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Lot Essay
“I need humour in my paintings: they have to be fun. If something isn’t fun, I don’t want to do it either.”
Li Jin is an artist and a gourmet. He takes great pleasure in depicting bountiful feasts: the juicy red-braised pork belly, plump green radish, freshly made dumplings, braised fish heads, whole garlic gloves and grilled fish make up the banquet present in Ode to Life. Gone in his art are the lofty ideals of the literati tradition of Chinese painting; instead, his lush and colourful depictions of food come from the everyday. A true bon vivant, Li Jin inscribes the painting with a well-known verse by the Tang dynasty poet Wang Wei, urging the viewer to finish one more glass of wine. On the wine bottle, there is a man wearing a tiger hat from the artist’s childhood, a clown-like, recurrent figure in Li Jin’s art. He explains that art ‘should not deify human beings. Instead, it should have animalistic rawness.’ Here, the pig on the wine glass looks at the braised pork belly dish with a fearful expression – perhaps a comment on the transient nature of physical pleasure.
Li Jin is an artist and a gourmet. He takes great pleasure in depicting bountiful feasts: the juicy red-braised pork belly, plump green radish, freshly made dumplings, braised fish heads, whole garlic gloves and grilled fish make up the banquet present in Ode to Life. Gone in his art are the lofty ideals of the literati tradition of Chinese painting; instead, his lush and colourful depictions of food come from the everyday. A true bon vivant, Li Jin inscribes the painting with a well-known verse by the Tang dynasty poet Wang Wei, urging the viewer to finish one more glass of wine. On the wine bottle, there is a man wearing a tiger hat from the artist’s childhood, a clown-like, recurrent figure in Li Jin’s art. He explains that art ‘should not deify human beings. Instead, it should have animalistic rawness.’ Here, the pig on the wine glass looks at the braised pork belly dish with a fearful expression – perhaps a comment on the transient nature of physical pleasure.