Images of the Mind – Revisited

In his discipline-defining 1984 exhibition and publication Images of the Mind, Wen Fong (1930–2018) wrote:

A well-executed brushstroke, expressing beauty and joy through movement, involves not only the muscle actions

of the artist’s finger, wrist, and arm, but also his mental, emotional, and psychic states. Like signatures and autographs,

calligraphy is said to reveal a person’s innermost being. Thus the Chinese refer to both calligraphy and painting as the

artist’s xinyin [心印], or “imprint of the mind.” As an imprint, or image of the mind, a work of calligraphy or painting is said

to reflect the artist—the man, his ideas, his thoughts, and his self-cultivation.

In memory of Professor Wen C. Fong, Class of 1951 and Graduate School Class of 1958