Evolutionary mural painting is the earliest independent painting form. The existing prehistoric remains are divided into cave murals and cliff murals, which are distributed in Europe, Africa, Oceania and Asia. The earliest was about 20 thousand years ago. In recent years, dozens of cliff murals have been discovered in China, some of which have been judged as Neolithic works (such as Yinshan rock paintings in Inner Mongolia).
With the development of architectural technology, murals have developed from cave cliff paintings to architectural murals. Ancient murals are mostly distributed in temples, palaces, monasteries, courtyards, caves, tombs and other buildings. Renaissance is a modern person in the history of western murals. Western modern painting and architectural style, as well as the development of science and technology, have also affected the changes in the form of murals. Since the 20th century, Mexican mural movement and Soviet mural creation have taken on new significance in content and form, facing the society.
Ancient documents in China recorded the content and scale of murals. Qu Yuan's Tian Wen was inspired by murals. The mural fragments of Qin Gong in Xianyang, Shaanxi Province are original hand-painted 2,300 years ago. Before Wei and Jin Dynasties, murals mostly expressed myths and secular life. After the introduction of Buddhism, religious murals developed rapidly and reached the peak in the Tang Dynasty. Mogao Grottoes, Qizil Grottoes and many Tang tombs in Shaanxi all show the style and artistic height of ancient murals in China. After the Song Dynasty, murals gradually declined. After the founding of People's Republic of China (PRC), murals were restored and developed, and the mural group of Beijing Capital Airport was completed on 1979. Later, murals were continuously added to some new buildings, and many works were innovative and developed in artistic expression, production methods, inheritance of traditions and reference to foreign experience.
The production and techniques of murals are mainly divided into two categories: painting and painting techniques.
Painting is the main type of painting, and the author finishes it directly on the wall by hand drawing. The base materials used are the surface layers of stone walls, mud walls, wooden boards, metal plates, woven fabrics or other materials, such as dry murals, wet murals, egg-colored paintings, oil paintings, wax paintings and acrylic paintings.
(1) dry murals, is directly painted on the dry murals. It first uses coarse mud to wipe the bottom, then spreads fine mud to smooth it, and finally brushes a layer of lime slurry, which can be painted after drying.
② Wet murals were widely used in ancient Europe. When the wall base is semi-dry, the paint is mixed with clear lime water, and the color is firmly combined with the undried wall through infiltration, which produces a special effect after drying. Because it must be completed at one time, it is not allowed to modify the sketch, and it will penetrate immediately after coloring. The color is deep and thick, so it is technically difficult to master the expected effect.
(3) Egg-colored paintings, painted on dry walls, prevailed in the Renaissance, with egg yolk (or egg white) as the main blending agent, and were water-soluble pigments mixed with honey, flower-free juice and glue. Opaque, easy to dry and hard, but easy to fall off, it should be coated with linseed oil or resin as a protective layer. /kloc-After 0/5th century, it was gradually replaced by oil painting.
(4) Wax painting is to mix wax with pigment, paint it on different materials such as wood or stone, and then heat it to change its surface, thus producing a shiny surface. Wax painting originated in Greece. It was found in the murals in Pompeii, Rome, and was later used for icon painting.
⑤ Oil painting, invented in Europe after15th century, uses linseed oil as a blending agent, and usually paints on linen or wooden boards, rarely on mud walls. In order to reduce the gloss of the picture, you can also use cheese, Mecca chalk and zinc white powder as oil absorption base.
Acrylic painting, with synthetic acrylic acid as a blending agent, is quick-drying and dull, which can avoid the weakness of slow drying of oil painting materials and reflective picture, and is adopted by modern murals.
The above main methods are sometimes mixed, or combined with process production, and some are also combined with relief. This mixed use method is more developed in modern murals.
Painting technology is the final effect of mural painting, which must be reflected by craft production. Due to the use of manual or modern techniques, coupled with the texture and texture characteristics of various materials, there are special artistic effects that other painting methods cannot achieve. The firmness of some materials can maintain the durability of murals and prevent natural damage; It is also convenient to make outdoor oversized murals. Therefore, this kind of mural is more and more developed in modern times, including wall carving, sculpture, mosaic painting, stained glass painting, ceramics and other types.
(1) Wall sculpture, which is between sculpture and mural painting, is still close to mural painting because it tends to be flat and compositional, mainly does not use volume modeling, and has different techniques such as shallow relief, deep relief and intaglio lines. In modern times, in addition to stone, there are cement, ceramics, wood carving, artificial resin, bronze, aluminum alloy, stainless steel and other materials. Or mixed wall carving.
(2) wall carving, with tools on the cement base. It uses cement to mix chalky soil, lime and quartz sand, and then mixes pigments to make multi-layer walls with different colors. When the paint surface is not dry, peel it off with tools such as a carving knife and carve out different color layers to form a picture.
(3) Mosaic fresco, an ancient technique, first appeared in West Asia, and has a new development in modern times. It is mainly mixed with cement and other adhesives, and colored stones, ceramic pieces, colored glass, feeders, shells, enamels, gems and other particles of different colors are glued together to form a picture. In addition, there are large stones (such as colored marble), wooden boards and colored glass inlays. Glazing, which was used on the glass windows of churches in ancient western countries, has been applied to the walls of general buildings in modern times, and it can be divided into high-temperature glass and ordinary glass, transparent and opaque.
④ Ceramic murals are very popular in modern times. Ceramics are widely used in modern murals and become an ideal form because of their simple production, durability, good visual effect and diverse varieties.
Muralists can also use various techniques to make murals, such as grinding paint, lacquer painting, enamel, weaving carpet, weaving, printing and dyeing, artificial resin, synthetic fiber, printing, enamel, metal and other materials, all of which can be used to make murals.
Due to the development of modern science and technology, murals have broken through the boundaries of painting, combining painting, sculpture, technology, architecture and modern industrial technology, thus becoming a marginal art.