After having assembled the “Valley of the white horse” episode on Mount Linglong, we made rough assemblages with the later stele of Zheng Wengong stele and with the Japanese modern stele forest, both in Mount Yunfeng, our fourth and last mountain. We found it natural to work on a larger Yunfengshan episode, to end up with one portrait for every mountain. We also wanted to work on lighter thematic episodes as planned: a “Japanese reception” episode, using both the modern stele forest in Mount Yunfeng and the interview of Sakata Genshō we filmed in Paris, and the interview about ink rubbings with director Li, as well as the interview of the stone mason and the story of the destruction and recarving (chongke 重刻) by the madman in Mount Daji.

For Mount Yunfeng, we wanted to focus on the shape of the mountain, on the activity of naming the landscape (timing 提名) and its landmarks. It seemed like the perfect mountain to illustrate timing, with its single path up the mountain, alongside which are found all the inscriptions attributed to Zheng Daozhao. We thought of starting the episode with the “drill” Lia gave us daily in the minivan on the way to the mountain, where she reminds everyone of its characteristics. We would then see a map appear, with all the inscriptions, which would light up when mentioned. We then arrive at the top of the mountain, where we meet the immortals, and we get a good view of the left pillar (zuoque 左闕). We still had to find a way to show the right pillar ( youque 右闕), to make the image of the mountain complete (so that it could look like a proper “山”). We then go down to the “tiger head rock” (hutou yan 虎頭岩), a boulder inscribed by Zheng Daozhao, and later renamed.

With this episode, we didn’t want to repeat the same formula as in the “Valley of the white horse”. We thought maps would be more appropriate for this subject, and why not include other forms of “sensible geography” : drawings, mock-ups, 3D models? AAfter a while, however, we realized that we had constructed a very articulated and rational script… which we simply did not have the videographic material for. We thus decided to concentrate on what we had, and accepted that some ideas would still be better conveyed through other mediums (e.g. storymaps).

We thus turned back to. the smaller thematic pieces, to build a fourth episode focusing on calligraphy. The base for this piece was the sequence in which we follow Lia Wei and Francesca Berdin in their search for their favorite characters amongst the thousand and some that is the later Zheng Wengong stele (鄭文公下碑). We had thought of another still-frame sequence, an immersion into the graphic form of the characters, almost an abstraction, that would bring us from the sixth century to the present day, while going through the realms of stone, paper and ink. Marie-Françoise Plissart also filmed Rosa Lin-Simonet, who teaches calligraphy at the Institut Belge des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, on several occasions, including one session where all the student team from the Altergraphy project was present. This episode is presently still a work-in-progress, and we are considering to add elements of the interviews around rubbings and stone carving, as well as an example of calligraphic transfer from paper toanothert media, to. complete the narrative.

The script below reflects the state of the episode until August 2025. It will be completed with additional elements in the course of 2026

“The Calligrapher left no trace” 書聖無跡

1- Introductory sequence: the Preface to the Orchid Pavillon and the issue of copy

The famous scroll slowly unfolds, revealing its many 之 (zhi), highlighted by the layering of the rubbing of the engraved version of the same copy. Through the repetition of this 波磔 (bozhe) movement and through their permanence between both materials, we raise the question of authenticity and variation. We cite the 19th century antiquarian Ye Changchi 葉昌熾 (1849-1917) in his expression of the zeitgeist on that matter : in the search of authentic traces of calligraphy, he proposes Zheng Daozhao as replacement for Wang Xizhi 王羲之 as the ‘calligraphy Saint’.

2- Title

The characters seem to appear on paper in real time as they are written on the other side, a simple yet efficient play of light and ink.

3- The Zheng Wengong stele: an authentic trace of the Saint of northern calligraphy

The camera follows Lia Wei and Francesca Berdin, as they interrogate Zheng Daozhao’s most famous monument, the Zheng Wengong later stele. They brought reproductions of a rubbing to confront the topography of the stone to their translation on paper. They search for their favorite character: if everything goes well, they should be able to grasp the essence of Zheng Daozhao’s calligraphic style. They land on two simple characters, a 此 (ci) and a 卌 (xi), which, dispatched in different strands of paper in the rubbing, stand side by side on the stone, complementing each other by accident.

4- The rubbings sequence: a videographic exploration on the theme of variation and signature

We choose the character 此 (ci) to “enter into the epiverse”: we dive into the rubbings, going through every occurrence of this character across the corpus of inscriptions attributed to Zheng Daozhao. This “empty word”, which he uses throughout the four mountains to name different landmarks, this rather ordinary character, we see it as the perfect candidate to lead us to the core of his calligraphic style. But no order emerges from this array of 此 (ci): rather than the style or the brush of the calligrapher, they lead us to the hands of the carver and the materiality of the stone.

So we change plans, we go back to the stele, to try and find in this one very long inscription, the sign of calligraphic intention. We choose the humble character 以 (yi), another “empty word”, which is carved 16 times in the stele, to show us, like the 之 (zhi) does in the Preface, the essence of calligraphic variation. We acknowledge the presence of calligraphy, be we still can’t talk of a certain calligrapher’s style. As a true calligraphy trace, this epigraphical monument is no more authentic than the copies of the Preface to the Orchid Pavilion.

We celebrate the death of the calligrapher through the repetition of the same 16 以 (yi) from the later stele, this time rendered in double outline by Kusakabe Meikaku 日下部鳴鶴 (1838-1922), at the end of the 19th century. His reproductions stem from a scientific effort, bringing the stone-induced irregularities to the same level as the calligrapher’s brush. They also hint back to the carving process, in which the stone mason starts by tracing the outline of the characters as a guide. What constitutes the first step of the transfer from calligraphy to epigraphy is also one of the preferred techniques used to copy calligraphic works, as well as a common practice for students. Like the stone mason, they concentrate on the depth of their stroke, they search for freedom in this third dimension.

5- The calligraphy lesson: to teach the movement of the wrist

The camera is peeking behind the shoulder of one of these students, as she tries to bring her 以 (yi) back to life from the rubbing, she struggles to contain the ink inside the projected outline. With her, we try to grasp the teachings of Rosa Lin-Simonet. She takes her wrist, showing her the incidence of her movements on the shape the ink creates on the paper. She makes her draw spirals for months, so that she can focus on her wrist first, not the character. She whispers in her ear as she writes: « to the left… to the right…left…left…right… ». We depart from the paper, in search of pure movement, we carve the air, we engrave time and space.

Next steps

The third and fourth episodes of “Arpenter un paysage inscrit” give insight into the two main pillars of the project: the mountains and calligraphy. They also represent the diversity of data that constitute our corpus. The episodes will be accompanied by short documents – a script of some sort- which will list the content of the episode in a textual form, allowing us to give additional information when needed as well as building bridges to other publications or parts of our website. This post and the previous one on the “Valley of the white horse” will serve as drafts for the scripts.

The material that does not appear in the four episodes is currently being archived. Some videos are transformed into stills, and enter our photographic corpus. Some, such as interviews, are valuable enough to have a life on their own: they are included as”crumbs” in the corpus: one or multiple shots put together with minimal intervention.

In the meantime, we have organized screenings of the work copies, so if you are interested in the project, we would love to continue the discussion then!

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