Painting, like all things, has its macroscopic connection, as well as its microscopic structure. As an important part of Chinese national culture, ink painting contains the macroscopic connection between painting art and Chinese philosophical thoughts, and has the significance of the carrier of Chinese culture, so it is a valuable research category. Xia Gui, one of the famous painters in the Song Dynasty, was good at expressing artistic conception with few sceneries. Xia Gui's ink paintings are a form of artistic expression, whose development and formation cannot be separated from the influence of traditional Chinese culture, especially the Taoist philosophy represented by Lao Zhuang is the most representative. The blank space is one of the artistic expression techniques commonly used in Xia Gui's works, and it is an important factor of the aesthetic form of Chinese painting. The blank space should not be simply understood as blank space. Intuitively speaking, blank space refers to the empty place and the part that has not been filled. The blank space in the picture is often an unintentional behavior, while the blank space is a conscious management of the "illusory" in the picture, which is meaningful. The blank space creates the artistic conception of Xia GUI's works, which has unique aesthetic value. This article tries to find its unique aesthetic value by analyzing the relationship between the artistic expression technique of "white space" and the Taoist philosophy represented by Lao Zhuang through the specific expression of Xia GUI's works. This paper firstly analyzes the relationship between Chinese Taoist philosophy and ink painting with the method of literature research, then uses qualitative research to sort out the aesthetic images of Xia GUI's works embodied in Taoist philosophy, and finally uses the data derived from the HeTu Luoshu theory to analyze the aesthetic skills and creation rules of Xia GUI's works with blank space. The purpose of this paper is to explore the characteristics of Xia GUI's works under the influence of culture and history layer by layer through the traditional meaning of philosophy. At the same time, it seeks the correlation between the artistic expression characteristics of the white space technique in Xia GUI's works and the philosophical thinking. Finally, it obtains the application rules of the white space technique through the Hetu Luoshu theory, which provides the internal significance and value for the development and innovation of modern ink painting.

Qinyan Zhang, Albert Young Choi. The technique of leaving white space in Xia Gui's works contains taoist philosophy. Academic Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (2023) Vol. 6, Issue 3: 80-89. https://doi.org/10.25236/AJHSS.2023.060313.

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