Although the emperor claims that you win the world, in fact he is often bound by many etiquette norms. Bound in three palaces and six courtyards, with a vast palace, I can't enjoy the mountains and rivers and enjoy nature like any civilian. Therefore, for them, painting is not only a personal talent, a display of talent, a kind of culture and education, but also a very important entertainment function to satisfy the nature that they can't watch in person.

Therefore, the landscape painting of the royal family is definitely not as simple as Dong Qichang's theory of Northern Sect, but also shows the extreme alienation of the emperor from the landscape world under his command, resulting in psychological compensation.

Highly praising Guo's "Early Spring Map" is the product of this psychological compensation. Guo's scenery is extremely delicate, so that you can imagine every detail of nature, but at the same time it is a safe and harmless spiritual journey. [9]

Therefore, the landscape painting with royal flavor should always let the emperor go deep into every detail, but it should also be shown in a safe and balanced structure. Because emperors lived in palaces far away from nature for a long time, they were curious about nature, but in fact they had inexplicable fears about nature. They must be careful not to let these sensitive and fragile emperors worry about landslides, waves or disasters when wandering around.

And figure painting also expresses the same psychology. The emperor spent almost all his life in the inner court of the deep palace. Of course, he has a very delicate observation on the appearance of suffering women, but at the same time, due to the strict system, emperors rarely have the opportunity to really understand the feelings of these characters and simply treat imprisoned empresses as vases and rockeries. Not to mention all the people in the world who are resentful and miserable, their ugly and disabled appearance, or their angry and arrogant behavior.

At the same time, flower-and-bird painting is also a delicate observation made by the emperor in the deep palace. It is difficult for these emperors to have real leisure and time, and it is also difficult to have equal and compatible wives and friends. Perhaps for these emperors, it is the auspicious and rare birds and beasts in the forbidden garden that can really put their emotions into it.

So ironically, we can see Mercedes-Benz horses, leisurely cows, harmonious apes and angry eagles in the works of court painters. Before the emperor, only animals that have no human feelings and can't talk can have a free image and be endowed with the power of emotion and movement. Therefore, we can find that the characters in the palace paintings are sitting or standing, extremely stiff, and most of them are expressionless.

Knowing this layer, we can find that the pursuit of magnificent, auspicious and exquisite palace paintings is actually an extremely depressed sense of alienation: a prisoner who pursues details without hesitation for invisible scenery; Or in figure painting, the imprisoned people look at the imprisoned people with a sense of alienation, ignoring their hearts and only taking their appearance; Or in flower-and-bird paintings, imprisoned people put a lot of emotions on inhuman animals, even decorations.

Behind these calm pictures are the repression and alienation that words and pictures can't express, which is tantamount to the tragedy that a group of tasteful painters are imprisoned by the system; At the same time, as a political leader, the inner pain of the emperor will eventually turn into the tragedy of countless subjects all over the world.

The theme of flower-and-bird painting and lady painting is always imprisoned. The only difference is that one is the royal garden, and the other is the palace, which was painted by this emperor, such as Huizong, who was locked behind Qian Shan Wanshui. Between the painter and the painted, I regard it as a sad song begging for freedom.