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Interview with Mr. Lian-peng Chuang
Did Not Want to Live without Meaning Mr. Lian-peng Chuang is from countryside. After entering National Tainan Teachers College, he was suddenly free, like a bird escaping from its birdcage. He didn’t want to live the 5-year junior college life without any meaning, so he participated in a calligraphy club. In those years, he was never satisfied with his works, which pushed him to continue on writing calligraphy. |
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Seriously Write Ugly Words
After graduating from Teachers Collage, he was dispatched to serve in Nan-tou. He went to Taipei to learn calligraphy with Mr. Yu-min Chiang on every Sunday. One year later, he applied to move to serve in Taipei. The teaching method of Mr. Chiang was very special. He taught students to seriously write very ugly words. He said “calligraphic characters are Chinese characters with change.” Mr. Chiang thought calligraphy requires more thinking and practices.
No Time for Dating
While living in Taipei, he either taught at school or wrote calligraphy, and had not time for dating. It was painful that he felt no matter how hard he worked, he could never have any improvement. It was the most difficult bottleneck to break through.
The Strongest Third Person
He practiced hard on 5 styles of scripts, and studied on copybooks during leisure time. He treated the ancients as good friends, and he talked, discussed, and debated with them every day. Before the wedding, his wife thought that a person who knows calligraphy should have good temperament. However, after the wedding, she found he only talked to the dead ancients every day. Ha! Calligraphy is the strongest third person in Mr. Chuang’s marriage.
Failed on Tricky Approach
In his junior year of college, he participated in a contest and intentionally wrote a very strange style of words and failed. Later, he participated in another contest in Taipei and won the first prize. He was then assigned to attend a seminar for sharing his learning experience in calligraphy. It was an unforgettable experience.
Compete with instructor
In 1986, he participated in the Patriotic Calligraphy Competition in Nan-tou County, and met his college teacher coincidently. There were many good participants. He did not expect to win any prize, so he wrote very relaxingly but won the first prize. Since then, his style was recognized and favored, and he became confident in his own calligraphic creation.
Preferred Font
Mr. Chuang thinks that writing seal script is like drawing earthworms, and it is the easiest one among five. We can only find seal script on seals, so it’s the only way to learn it by memorizing the characters in seal script dictionary. As to fonts, he favors running script since the senses of design and art are in the movement of writing.
Creation Concept Is a Combination of Chinese and Western Styles
Most of people think that a good writing should look similar to the copybook, but when it is too much alike, the person then loses one’s personal style. Therefore, he thinks the words should be 80 or 90 percent alike, and the rest should leave for the personal style. Mr. Chuang uses the western concept of “changing between map and land” and the Chinese concept of “counting white as black” to create his own “using black for white” concept. White means the blank part of words, while black means the strokes of words. Good combination of white and black generates nicer art interest.
Arrogant Artist Character
Mr. Chuang said that after his careful research, he found calligraphers’ lives are longer than Chinese ink painters, but calligraphers have the bad habit of arrogance. The reason might be that the creation of calligraphy cannot be modified repeatedly. If you make a mistake, the mistake stays. Also, a calligrapher should overcome the fear of writing on site. Therefore calligraphy makes people excessively confident.
Masterpiece of The Drinker
The masterpiece of Mr. Chuang is the “The drinker’s Intention Is Not in the Cup”. The character “drinker” looks like a comfortable scene that an old man appreciates the nature scenery. He likes this one very much. Sometimes, he arranged characters back and forth many times and it was still hard getting the appropriate arrangement.
Understand Or Not
One of his teachers said: “The one that you can understand is not a good work. The one that you do not understand is a good work.” Now, he asked the teacher again, and the teacher replied: “The one you can understand is a good work, and the one you do not understand is not a good work.” What a complicate philosophy! I believe that for the beginners, they appreciate the work with feeling, but for the experienced, they understand the work and are capable of making comments on whether the work is good or bad.
Family Support Him All the Way
When he was first invited to Yun-lin County to hold a solo exhibition, his father was very sick but still insisted on go to the exhibition. His father respected his left-handed son and did not mind him choosing to learn calligraphy. His children also came to exhibition to encourage him. The entire family supported him with actions.
“People are tiny, so you decide what kind of life you are going to have by the friends you make.” Mr. Chuang decided to join bicycle club, Tai Chi club, and table tennis club to maintain nice interpersonal interactions and supplement new knowledge besides calligraphy club.
Wonderful Endurance
The Freak Calligraphy Work Exhibition held by NPH in 2012 at the Cultural Affairs Bureau was very impressive. Besides calligraphy on papers, they tried to write on silk cloth. They also installed many art decorations. Everything was a new challenge and harvest.
He received a letter after the first solo exhibition indicating that someone wants to collect his writing. He was deeply touched by the affirmation. One day before this interview, Mr. Chuang received a strange phone call from an elder again expressing that he wanted advices from Mr. Chuang. These wonderful reasons are the motivations that push Mr. Chuang to continue learning and moving forward.
He believes potential needs to be developed, so insistency helps reach success. After the interview, we verified that calligraphy is the life of Mr. Chuang and is his lifetime interest. It is the media of his relationship, and provides a platform for him to show his confidence.
After graduating from Teachers Collage, he was dispatched to serve in Nan-tou. He went to Taipei to learn calligraphy with Mr. Yu-min Chiang on every Sunday. One year later, he applied to move to serve in Taipei. The teaching method of Mr. Chiang was very special. He taught students to seriously write very ugly words. He said “calligraphic characters are Chinese characters with change.” Mr. Chiang thought calligraphy requires more thinking and practices.
No Time for Dating
While living in Taipei, he either taught at school or wrote calligraphy, and had not time for dating. It was painful that he felt no matter how hard he worked, he could never have any improvement. It was the most difficult bottleneck to break through.
The Strongest Third Person
He practiced hard on 5 styles of scripts, and studied on copybooks during leisure time. He treated the ancients as good friends, and he talked, discussed, and debated with them every day. Before the wedding, his wife thought that a person who knows calligraphy should have good temperament. However, after the wedding, she found he only talked to the dead ancients every day. Ha! Calligraphy is the strongest third person in Mr. Chuang’s marriage.
Failed on Tricky Approach
In his junior year of college, he participated in a contest and intentionally wrote a very strange style of words and failed. Later, he participated in another contest in Taipei and won the first prize. He was then assigned to attend a seminar for sharing his learning experience in calligraphy. It was an unforgettable experience.
Compete with instructor
In 1986, he participated in the Patriotic Calligraphy Competition in Nan-tou County, and met his college teacher coincidently. There were many good participants. He did not expect to win any prize, so he wrote very relaxingly but won the first prize. Since then, his style was recognized and favored, and he became confident in his own calligraphic creation.
Preferred Font
Mr. Chuang thinks that writing seal script is like drawing earthworms, and it is the easiest one among five. We can only find seal script on seals, so it’s the only way to learn it by memorizing the characters in seal script dictionary. As to fonts, he favors running script since the senses of design and art are in the movement of writing.
Creation Concept Is a Combination of Chinese and Western Styles
Most of people think that a good writing should look similar to the copybook, but when it is too much alike, the person then loses one’s personal style. Therefore, he thinks the words should be 80 or 90 percent alike, and the rest should leave for the personal style. Mr. Chuang uses the western concept of “changing between map and land” and the Chinese concept of “counting white as black” to create his own “using black for white” concept. White means the blank part of words, while black means the strokes of words. Good combination of white and black generates nicer art interest.
Arrogant Artist Character
Mr. Chuang said that after his careful research, he found calligraphers’ lives are longer than Chinese ink painters, but calligraphers have the bad habit of arrogance. The reason might be that the creation of calligraphy cannot be modified repeatedly. If you make a mistake, the mistake stays. Also, a calligrapher should overcome the fear of writing on site. Therefore calligraphy makes people excessively confident.
Masterpiece of The Drinker
The masterpiece of Mr. Chuang is the “The drinker’s Intention Is Not in the Cup”. The character “drinker” looks like a comfortable scene that an old man appreciates the nature scenery. He likes this one very much. Sometimes, he arranged characters back and forth many times and it was still hard getting the appropriate arrangement.
Understand Or Not
One of his teachers said: “The one that you can understand is not a good work. The one that you do not understand is a good work.” Now, he asked the teacher again, and the teacher replied: “The one you can understand is a good work, and the one you do not understand is not a good work.” What a complicate philosophy! I believe that for the beginners, they appreciate the work with feeling, but for the experienced, they understand the work and are capable of making comments on whether the work is good or bad.
Family Support Him All the Way
When he was first invited to Yun-lin County to hold a solo exhibition, his father was very sick but still insisted on go to the exhibition. His father respected his left-handed son and did not mind him choosing to learn calligraphy. His children also came to exhibition to encourage him. The entire family supported him with actions.
“People are tiny, so you decide what kind of life you are going to have by the friends you make.” Mr. Chuang decided to join bicycle club, Tai Chi club, and table tennis club to maintain nice interpersonal interactions and supplement new knowledge besides calligraphy club.
Wonderful Endurance
The Freak Calligraphy Work Exhibition held by NPH in 2012 at the Cultural Affairs Bureau was very impressive. Besides calligraphy on papers, they tried to write on silk cloth. They also installed many art decorations. Everything was a new challenge and harvest.
He received a letter after the first solo exhibition indicating that someone wants to collect his writing. He was deeply touched by the affirmation. One day before this interview, Mr. Chuang received a strange phone call from an elder again expressing that he wanted advices from Mr. Chuang. These wonderful reasons are the motivations that push Mr. Chuang to continue learning and moving forward.
He believes potential needs to be developed, so insistency helps reach success. After the interview, we verified that calligraphy is the life of Mr. Chuang and is his lifetime interest. It is the media of his relationship, and provides a platform for him to show his confidence.