Yao Shuangding

Yao Shuangding, male, from Xihé County, Longnan City, Gansu Province. University graduate. Has been deeply devoted to the art of calligraphy for many years, persistently practicing without interruption. He has explored all script styles, with particular emphasis on regular, running, and cursive scripts. His early regular script was inspired by Zhong Yao’s “Xuanshi Table,” acquiring its vigorous and rustic charm; later, he studied the “Yan Qinli Stele,” learning its grandeur and majesty. His running script began with the “Shengjiao Sequence,” tracing back to the “Lanting Xu” and Wang Xizhi’s letters, drawing rich nourishment, and also adopting the unrestrained vigor and powerful spirit of Yan Zhenqing’s “Memorial to My Nephew.” In composition and ink usage, he absorbed the aesthetic sensibilities of late Ming masters such as Wang Duo and Fu Shan, pursuing abundant and free-form structural variations with a lofty, ancient tone. His cursive script is rooted in Wang Xizhi’s “Seventeen Posts,” which he has studied for many years. He later turned to Huaisu’s “Cursive Script Thousand Character Classic,” Sun Guoting’s “Shupu,” and further incorporated influences from various sources, blending in the spontaneous and lively qualities found in Han dynasty bamboo slips; he particularly admires the profound and robust energy of Wang Duo’s “Cursive Script Poetry Scroll.”