Author(s)

ChangPu Wu

Affiliation(s)

The Department of Chinese Painting, Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing 100105, China.

Corresponding Author

ChangPu Wu

ABSTRACT

This article investigates how shan shui (Chinese landscape painting) realizes a bidirectional transformation between linmo (copying after the masters) and chuangzuo (creative work), and reassesses its contemporary value. Adopting a qualitative pathway of concept archaeology, paradigm restatement, and operationalization, it constructs a Double-Loop, Four-Stage (DLFS) mechanism. The outer loop—qufa (appropriating a canon), jiefa (explicating its logic), yunfa (deploying it under a new brief), and chufa (issuing one’s method)—clarifies the progression from paradigmatic models to individualized procedure; the inner loop—mo (copy), xi (analyze), bian (vary), and zheng (validate)—models cyclical calibration in practice. Three operational modules are advanced: Canon–Nature Cross-Validation (linben–ziran huzheng), “Three-Distances” Spatial Analysis (san yuan: pingyuan, gaoyuan, shenyuan), and Poetic Scene-Making (shixing zaojing). These correspond to three soft criteria—structural legitimacy, spatial navigability, and semantic governance. Two case studies demonstrate that, without breaching canonical principles (lifa), minimal and interrogable adjustments can reliably effect the passage “from copying to creation,” while creation feeds back to improve copying—thus substantiating the loop. Grounded in Song-period paradigms, the model’s extension to Yuan–Ming–Qing and contemporary ink requires an adapter layer for material, subject, and venue, and cross-media application presupposes structural mapping.

KEYWORDS

Bidirectional transformation between copying (linmo) and creation (chuangzuo); Double-Loop; Four-Stage (DLFS) model; Canon–nature cross-validation; Three-distances spatial analysis; poetic scene-making

CITE THIS PAPER

ChangPu Wu. The linmo–chuangzuo bidirectional transformation mechanism in Chinese landscape painting. Trends in Social Sciences and Humanities Research. 2025, 3(6): 46-52. DOI: https://doi.org/10.61784/tsshr3182.

REFERENCES

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