Mogu means "boneless" and a boneless painting does not have any obvious or unobvious contour ink lines as we often see in a Gongbi painting. Even if it has a line, it should be expressed by some different colors. In another words, instead of using ink lines, a Mogu painting uses colors or colored lines and colored gradation to create a painting.   
 

The term "boneless" originated from the book "Lin Quan Gao Zhi" written by the famous painter and art theorist Guo Xi (1023- approximately 1085) in the Song Dynasty (960 - 1127).

Mogu Painting was created by a famous artist Zhang Zengyao (his birth and death years are unknown) in the Northern and Southern Dynasties (420-589).   

In the Five Dynasties (907-960), Huang Quan (approximately 903-965) significantly developed it to paint trees and flowers.

In the Tang Dynasty (618 - 917), Yang Sheng (his birth and death years are unknown) mastered and developed it in landscape field.

In Ming Dynasty (1368 to 1644), Xu Wei (1521－1593) combined the Mogu style into his famous “Splash ink freehand brushwork”

In Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), Yun Shouping /Yun Nantian(1633—1690) made it famous and Ren Bonian (1840－1895), Wu Changshuo (1844 —1927) developed it forward.   

Mogu painting has been a small stream in Chinese painting history since it was created, but, there are no many famous Mogu paintings to be passed down.   

I started to touch Mugo painting in March 2011 at China Central Academy of Fine Arts.

According to my instructor:   
 

Chinese Mogu Painting uses the methods of Chinese Xieyi paintings, to meet the result of Chinese Gongbi paintings. Therefore, it is a painting that lies between Chinese Gongbi and Xieyi.   

-- "Mogu" in Chinese is means "There is no Bone". Since ink line is the Bone of Chinese painting, there is no bone, means artists don’t paint a Chinese Mogu Painting with ink lines, but create a painting with colors or colored line directly.   
-- Instead of using ink line, Chinese Mogu uses the colors directly.   

Here are some of my Chinese Mogu paintings I did in both of Chinese National Academy of Arts and the Central Academy of Fine Arts and I left the schools. I do hope to bring you a big smile and get your comments or guidance.

If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, you are welcome to write to info@ebridge.cn. 

--Shirley