.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
British artist Lucian Freud (fig. 1), one of the most eminent painters of the 20th Century, once said, "The task of the artist is to make the human being uncomfortable, and yet we are drawn to great works by involuntary chemistry, like a hound getting a scent; the dog isn't free, it can't do otherwise, it gets the scent and instinct does the rest." Since the May Fourth Movement, Cai Yuanpei advocated for "Artistic Revolution" through realism. Realism is an important thread that runs through the recent Chinese contemporary art history. Liu Xiaodong's Realism abandons any doctrine that serves any ideology. At the same time, he employs the traditional charm of academic style and poetic expressions. Through his extremely proficient painting technique, the paintbrush becomes Liu Xiaodong's most heartfelt and liberating expression.
Stemmed from his love and respect for the serious cinema, Liu Xiaodong collaborated with the many famous movie directors who came from the same Sixth Generation Chinese artists (born in 1960s) throughout his career. He painted works that were based on movie camera perspective, and he sometimes executed those works at the movie set. He even appeared in movie scenes such as Wang Xiaoshuai's The Days (1994), Beijing Bicycle (2001), Zhang Yuan's Sons (1996), and Jia Zhangke's Still Life (2006). Painted in 1995, Sons (Lot 40) is an extremely important piece that is representative of Liu Xiaodong's artistic output of the decade. It was also featured as the promotional poster for the movie. Inspired by director Zhang Yuan's movie, Sons was recorded using the 35mm documentary film. The relationship between the family of four living in Beijing was the main focus of the movie. It documented the struggle for survival and peace of the grassroots family. It emphasizes the dignity and goodness of humanity. This film won the Hivos Tiger Award and the Critic's Choice Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam in 1996. Zhang Yuan has also expressed in many interviews that this movie is one of his most important works.
Liu Xiaodong visited Zhang Yuan when he was filming Sons in 1995. A photograph of the family characters in the movie was taken on the set, and it was subsequently developed into the painting of Sons. The parents in the painting are both dancers of the national dance company. Due to the re-structuring of the Chinese national economic system in the 90s, "The people's artists" could no longer enjoy the elevated status of the bygone era. They could not help but to give into the reality of aggressive competition in the society that was ushered in by the market economy. Having lived most of their lives under the care of the State, the middle-age couple found that the shock of the new economic system and rapidly growing competition in the society were too much to handle for the nuclear family of four. Each member reacted differently to such dramatic changes: Out of her love for the family and her strength of character, the mother was willing to swallow her pride and worked as a substitute teacher at a children's dance class. The father, however, could not adjust his expectation to the new economic reality and turned to alcoholism as an escape for his frustration. The two young sons were lost amidst the confusion in this powerless family and the new social order that surrounded them. Even though the sense of helplessness and confusion of the family are told through the unembellished style of a documentary film, the audience is still drawn into the story by the intimate connections within the family and sympathizes with their hardship and struggle. The warmth and care between the family members are etched into the hearts of the audience.
Director Zhang Yuan spoke very highly of this work by Liu Xiaodong, "The movie spent 100 minutes to tell a story. Yet, this one painting has covered so much. This is a testimony to his (Liu Xiaodong's) power as an artist". Every brushstroke in Sons is an accumulation of emotions, and the precise use of colours captures the fleeting movement of intense feelings. The subtlety of this scene is highlighted by the sincerity and richness of character in the gazes of the family members. Without pandering to the audience with melodrama, Liu Xiaodong brings the audience to the most sentimental feeling that is the core of humanity. Such feelings are universal - they are not bound by geographic, temporal, or ideological differences. The greatest artworks are often filled with a deeper understanding of human sensibilities. To capture and express these intangible sentiments, they must be built upon a profound mastery of the painting techniques.
American post-war sculptor George Segal has a tendency to capture human movements and facial expressions that are frozen in time. Through the study of these particular instances, he gains a deeper understand of humanity. His subjects are always people of the working class, and he is obsessed with how light can bring out the different characteristics of the subject. In Sons, Liu Xiaodong chooses an angle that reflects the abundance of feelings and empathy to depict this family. It is a departure from the conventional way of outdoor subjects. The artist uses brushwork that is fluid and passionate to complete a scene that is filled with effects of movie set lighting. The light and shadows on the faces of the figures are starkly dramatic. The father's gaze is directed to the left side of the picture, while the mother and son look directly at the camera with determination and tenderness. The grey blue background is lit by a single yellow lamp. Together with the swirl of smoke rising behind the father, these elements animate the foreground with optimism. The pink roll of paper, yellow cigarette box, green beer bottle, and the red thermos located behind the son break the dominant tones of blue, white, and grey. Such high degree of succinctness in the use of colours is the artist's way of bestowing spirit and coalescing with the temporality on the picture plane.
The movie opens with the line "Every man a son, but not every man a father". The identity of being a son has a universality that summarizes the anxiety, dread, and the goodness of the heart of a generation. All these complex mental states, be they tragic or exalted, are expressed through this family portrait. In Chinese history, the elites are expected to have the capacity to concern themselves with the well-being of the entire nation. This is different from the collective and ethnic anxieties that were experienced by the intellectuals of the last generation. Their anxieties were individualized and personal. To Liu Xiaodong's generation of artistic elites, the kind of anxiety that they experienced from the changing current of time takes yet another different form: to them, their heartaches are free from melodrama and grand narratives. They are individualised realities that are tightly connected with the absurdities of the era. Every ordinary person in Liu Xiaodong's painting is an individual with his or her personalised gaze at life. Such poignant depictions have also become powerful cultural landscapes of their time. Alexandra Munroe, Senior Curator of Asian Art at the Guggenheim Museum, New York expressed that Liu Xiaodong and his contemporaries, who are movie directors had experienced great trauma to their values. Caught in a chasm, their generation has lost confidence in any elitist world order or ideological shelter. They are highly doubtful of whether western modern intellectual history can rescue and rebuild Chinese culture. Spiritually displaced, they expressed their concerns for the everyday realities of the laboring class through art. Through the individual lives of the ordinary people, they found poetry and conscience.
-Liu Xiaodong: Evidence
Liu Xiaodong has reiterated that the focus of his works is on people and history. The convergence is ultimately people and their stories, "the brutality of everyday lives is inevitable and banal. The metaphor is a trajectory from which we cannot divert, and we cannot return to our true sense of selves. Is that the perspective of our destiny in this era?" (Guo Xiaoyan - Painting: Against the Crumbling World). With its perfect imageries, connection with the cinematic art, and sympathy for the humanity as the creative background, Sons was exhibited in important exhibitions of the Chinese contemporary arts the next year (1996) after its completion. Subsequently, it was widely exhibited and published. It is revered as a masterpiece of the new Chinese Realism of 20th century and the decade of the 1990s.
Stemmed from his love and respect for the serious cinema, Liu Xiaodong collaborated with the many famous movie directors who came from the same Sixth Generation Chinese artists (born in 1960s) throughout his career. He painted works that were based on movie camera perspective, and he sometimes executed those works at the movie set. He even appeared in movie scenes such as Wang Xiaoshuai's The Days (1994), Beijing Bicycle (2001), Zhang Yuan's Sons (1996), and Jia Zhangke's Still Life (2006). Painted in 1995, Sons (Lot 40) is an extremely important piece that is representative of Liu Xiaodong's artistic output of the decade. It was also featured as the promotional poster for the movie. Inspired by director Zhang Yuan's movie, Sons was recorded using the 35mm documentary film. The relationship between the family of four living in Beijing was the main focus of the movie. It documented the struggle for survival and peace of the grassroots family. It emphasizes the dignity and goodness of humanity. This film won the Hivos Tiger Award and the Critic's Choice Award at the International Film Festival Rotterdam in 1996. Zhang Yuan has also expressed in many interviews that this movie is one of his most important works.
Liu Xiaodong visited Zhang Yuan when he was filming Sons in 1995. A photograph of the family characters in the movie was taken on the set, and it was subsequently developed into the painting of Sons. The parents in the painting are both dancers of the national dance company. Due to the re-structuring of the Chinese national economic system in the 90s, "The people's artists" could no longer enjoy the elevated status of the bygone era. They could not help but to give into the reality of aggressive competition in the society that was ushered in by the market economy. Having lived most of their lives under the care of the State, the middle-age couple found that the shock of the new economic system and rapidly growing competition in the society were too much to handle for the nuclear family of four. Each member reacted differently to such dramatic changes: Out of her love for the family and her strength of character, the mother was willing to swallow her pride and worked as a substitute teacher at a children's dance class. The father, however, could not adjust his expectation to the new economic reality and turned to alcoholism as an escape for his frustration. The two young sons were lost amidst the confusion in this powerless family and the new social order that surrounded them. Even though the sense of helplessness and confusion of the family are told through the unembellished style of a documentary film, the audience is still drawn into the story by the intimate connections within the family and sympathizes with their hardship and struggle. The warmth and care between the family members are etched into the hearts of the audience.
Director Zhang Yuan spoke very highly of this work by Liu Xiaodong, "The movie spent 100 minutes to tell a story. Yet, this one painting has covered so much. This is a testimony to his (Liu Xiaodong's) power as an artist". Every brushstroke in Sons is an accumulation of emotions, and the precise use of colours captures the fleeting movement of intense feelings. The subtlety of this scene is highlighted by the sincerity and richness of character in the gazes of the family members. Without pandering to the audience with melodrama, Liu Xiaodong brings the audience to the most sentimental feeling that is the core of humanity. Such feelings are universal - they are not bound by geographic, temporal, or ideological differences. The greatest artworks are often filled with a deeper understanding of human sensibilities. To capture and express these intangible sentiments, they must be built upon a profound mastery of the painting techniques.
American post-war sculptor George Segal has a tendency to capture human movements and facial expressions that are frozen in time. Through the study of these particular instances, he gains a deeper understand of humanity. His subjects are always people of the working class, and he is obsessed with how light can bring out the different characteristics of the subject. In Sons, Liu Xiaodong chooses an angle that reflects the abundance of feelings and empathy to depict this family. It is a departure from the conventional way of outdoor subjects. The artist uses brushwork that is fluid and passionate to complete a scene that is filled with effects of movie set lighting. The light and shadows on the faces of the figures are starkly dramatic. The father's gaze is directed to the left side of the picture, while the mother and son look directly at the camera with determination and tenderness. The grey blue background is lit by a single yellow lamp. Together with the swirl of smoke rising behind the father, these elements animate the foreground with optimism. The pink roll of paper, yellow cigarette box, green beer bottle, and the red thermos located behind the son break the dominant tones of blue, white, and grey. Such high degree of succinctness in the use of colours is the artist's way of bestowing spirit and coalescing with the temporality on the picture plane.
The movie opens with the line "Every man a son, but not every man a father". The identity of being a son has a universality that summarizes the anxiety, dread, and the goodness of the heart of a generation. All these complex mental states, be they tragic or exalted, are expressed through this family portrait. In Chinese history, the elites are expected to have the capacity to concern themselves with the well-being of the entire nation. This is different from the collective and ethnic anxieties that were experienced by the intellectuals of the last generation. Their anxieties were individualized and personal. To Liu Xiaodong's generation of artistic elites, the kind of anxiety that they experienced from the changing current of time takes yet another different form: to them, their heartaches are free from melodrama and grand narratives. They are individualised realities that are tightly connected with the absurdities of the era. Every ordinary person in Liu Xiaodong's painting is an individual with his or her personalised gaze at life. Such poignant depictions have also become powerful cultural landscapes of their time. Alexandra Munroe, Senior Curator of Asian Art at the Guggenheim Museum, New York expressed that Liu Xiaodong and his contemporaries, who are movie directors had experienced great trauma to their values. Caught in a chasm, their generation has lost confidence in any elitist world order or ideological shelter. They are highly doubtful of whether western modern intellectual history can rescue and rebuild Chinese culture. Spiritually displaced, they expressed their concerns for the everyday realities of the laboring class through art. Through the individual lives of the ordinary people, they found poetry and conscience.
-Liu Xiaodong: Evidence
Liu Xiaodong has reiterated that the focus of his works is on people and history. The convergence is ultimately people and their stories, "the brutality of everyday lives is inevitable and banal. The metaphor is a trajectory from which we cannot divert, and we cannot return to our true sense of selves. Is that the perspective of our destiny in this era?" (Guo Xiaoyan - Painting: Against the Crumbling World). With its perfect imageries, connection with the cinematic art, and sympathy for the humanity as the creative background, Sons was exhibited in important exhibitions of the Chinese contemporary arts the next year (1996) after its completion. Subsequently, it was widely exhibited and published. It is revered as a masterpiece of the new Chinese Realism of 20th century and the decade of the 1990s.