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Lot Essay
Thanks to his father's influence, Chu Teh-Chun developed a deep interest in drawing and calligraphy at an early age and entered the Hangzhou School of Art when he was 15. The headmaster of the school, Lin Fengmian, was an advocate of French modern art and recruited many teachers who had studied in France, a circumstance that was to have a profound effect on Chu later. In 1955, Chu furthered his studies in France where he began to combine the influences of Chinese painting and calligraphy with more liberal and abstract Western art, creating his own unique style that would later surprise the art world.
Dans la brume (Lot 110), as the title implies, depicts a foggy scene after the snow when the sky is turning blue. Chu used rapid brushstrokes to condense natural forms into a powerful, geometric, abstract illustration, emphasizing the tension between line, brushstroke and colour. It is clear that the work is heavily influenced by his training in Europe. When compared to the works of abstract expressionist, Willem de Kooning, both de Kooning and Chu utilize brisk brushstrokes, which eliminate the boundaries of the painting's surface and extend it beyond its frame, producing a broader, wider and freer space. Lines and surfaces blend in and overlap endlessly, maintaining a harmonious rhythm without conflicting with each other, resulting in a stunning effect.
Both Chu and de Kooning's expressionism captures emotions and builds up effects through the use of colour, allowing the pigments to mix and splash, creating a slowly flowing movement across the painting. However, the artists differ in their use of paints - de Kooning uses thick oil paints to produce flowing lines in his painting, building an overwhelming world of abstraction while Chu uses the diluted paints of the Chinese calligraphic tradition. While de Kooning's paintings resound with a sense of shock, Chu's works exude a beautiful silence. Chu fully demonstrates the spirit of Chinese landscape painting by conveying a sense of the unreachable, through vivid imagery and the imaginative use of space - a perfect combination of power and elegance.
Chu uses washes of colour, which allow the oils to fuse and converge, producing what Emperor Shizong of the Later Zhou dynasty described as "the colour of hope after the storm and rain." As if pining for sunny weather after the snow and frost has passed, Chu accents the whites and greys in his painting with hints of colour, recreating the memory of a natural snowscape from his subjective consciousness, restoring art to its most pure form of expression.
Dans la brume (Lot 110), as the title implies, depicts a foggy scene after the snow when the sky is turning blue. Chu used rapid brushstrokes to condense natural forms into a powerful, geometric, abstract illustration, emphasizing the tension between line, brushstroke and colour. It is clear that the work is heavily influenced by his training in Europe. When compared to the works of abstract expressionist, Willem de Kooning, both de Kooning and Chu utilize brisk brushstrokes, which eliminate the boundaries of the painting's surface and extend it beyond its frame, producing a broader, wider and freer space. Lines and surfaces blend in and overlap endlessly, maintaining a harmonious rhythm without conflicting with each other, resulting in a stunning effect.
Both Chu and de Kooning's expressionism captures emotions and builds up effects through the use of colour, allowing the pigments to mix and splash, creating a slowly flowing movement across the painting. However, the artists differ in their use of paints - de Kooning uses thick oil paints to produce flowing lines in his painting, building an overwhelming world of abstraction while Chu uses the diluted paints of the Chinese calligraphic tradition. While de Kooning's paintings resound with a sense of shock, Chu's works exude a beautiful silence. Chu fully demonstrates the spirit of Chinese landscape painting by conveying a sense of the unreachable, through vivid imagery and the imaginative use of space - a perfect combination of power and elegance.
Chu uses washes of colour, which allow the oils to fuse and converge, producing what Emperor Shizong of the Later Zhou dynasty described as "the colour of hope after the storm and rain." As if pining for sunny weather after the snow and frost has passed, Chu accents the whites and greys in his painting with hints of colour, recreating the memory of a natural snowscape from his subjective consciousness, restoring art to its most pure form of expression.