In the realm of Chinese landscape painting, the texture of rocks, the contours of peaks, and the traces of time are not rendered through light and shadow, but through a unique brush-and-ink language—texturing techniques. This technique, refined over millennia, functions like a geological notebook written with brush and ink, documenting generations of painters' observations and interpretations of natural landscapes.

From “Outline-Only” to Mature Technique

Early landscape painting underwent a phase known as “outline-only” (空勾无皴). Zhan Ziqian's Spring Outing, the earliest extant independent landscape scroll from the Sui Dynasty, depicts mountains and rocks outlined solely by lines, filled with heavy blue-green pigments. The texturing techniques of cun and ca had yet to emerge. While landscapes of this period had moved beyond the childishness of “figures larger than mountains and water too dense to flow,” the texture of mountain forms remained simplistic.

The turning point came during the Five Dynasties period. Jing Hao, a painter secluded in Hong Valley of the Taihang Mountains, confronted the complex topography of northern China's rugged peaks and felt traditional line-outline and color-fill techniques fell short in capturing the jaggedness and grandeur of mountain rocks. In his Treatise on Brush Techniques, he systematically summarized new painting concepts, creating the “outline-and-chisel” technique centered on dots and planes, endowing landscape painting with its first rich set of stylized language. His contemporary Guan Tong inherited and developed this style, rendering mountains and rocks with solid, towering forms—a technique later known as “Guan-style landscapes.”

Two Major Texturing Schools: Hemp-Fiber and Axe-Chop

The evolution of texturing techniques gradually branched into two distinct traditions. Southern painters, represented by Dong Yuan of the Southern Tang dynasty, depicted the earthen hills of the Jiangnan region. His “Hemp-Fiber Texturing” employed rounded brushstrokes with the center of the brush, creating lines that cascaded like hemp fibers. Through alternating densities, it conveyed the mountains' rounded massiveness and lush vegetation. Ju Ran inherited this technique, further refining it with elongated strokes to capture the delicate, moist beauty of southern landscapes, jointly establishing the foundation of the Southern School.

In the north, facing the rugged stone mountains of Taihang and Wangwu, Fan Kuan developed the “raindrop texture” (also known as bean-paste texture). Created with short, forceful strokes resembling raindrops pelting a wall, it precisely captured the texture of the Loess Plateau. During the Southern Song Dynasty, Li Tang perfected the axe-chop texture. In his Pine Winds Among Ten Thousand Ravines, broad, side-edged brushstrokes swept across the canvas, rendering mountain rocks with sharp edges and majestic grandeur, showcasing the masculine beauty of northern landscapes.

The Spiritual Implications of Texturing Techniques

Texturing techniques transcend mere craftsmanship; they serve as a medium for artists to converse with nature. In his “Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains,” Yuan Dynasty painter Huang Gongwang masterfully employed the hemp-fiber texture technique. His brushwork, alternating between dry and moist strokes, not only rendered the earthen landscapes along the Fuchun River but also conveyed the literati sentiment of immersing oneself in nature and transcending worldly concerns. During the Qing dynasty, Shi Tao advocated “sketching every extraordinary peak”—eschewing rigid adherence to any single cun method. He employed flexible brushwork according to the mountains' true forms, fusing natural vitality with personal emotion into a unified whole.

From Jing Hao's “revolution in cun techniques” during the Five Dynasties, to the Yuan dynasty's elevation of brushwork's expressive depth, and finally to Shi Tao's creative “method without method,” the evolution of cun techniques mirrors the intellectual history of how Chinese artists observed, understood, and depicted nature. Each stroke of cun and rubbing interprets the texture of mountains and rivers; every trace of ink leaves an imprint of the artist's inner world.