Frame size: 211.5 x 40.2 cm (M)
Born in Jiangsu, China, to a family of distinguished scholars, Reverend Song Nian (1911-1997), commoner name Song Tiecheng, studied in a private school and practised calligraphy from the tender age of six. At 16, he entered the monastery and shortly after, enrolled in Tsinghua University in 1928 to study literature. A student of famous Jiangnan scholar Xiao Tiu’an and other teachers, Song Nian consolidated what he had learnt and eventually developed an original script, known as the ‘Song Nian Style’. He emigrated to Singapore in 1961 and was the head of Puti Temple. Well-versed in the traditional Chinese art forms, namely poetry, painting, calligraphy and seal-carving, Song Nian was a renowned figure in Singapore’s art scene.The cursive script began as hurried writing of the old clerical script during the Qin dynasty, and later gained prominence in the Han dynasty as shorthand for the complicated clerical script. This calligraphy by Song Nian exemplifies a script that shows characteristics from the two scripts: a less rigid form of the clerical script.
