Wingrove, David - Chung Kuo 02 (69 page)

He leaned
forward and filled his glass, then looked about him, enjoying
himself, knowing he had their full attention. "Well? What do you
think?" Wolf shook his head. "I don't know. The eldest son
fell in, perhaps?" Sergey narrowed his eyes. "Ah yes, that
would have been good, wouldn't it? But this was better. Much better.
Imagine it. There we all are, still waiting for someone to switch the
damn sprinklers off, our expensive clothes ruined, the ground a total
bog beneath our feet, no one willing to show disrespect by leaving
the gardens before the ceremony's over, when what should happen but
the unthinkable. Out floats the coffin!"

"Kuan Yin,
preserve us!" Wolf said, his eyes round as coins.

"Poor man,"
murmured Catherine, looking down.

Sergey laughed.
"Poor man, my ass! He was dead. But you should have seen the
faces on those Han. It was as if they'd had hot irons poked up their
backsides! There was a muttering and a spluttering and then—damn
me if they didn't try to shove the coffin back into the tomb against
the current! You should have seen the eldest son, slipping about in
the mud like a lunatic!"

"Gods
preserve us!" Wolf said. "And did they manage it?"

"Third time
they did. But by then the sprinklers were off and the servants were
carrying the water away in anything they could find."

The two men
laughed, sitting back in their chairs and baring their teeth. Across
from Wolf, Lotte smiled broadly, enjoying her brother's laughter.
Only Catherine seemed detached from their enjoyment, as if
preoccupied. Sergey noticed this and leaned toward her slightly.
"What is it?"

She looked up.
"It's nothing . . ."

He raised an
eyebrow, making her laugh.

"Okay,"
she said, relenting. "I was just thinking about the painting I'm
working on."

"You're
having trouble?"

She nodded.

Wolf leaned
across to nudge Sergey. "I shouldn't worry. She's not a real
artist."

Catherine glared
at him, then looked away. Wolf was always mocking her for working on
an oil board, when, as he said, any artist worth their rice bowl
worked in watercolors. But she discounted his opinion. She had seen
his work. It was technically perfect, yet somehow lifeless. He could
copy but he couldn't create.

She looked back
at Sergey. "I was thinking I might go to the lecture this
afternoon."

He lifted his
chin slightly. "Lecture?"

She smiled. "Oh
... I forgot. You weren't here when the College officials came
around, were you?" She searched in her bag for something, then
set a small hexagonal pad down on the table. She placed her palm
against it momentarily, warming the surface, then moved her hand
away. At once a tiny, three-dimensional image formed in the air and
began to speak.

"That's Fan
Liang-wei, isn't it?" said Wolf, leaning across to refill his
glass.

"Shhhsh,"
Sergey said, touching his arm. "Let's hear what the old bugger
has to say."

Fan Liang-wei
was one of the most respected
shanshui
artists in City Europe.
His paintings hung in the homes of most of the Minor Families. The
Great Man's long white hair and triple-braided beard were familiar
sights to those who tuned in to the ArtVid channel; and even to those
whose tastes were less refined, Fan Liang-wei was the personification
of the
wen ren,
the scholar-artist.

It was standard
practice for professors of the College to advertise their lectures in
this way, since their fees were paid according to attendance figures.
Indeed, it was the practice for some of the less charismatic of them
to bribe students to attend—

filling the
first few rows of the hall with sleepers. For the Great Man, however,
such advertising was not strictly necessary. His fee was guaranteed
whatever the attendance. Nonetheless, it was a matter of ego, a
question of proving his supreme status to his fellow academicians.

The tiny figure
bowed to its unseen audience and began to talk of the lecture it was
to give that afternoon, its internal timer updating its speech so
that when it referred to the lecture it reminded the listeners that
it was "less than two hours from now." The lecture was to
be on the two
shanshui
artists Tung Ch'i-ch'ang and Cheng Ro,
and was entitled "Spontaneity and Meticulousness." Sergey
watched it a moment longer, then smiled and reached out to put his
hand over the pad, killing the image.

"It could
be amusing. I've heard the old man's worth hearing."

"And Heng
Chian-ye?" Wolf asked.

"You've not
forgotten the card game?" Sergey looked across and saw how
Catherine had looked away angrily. He knew how strongly she
disapproved of this side of him—the gambling and the late-night
drinking sessions—but it only spurred him on to greater
excesses, as if to test her love.

He smiled, then
turned back to Wolf. "That's all right. I told him I'd see him
at four, but it'll do the little yellow bastard good to wait a bit.
It'll make him more eager."

Wolf laughed.
"Do you still intend to challenge him? They say he's a good
player."

Sergey lifted
his chin and looked away thoughtfully. "Yes. But Heng's an
arrogant young fool. He's inflexible. Worse, he's rash when put under
pressure. Like all these Han, he's more concerned with saving face
than saving a fortune. And that will be his undoing, I promise you.
So, yes, I'll challenge him. It's about time someone raised the
stakes on young Heng."

Sergey leaned
forward, looking across at Lotte. "And you, Lotte? Are you
coming along?"

Again his words,
his action in leaning toward Lotte, were designed to upset Catherine.
They all knew how much Lotte was besotted with the handsome young
sculptor. It was a joke that even she, on occasion, shared. But that
didn't lessen the pangs of jealousy that affected Catherine.

As ever, Lotte
looked to her brother before she answered, a faint color at her
cheeks. "Well, I ought, I know, but—"

"You
must,"
Sergey said, reaching out to cover her hand with his own. "I
insist. You'd never forgive yourself if you didn't see the Great
Man."

Wolf answered
for her. "We were going to do some shopping. But I'm sure . . ."

Wolf looked at
Lotte, smiling encouragement, and she nodded. Wolf still had hopes
that his sister might marry Novacek. Not that it affected his
relationship with Catherine. Not significantly.

"Good,"
said Sergey, leaning back and looking about the circle of his
friends. "And afterward I'll treat you all to a meal."

* *
*

the TIERS of the
lecture hall were packed to overflowing. Stewards scurried up and
down the gangways, trying to find seats for the crowds pressing into
the hall, clearly put out by the size of the attendance. Normally the
hall seemed vast and echoing, but today it was like a hive, buzzing
with expectation.

At three
precisely the lights dimmed and the hall fell silent. On a raised
platform at the front of the hall a single spotlight picked out a
lectern. For a while there was no movement on stage, then a figure
stepped out of the darkness. A murmur of surprise rose from the
watching tiers. It was Chu Ta Yun, the Minister of Education. He
stood to one side of the lectern, his head slightly bowed, his hands
folded at his waist.

"Ch'un
tzu,"
he began, his tone humble, "I have been given the
great pleasure and honor of introducing one of the outstanding
figures of our time. A man whose distinctions are too numerous to be
listed here and whose accomplishments place him in the very first
rank of painters. A man who, when the history of our culture is set
down by future generations, will be seen as the epitome—the
touchstone—of our art.
Ch'un tzu,
I ask you to welcome
to our College the Honorable Fan Liang-wei, painter to the court of
His Most Serene Highness, Li Shai Tung."

As the Minister
withdrew, head bowed, into the darkness, Fan Liang-wei came into the
spotlight, resting his hands lightly on the edge of the lectern, then
bowing his head to his audience. There was a faint shuffling noise
as, in unison, the packed tiers lowered their heads in respect to the
Great Man.

"Ch'un
tzu,"
he began, in the same vein as the Minister, then,
smiling, added, "Friends . . ."

There was a
small ripple of laughter from the tiers. The ice had been broken. But
at once his face grew serious again, his chin lifting in an
extravagant yet thoughtful gesture, his voice taking on an immediate
tone of authority.

"I have
come here today to talk of art, and, in particular, of the art of
shanshui
painting, something of which I have, or so I delude
myself, some small knowledge."

Again there was
the faintest ripple of amusement, but, as before, it was tinged with
the deepest respect. There was not one there who did not consider Fan
Liang-wei to be Chung Kuo's foremost expert on the ancient art of
shanshui.

The Great Man
looked about the tiers, as if noting friends there among the crowd;
then he spoke again. "As you may know, I have called today's
talk 'Spontaneity and Meticulousness,' and it is upon these two
extremes of expression that I wish to dwell, taking as my examples
the works of two great exponents of the art of
shanshui,
the
Ming painter Tung Ch'i-ch'ang and the Song painter Cheng Ro. But
before I come to them and to specific examples of their work, I would
like to take this opportunity of reminding you of the critic Hsieh
Ho's Six Principles, for it is to these that we shall, time and
again, return during this lecture."

Fan Liang-wei
paused, looking about him. He had just opened his mouth to speak when
the door to his right swung open and a young man strode into the
hall, ignoring the hushed remonstrances of a steward. The steward
followed him two or three paces into the hall, then backed away, head
bowed, glancing up at the platform apologetically before drawing the
door closed behind him. The young man, meanwhile, moved
unselfconsciously along the gangway in front of the platform and
began to climb the stairs. He was halfway up when the Great Man
cleared his throat.

"Forgive
me, young Master, but am I interrupting something?"

The young man
half turned, looking back at the speaker, then, without a word,
climbed the rest of the steps and sat down at their top.

There was a
murmur of astonishment from the surrounding tiers and even a few
harshly whispered words of criticism, but the young man seemed
oblivious of it. He sat there, staring down at the platform, a
strange intensity in his manner making him seem brooding, almost
malicious in intent.

"Are we
comfortable?" the Great Man asked, a faint trace of annoyance in
his voice.

The young man
gave the barest nod.

"Good. Then
perhaps we might continue. As I was saying . . . Hsieh Ho, in his
classic fifth-century work the
Ku Hua-p'in-lu
, set down for
all time the Six Principles by which the great artist might be
recognized. In reiterating these, we might remember that while Hsieh
Ho intended that all six should be present in a great work of art,
they do, nonetheless, form a kind of hierarchy, the First Principle,
that of spirit-consonance, of harmony of spirit to the motion of
life—that sense we have of the painting coming alive through
the harmonizing of the vital force, the ch'i, of the painter with the
ch'i
of his subject matter—forming the first rank, the
First Level, if you like."

There was a mild
ripple of laughter at the Great Man's play on words. He continued
quickly, his anger at the rudeness of the young man's interruption
set aside momentarily.

"Bearing
this in mind, we see how the Second Principle, the bone structure of
the brushwork—and its strength in conveying the ch'i, or vital
energy—stems from the First and is, indeed, dependent upon it,
as a Minister is dependent upon the favor of his T'ang. Likewise, the
Third Principle, the fidelity, or faithfulness of the artistic
representation to the subject, is dependent upon these first two. And
so forth."

He hesitated,
then looked directly at the young man seated at the head of the
stairs. "You understand me, young Master?" Again the young
man nodded.

"Good. Then
let me move on quickly. Fourth of the Six Great Principles is
likeness in color. Fifth is the proper placing of the various
elements within the scheme of the painting. And Sixth, and last in
our great hierarchy, is the preservation of the experience of the
past through making pictorial reference to the great classical
paintings."

Fan Liang-wei
smiled, looking about him, then moved to one side of the platform,
half turning as the screen behind him lit up, showing an ancient
painting.

"There is,
of course, one further quality that Hsieh Ho demanded from the great
artist—a quality that, because it is intrinsic to art, is
enshrined in each of those six great Principles—that of
ching.
Of precision or minuteness of detail."

He indicated the
painting. "This, as you may recognize, is Tung Ch'i-ch'ang's
Shaded Dwelling among Streams and Mountains,
one of the great
works of Ming art. This hanging scroll. . ."

The Great Man
had turned, looking back at his audience; but now he stopped, his
mouth open, for the young man had stood and was making his way slowly
down the steps again.

"Forgive
me," he said tartly, his patience snapping, "but have I to
suffer more of your interruptions?"

The young man
stopped, a faint smile playing on his lips. "No. I've heard
enough."

"Heard
enough . . ." For the briefest moment Fan's face was contorted
with anger. Then, controlling himself, he came to the edge of the
platform, confronting the young man. "What do you mean, heard
enough?"