What role do scattered accent stones play in landscape penjing?

  The positions of the main and secondary rocks of a landscape penjing within the tray are extremely important; their spirit, volume and posture directly determine the artistic level of the work. But whether their function stands out is also related to the use of a kind of foiling element that is usually overlooked——scattered accent stones.

  Scattered accent stones are a foiling element placed in scattered yet orderly group form in the blank water-surface space of a landscape penjing. They themselves possess the nature of a "point" in the compositional sense, and are a kind of visual unit with a spatial position. When people's gaze concentrates on them, a sense of expansion is produced in their visual psychology; therefore, they themselves can serve to occupy space and divide space.

  The role of scattered accent stones is mainly shown in the following aspects:

  1. As a foiling element for the main and secondary rock forms in the penjing

  The characteristic of penjing is that the small reveals the large, but no matter how large the penjing, the volume of its main and secondary peaks is limited. In order for people to psychologically feel, when appreciating it, a sense of "one peak suggests a thousand xun of Taihua," some low and small foiling elements must be used to set off the main peak and the secondary peak, making them appear much larger than their actual existence and increasing their sense of volume. Scattered accent stones play an excellent supporting role in this respect.

  2. As a dividing element for the blank water-surface space at the foot of the mountain

  Penjing is a three-dimensional form, and it cannot, like landscape painting, let the mountain float in midair with clouds or something else below omitted. The rocks in the tray must be firmly rooted and seated. When we set the main and secondary rocks firmly in the tray, the remaining blank space needs careful handling. A saying in penjing circles, "peaks are easy to set, but the foot is hard to handle," refers precisely to this step. The arrangement of scattered accent stones is the handling and division of the blank water-surface space at the foot of the mountain. As said earlier, scattered accent stones must produce a sense of expansion in people's visual psychology and have a tension effect, enabling them to play a space-occupying role in the blank space. Therefore, if the arrangement of scattered accent stones is appropriate, the water surface at the foot of the mountain can be reasonably divided and become rich in variation.

  In landscape penjing, especially in a penjing with an opening-and-closing composition, they play the role of a "knot" in the momentum: we know that in penjing, especially those in which main and secondary rock forms exist at the same time and which have an opening-and-closing composition, their directional arrangement generally contains the four links of "rise, continuation, turn and knot." The so-called "gaining momentum layer by layer" refers to the organic combination of these four links, and the "knot" is the completion point of these four links. Scattered accent stones are precisely such a "knot point"; in a vivid overall picture, they serve to close the momentum and give the final explanation for the development of the mountain form's posture.