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In calligraphy, couplets seem easy to write, but they are very difficult to write. First, their form is relatively fixed, which is not conducive to creation; second, the number of characters is relatively small, and the structural changes are not great.

Looking through the 8th National Couplet Calligraphy Exhibition of the Chinese Calligraphers Association, you can still find several excellent works. Take this calligraphy for example.

The couplet reads: "Hualong shines on the water, soaring into the sky on the clouds and mist." The author is Fan Shouwei, a native of Anhui.

Fan Shouwei is also an old calligrapher, and he often appears on the lists of various exhibitions and awards, such as the "Second National Regular Script Exhibition", "Second National Large Character Exhibition", "Fifth Yan Zhenqing Calligraphy Competition" and "Pingfu Tie Cup National Calligraphy Competition", all of which have award records.

Fan Shouwei's work was selected for the "8th National Couplet Calligraphy Exhibition". In addition to the main text, the author also added two lines of postscript to the upper and lower couplets to explain the origin of the couplet, so that the work would not be monotonous and boring.

Couplets are generally not easy to write and can easily make people feel monotonous. The author uses small characters to write the postscript, which not only adds diversity to the work in form, but also expands the content of the couplet, making it more formal and readable.

Fan Shouwei used regular script, which is obviously the work of Yan Zhenqing. Starting from Yan Zhenqing, Yan Zhenqing's calligraphy has been sought after by calligraphers of all generations, not only because of his loyalty and integrity, but also because his calligraphy is a unique art form with strong inclusiveness. As long as you learn this kind of calligraphy, you will make great progress.

Fan Shouwei's calligraphy is not entirely in line with Yan Zhenqing's style, but he has added some new elements to his calligraphy, such as adding flexible elements to the writing, making the mapping relationship between the strokes of a single word closer.

The calligraphy of Yan's family that we have learned, except for a few pieces of ink such as "Self-written Announcement" and "Couplet of Zhushan Hall", the rest are all inscriptions. As for the inscriptions, because the craftsmen omitted too many details when carving, they were more of an arrangement of strokes, which made it very difficult for later generations to learn and draw lessons from them.

A Qigong master once said that to study inscriptions, one must "see the tip of the pen from the knife carving", that is, to imagine the original ink image through these lines.

In fact, when many of us learn to write inscriptions, we often only draw traces of each stroke, and do not restore it to ink. Fan Shouwei incorporates many running script techniques into Yan Zhenqing's regular script, making the font lively and vivid, which is also an inspiration for many calligraphy fans.

Secondly, Fan Shouwei's calligraphy style of Yan Zhenqing is concise, naive, thick and full. The characteristic of "concise" is the use of the brush cleanly and neatly. For example, he does not have many strokes, especially the downward stroke, which is short and strong.

His movements are short, round and look a little clumsy, but it is also because of this that his works appear a little clumsy rather than modern and beautiful.

The reason why Fan Shouwei's calligraphy is vigorous is because his brushstrokes are vigorous and his characters are round. The structure of Yan Zhenqing's calligraphy belongs to "external expansion", and Fan Shouwei grasped this feature and strengthened it, so that the viewer can see the calligraphy gene of Yan Zhenqing contained in his calligraphy at a glance.

Fan Shouwei's novels naturally have their shortcomings, the most important of which is that his writing is too delicate. Judging from the works that Fan Shouguang has exhibited and won in the National Art Exhibitions over the years, his works are basically in the regular script of Yan Zhenqing, which shows both his dedication and his narrow-mindedness.

Learning a style or a font naturally requires depth. But when you reach a certain level, you must broaden your horizons and absorb more nutrients, otherwise you will become stubborn because of the limitations of your vision. Fan Shouwei's regular script seems to have a slippery feeling in his calligraphy. Maybe at this point, I should put Yan style aside and switch to a new font.