people have unique experiences for
black, white and gray, that’s the notion of various shades of Chinese ink, that is, though the variation
of the proportion of ink and wash, to produce slight color difference in the aspects of dry-wet, shade
and black-white, while the white is not the color of white, mainly for stay white, once the manner is
fully used by contemporary artists, that’s to produce slight brush stroke contrast among black, white
and gray, especially paint with brush, not oil painting knife, which mainly focus on the relationship
between black-white-gray and Qi-ification, not color difference transition and contrast, but the contrast
between flow and lag of Qi-ification. Therefore, the brush strokes on the works of Lao Dan embody the
bitter emotional appeal of lifeline and the hardness of the transformation of body breath.

Next, black-white contrast is the discrepant contrast on ontology, what’s Chinese traditional painting
produced is convex-concave sense, when begins to paint, it should have convex-concave shape, the convex
-concave sense is the remain of affection, therefore, picture drifts by black, on this account, vacate
unexpected blank-empty, especially penetration, which brings convex-concave sense, through the degree
of brush stroke and the shade of color, present the differences of layers of brush stroke, open the
interior space of picture, especially the contrast between grayish white with light sensation and the
color of black, open the internality of picture.

Last, the black-white is not the contrast between the colors of black and white, because the stay white
in Chinese tradition is not black-white contrast in color, but is incomparable, is transcendent rest,
is restless. Only opening the restless blank-empty once more can experience freedom. As Western chiaroscuro
contrast, the contrast between light and shadow also has absolute quality, therefore, it must enter into
absolute light sensation once more. Lao Dan borrows Western light sensation, that’s also the element of
universe, that’s grayish white’s strengthening on picture, Lao Dan paints several works which are
completely grayish white, melting into a vast of grayish white, washing out picture and continuously
springing up, as the heat stream and air transport in universe, burst through picture and wash our gazes,
absorbing us into it.

That’s the desire for freedom, art is always the form of the sense of freedom, the works of Lao Dan,
based on retaining the inner truth of getting inspiration only from painting by Chinese traditional
scholars, open the new experiences for chaos in the way of gathering his own energy.

The breath of penetrating, the freedom of flushing, the lifelines on the works of Lao Dan are dancing,
that’s the dance of world, those lines have the handling brush as grass script or style between
running script and grass script, Lao Dan himself goes in for calligraphy, before painting, he often
practices calligraphy so as to adjust his state and breath, which return to the inner strength of
traditional training of Qi again, sometimes, he even writes calligraphy directly on canvas with acrylic
paint, calligraphy and painting, character and picture become one, which not only recover traditional
hand touch, but also train one’s own sense of freedom. As artist Mr. Qiu Zhenzhong indicated, Chinese
calligraphy works’ great turn in the Tang Dynasty lies in the strokes of calligraphy of indirect
transformation weaken to a certain degree in calligraphy after brush movement strength of stir and
turn replaced by the brush stroke of lift and press, we should indicate that on lines of figure painting
and the misty cloud of Shanshui painting, indirect and tender strength is embodied completely! Those
forms of dancing misty clouds, brush stroke of stir and turn and the rhythm which is in different shades
and degrees seen on the works of Lao Dan by us which seem to be off are not off in fact, brushes are off
while breath is not off, breath is off while life is not off, life is off while magical ideas is not off,
as Yinian Sanqian of Buddhism, in the stretch of generating illusive ideas, picture leaves endless
aftertaste.

His white works are especially loved by people, those white virtually are the white magical pellets for
training life--just like Ren Jie named Lao Dao by himself--that’s the metaphor of ancient magical
pellets for extracting immortality drugs! Moreover, those moving white bring immense world of ice and
snow, no matter white or gray, they all brings a kind of ancient artistic conception which is extremely
desolate and cold, that’s the ancient airy and humble being converted creatively. The blank-empty
and grayish white on the picture echoes internally, a kind of dark atmosphere permeates on the works,
as if people are absorbed into it, a strong aura want to absorb us, the internality of picture is
completely opened, that’s the painting summoning us!