Feng Zikai

Feng Zikai

Feng Zikai (November 9, 1898 to September 15, 1975), formerly known as Fengrun, also known as Ren and still, changed to Zikai later. His name is yuanyuantang, pseudonym is "TK" (fangtseka), and his legal name is Yingxing. He was born in Shimen Bay, Chongde County, Zhejiang Province (now Shimen Bay, Tongxiang City, Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province). He is a famous calligrapher, painter, essayist, translator and artist in modern China Music education theorist is also an indispensable heavyweight in the 20th century Chinese art circle and an important designer in the history of modern Chinese binding and design. He is known as "the most artistic artist in modern China" and "the originator of modern Chinese comics".

Feng Zikai studied painting from Li Shutong and Xia Mianzun. In the sixth year of the Republic of China (1917), he organized Tongyin painting association with his classmates and joined Dongshi society, which studied seal cutting. In 1919, he held the first exhibition with colleagues of the painting society. In 1921, he went to Japan to study oil painting at Kawabata foreign painting school in Tokyo. In 1922, he returned to China and taught pictures and music at Chunhui middle school in Shangyu, Zhejiang Province. Since the founding of the people's Republic of China, Feng Zikai has successively served as Shanghai People's representative, member of the National Committee of the Chinese people's Political Consultative Conference, chairman of Shanghai Branch of China Artists Association, vice chairman of Shanghai Federation of literary and art circles, President of Shanghai Chinese Painting Academy, etc. On September 15, 1975, Feng Zikai died in the emergency observation room of Shanghai Huashan Hospital at the age of 77.

Feng Zikai has made outstanding achievements in comics, calligraphy and translation. He has published more than 160 calligraphy and painting collections, prose works, art theory and music theory works. Most of his paintings are about children. They are humorous and reflect social phenomena. They were recorded in primary school textbooks during the period of the Republic of China. His prose was included in Taiwan Chinese textbooks. Among them, comics are favored by the world for their artistic ideas of "high and popular" and artistic features of "small and medium can see big, and there are aftertones outside the strings".

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Life of the characters

Scholarly home

On November 9, 1898, Feng Zikai was born in Chongde County, Zhejiang Province. The ancestors opened a dyeing workshop in their hometown. His father Feng (Huang) was good at poetry and prose, and he was the most famous person. Feng Zikai is the eldest male, ranking seventh. He has six elder sisters, one younger sister and two younger brothers, but both of them died early.

In 1907, Feng Zikai, nine years old, went to a private school.

In 1910, Feng Zikai, 12, entered Xixi primary school in Shimen Bay. After Feng run (Feng Zikai's original name) entered the new primary school, his teacher changed the word "run" to "Ren", saying that "Ren" is similar to "run" in Zhejiang Mandarin, and "Ren" is closer to "Ci" in meaning. Parents did not object, so Fengrun renamed Fengren. Feng Zikai was fond of painting when he was young, especially copying the painting Manual of mustard seed garden.

Feng Zikai got married very early and married Xu Limin, the daughter of a famous family in Chongde county. Xu ruisun, Xu Limin's father, once served as a school inspector. Many years ago, he read Feng Zikai's composition for the elementary school entrance examination. He fell in love with it and appreciated the talent of this younger generation. Knowing that he was a local celebrity and the son of Ju Ren in the late Qing Dynasty, he hoped to betroth his daughter to him. Feng Zikai's widowed mother is worried about her poor financial resources and improper family status. However, Xu has repeatedly talked with her parents, showing full sincerity. At the age of 16 (1914), Feng Zikai and 18-year-old Xu Limin got married. After pursuing school in their early years, they got married.

Study in early years

In 1914, Feng Zikai went to Hangzhou to apply for the exam. Before the exam, his mother prepared cakes and zongzi for him. Later, he was admitted to Zhejiang first normal school (now Hangzhou Normal University) with the third place. He studied music and painting from Uncle Li and Chinese from Xia Mianzun. In February of the same year, he published his works for the first time. When he was a sophomore in the preparatory class, he took Professor Li Shutong's plaster painting class. Feng Zikai was addicted to it and made rapid progress in his painting. Under the guidance and encouragement of Li Shutong, Feng Zikai, on the one hand, made great efforts to sketch from life, on the other hand, he observed famous western paintings and studied painting theory. He also learned music from Li Shutong and practiced piano hard. Li Shutong said to Feng Zikai: scholars first understand and then literature and art.

Another teacher of Feng Zikai is Mr. Xia Mianzun, who has laid a solid literary foundation and engaged in literary translation for Feng Zikai. At that time, Xia Mianzun was a warden in the first normal university, and later changed to a Chinese teacher.

During his study, Feng Zikai often won the first place in Chinese because he was good at writing articles, which was highly valued by his teacher Shan BUAN. Shan BUAN thinks that there should be a double name in addition to the single name "Fengren", so he gives the student the number "Zikai". From then on, Fengren changed its name and passed down from generation to generation.

In the sixth year of the Republic of China (1917), Feng Zikai and his classmates organized the Tongyin Painting Association and joined the Dongshi society, which studied seal cutting.

In 1918, Feng Zikai published his poems for the first time.

In 1919, after graduating from Zhejiang No.1 normal school, Feng Zikai went to Shanghai alone, organized the "Chinese Society for aesthetic education" with his classmates, published the magazine "aesthetic education", and founded the first art normal school in the history of Chinese education, including painting, music and handicrafts. In the same year, Feng Zikai and his colleagues in the painting society held the first exhibition of his works.

Eastward to Japan

In 1921, Feng Zikai sold his ancestral property and borrowed 400 yuan from his brother-in-law to study in Tokyo. He is doing a short-term study in Tokyo. Four months later, he finished playing three violin exercise books and several operettas. In fine arts, Feng Zikai specializes in charcoal strokes. One day, he saw the volume of spring in the painting collection of Dream II on the old book stand. The author of this book, takekumuna II, is a self-taught Japanese painter who specializes in simple style comics and has his own family. Feng Zikai believes that these paintings are "silent poems". From Zhu jiumenger's works, Feng Zikai found the way of art in the future. Feng Zikai studied in Japan for 10 months and had to return home after running out of money.

Business start

In 1922, Feng Zikai began to create comics. He was a pioneer of Chinese comics. His comics were simple in shape, simple in style, and full of childlike interest. Among many painters, he was unique. He has held exhibitions in Hong Kong, Taiwan and other places.

Feng Zikai is engaged in English and Japanese translation after teaching in Shanghai Art College. Feng Zikai's motivation for creating comics was that the school affairs meeting was too boring. After observing the different postures of his colleagues, he went back to the dormitory and drew a draft. He found it interesting and began to try other contents. Zhu Ziqing and Yu Pingbo jointly organized a magazine our July. He asked Feng Zikai for a picture, which was published in the journal in 1924. The title of the picture is "a crescent moon and the sky is like water after people are scattered", which attracted the attention of Zheng Zhenduo, who runs the literary weekly in Shanghai.

In 1925, literary weekly began to publish Feng Zikai's paintings in succession. Zheng Zhenduo gave them the title of "Zikai's cartoon". After the publication of the painting, it became famous. Yu Pingbo, Zhu Ziqing, Zheng Zhenduo, Zhu Guangqian and other scholars highly praised him. Since then, Feng Zikai has successively published such lyrical paintings as "red cherry, green plantain" and "cuifu pedestrian's head" in literary weekly, and titled them with the title of "comics". Since then, the name of "comics" began to appear in China. Feng Zikai also became the originator of Chinese cartoon creation.

In 1926, Kaiming bookstore was founded. In 1927, he converted to Buddhism from master Hongyi and became a Buddhist infant. He participated in the establishment of Lida middle school (later Lida School Park) in Shanghai.

the period of the war of Resistance Against Japan

On July 7, 1937, the Lugouqiao Incident broke out. In November, Feng Zikai and his family fled from their hometown to Changsha, Hunan Province, via Jiangxi Province, and then moved to Guilin, Guangxi Province. During the Anti Japanese War, Feng Zikai drew a lot of cartoons about the theme of the war. He could not bear to see all kinds of tragedies and looked forward to the day of victory.

From 1939 to 1942, Feng Zikai followed Zhejiang University, which was moving to the West. He taught in Yishan, Guangxi, and Zunyi, Guizhou, and taught art education and appreciation for teachers and students of Zhejiang University. In 1941, Zikai's complete works of comics was painted in Zunyi. In the autumn of 1942, Feng Zikai arrived in Chongqing, Sichuan Province to teach at the National Academy of Arts. A year later, he resigned and wrote for a living at home.

In 1945, when the news of Japan's surrender came, Feng Zikai was so excited that he made a cartoon "night of victory", depicting the happy scene of the family and drinking two bottles of Maotai that he had kept for a long time. After the victory of the Anti Japanese War, Feng Zikai returned to Hangzhou to settle down.

The founding of the people's Republic of China

In 1949, Feng Zikai went to Hong Kong to hold an art exhibition and has lived in Shanghai ever since.

After the founding of the people's Republic of China, Feng Zikai mainly engaged in the translation of Russian and Japanese literary works, and successively served as the Shanghai Municipal People's representative and member of the Chinese people's Political Consultative Conference, member of the National Committee of the Chinese people's Political Consultative Conference, executive director of the Chinese Artists Association, chairman of the Shanghai Artists Association, vice chairman of the Shanghai Writers Association, and vice chairman of the Shanghai Federation of literary artists. In 1960, the Shanghai Academy of Chinese painting was established, and he served as the first president.

In 1953, Feng Zikai, Qian Juntao, Zhang Xichen, Ye Shengtao, Huang Mingxiang and others raised funds to build a relic stone pagoda for master Hongyi in hupaohoushan, where they came to visit every year.

From 1961 to 1965, he translated the Japanese classic novel Genji

Chinese PinYin : Feng Zi Kai