Abstract:“Form” and“shape” originally were the two different concepts in China and the West. However, only when we clarify the origin of“form” of traditional Chinese figure painting can we better solve the problem of“shape” in modern fig- ure ink painting which is the combination of the Chinese and Western paintings. The modern figure ink painting is a kind of “shape” art which shapes art through“form”. Painters have to enter into life, observe and integrate themselves into it. Through the accurate the external images of figures, the painters can probe into and find these figures’ real dispositions of their internal world. They combine the metaphysic“form” with the physical“shape” and have brought about the unification between the subjective expression of form and shape and the objective playback, which achieves the unity between form and spirit and aesthetics of traditional Chinese painting.