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拍品专文
Sanyu, Chinese painter. Born 14 October 1900 in Sichuan...has shown Chinese ink-wash sketches and oil works at the Salon d'Automne...
- Dictionary of Contemporary Artists 1910-1930, 'Sanyu'
The Dictionary of Contemporary Artists 1910- 1930, published in France in 1934, listed this entry under the column marked 'Sanyu': 'Sanyu, Chinese painter. Born 14 October 1900 in Sichuan...has shown Chinese ink-wash sketches and oil works at the Salon d'Automne...' It was 1921 when Sanyu, under the new 'work-study' policy instituted by the Chinese government, braved the high seas to travel to France, where he would gradually absorb the essentials of Western art and aesthetics. Sanyu was taught at home as a child; his family was well-to-do and he received good training and education, even learning calligraphy from the renowned Sichuan calligrapher Zhao Xi. During his subsequent 45-year stay in France, he enjoyed the freedom and romantic ambience of its art world, while his own uninhibited genius and sharp powers of observation allowed him to absorb the styles of the School of Paris in vogue at the time. Sanyu's creative work may have been founded on the Eastern tradition of ink and brush, but in the openness of this new culture he naturally moved beyond the interpretation of forms, colors, and space native to this millennia-old Chinese tradition. In the Montparnasse district where he lived, he made the acquaintance of any number of internationally known artists, including Modigliani, Picasso, Matisse, Tsuguharu Foujita, Chaim Soutine, and Giacometti, while also associating regularly with the elite of the overseas Chinese artistic and literary circles, including Xu Beihong, Xu Zhimo, Shao Xunmei, Chang Tao-fan, and Guo You-shou. Sanyu's works provide lasting enjoyment and always retain their fresh visual fascination and interest; they represent a meeting of tradition and modernity, Eastern and Western influences, lyricism and realism, trendiness and classicism, and the personal with the societal era. His art presents us with each of these, and the distilled essence of East and West, in models of accomplished artistry, and based on the mature techniques of the five-thousand year tradition of Chinese painting, his art also provided an Eastern form of visual experience in response to the questions posed by Western modernism.
SPARROWS ON A LIINE (LOT45) – THE ONLY CURRENTLY EXTANT STREET SCENE BY SANYU
Sanyu's art presents no special difficulty for the viewer; the visual experience it provides is often one of continued visual extension and great expansiveness. His presentation of space, color, forms, and lines is the product of an artist exploring Western art forms from the basis of his foundation in Eastern aesthetics. In the 1920s, rather than studying realist styles in a centuries-old academic institution, Sanyu chose instead the freedom and openness of the Académie de la Grande-Chaumiére, which also provided models for its painters. His work during this period, mostly nudes outlined with the strokes of a calligraphy brush, exudes an Eastern flavor, but by the end of the decade, he had begun painting oils, frequently depicting floral subjects, nudes, still lifes, animals, and a much smaller number of landscapes. In fact only three landscapes have so far appeared on the market: This Sparrows on a line is one of those three, and is the only known work of Sanyu's career to feature a street scene. Sanyu must be counted as the artist who brought the most avant-garde sensibility to the painting of landscapes, figure studies, and still life subjects in the modern history of Chinese art. Sparrows on a Line unusually and boldly makes use of pink in a street scene in which each aspect of the scene is presented in a simplified form. Sanyu's various considerations led him to see the importance of maintaining a harmonious whole; his presentation of near and far distance and the type of perspective he chooses make it necessary to abandon the rational presentation of individual objects in the scene. The result is that in respect of spatial presentation, color, forms, and lines, he still displays his Eastern aesthetic sensibility, while at the same time pushing forward the development of Chinese art through his adoption of Western elements.
BOLD COLOR, FREELY IMPRESSIONISTIC DEPICTION, AND PRESENTATIONS OF DISTANCE AND PERSPECTIVE PROVIDE AN EASTERN VISUAL RESPONSE TO WESTERN MODERNISM
The basic palette of Sparrows on a Line consists of white, grey, black, and pink. Sanyu's choice of pink for this street scene is a bold one, as prior to his career, no one in the history of either Eastern or Western art had chosen to use such large areas of sheer pink in depicting scenic objects. In the 1930s, when Sanyu began working in oil, he chose to base his palette around pink, producing a series of works referred to as his 'pink period.' Works belonging to that period include his Femme en rouge, Roses in a White Vase, and Two Standing Nudes, which achieved outstanding sales results at Christie's in 2013 and 2014. Sanyu's use of pink further differs from Western Fauvist artists such as Matisse, who primarily used lines and flat areas of complementary colors such as red and green to express space. Chinese ink-wash paintings use black to outline their subjects, while in Chinese calligraphy, visual movement and dynamism are derived from equal attention to black and white spaces. In his oils works Sanyu preserved much of the flavor of Eastern works in the ink medium, using pink to mediate between the white, grey, and black tones of his paintings and to harmonize his use of the Western oil medium. The enduring, classic nature of his work, its lasting appeal and meaning to both Eastern and Western sensibilities, derives from these elements.
Sparrows on a Line depicts a view of the ocean outside Paris, gazing from a rooftop across modern power lines and out to the distant sea. Sparrows congregate near the two poles supporting the power lines, while small blocks of white in the foreground can easily be seen to represent the classic chimneys of Paris streets, and the rows of red squares that dot those chimneys can be inferred to be red bricks set among them. Sanyu relies on visual experience and intuitive observation to depict the elements of the scene, using a freehand lyrical manner to show the sparrows dotting the two ends of the wires; recording his spontaneous impressions of the moment in this way is exactly the essence of the Chinese ink-wash method. Even though Picasso's Cubist work opened the door wide for Western art and its simplification of forms, and despite the many years that Sanyu lived in France and his familiarity with Western trends in art, he still responds here by choosing a more Eastern, freehand manner of depicting these forms.
Sanyu's concise lines earned him the label 'the Chinese Matisse,' and his presentation of space, too, displayed a consistently cultured style. In the Southern Song painter Mu Xi's Six Persimmons we can see what is meant by 'the five colors within black,' that is, the degrees of dark and light whose varied tones can be used to suggest the relative distances of objects. Sanyu spreads grey pigments across the canvas for his sky, while the black representing the surface of the sea creates enough contrast to automatically suggest the relative distances of sky and sea from the viewer. And despite the chimneys in the foreground and the sparrows near the poles being spread out toward the two sides of the painting, their size does not change with distance, which represents a use of dual perspective effects in painting that derives from the Chinese multiple-point or distributed perspective. A completely rational depiction of objects is thus abandoned in order to maintain the overall harmony of the composition, a feature that also appears in works by the 'father of modern painting,' Cezanne, and was one of the avant-garde viewpoints with which he helped advance Western painting. The tranquility and simplification of Sanyu's painting style hides within it a unique kind of visual experience, his rich painterly vocabulary reflecting a deeply knowing consideration of its elements.
By contrast with other Chinese painting masters of the same period, Sanyu's works are in a class of their own, and his style, difficult to categorize as belonging to any particular Western school of painting, thus constitutes a new kind of Chinese painting. Sparrows on a Line can be seen as the boldest, the most avant-garde Chinese work of the 1930s. In it Sanyu reveals the spirit of lyrical Chinese freehand at its most essential, his portrayal lifting the viewer to an intuitive level of understanding of the subject. He blends influences and impressions of Western modernism in the use of color, space, forms, and lines, creating the first example in the '30s of using this Western painting medium to depict a Western city scene while bringing Chinese ink-wash scenic painting into the new wave of modernism. In his recognizable, figurative subjects, his freehand, impressionistic portrayal stimulates the imagination and retains an essential inkwash character, and in his freehand approach his color contrasts create impressions of space, in a rare and treasurable modernist work from the early 20th century that blends Eastern and Western influences. This year, the National Museum of History in Taipei, Taiwan is holding a Sanyu exhibition for four months, beginning in March, that displays 49 works held by the museum for a half century yet never before seen. The exhibition includes genres such as the nude, floral still lifes, and animal paintings, but no landscape such as this. This work thus extends our understanding of Sanyu, as a rare and major work embracing scenic landscape, the old and new eras in China, and the confluence of East and West. It gains exceptional significance and value by embodying Sanyu's first steps in creating a new era in art.
- Dictionary of Contemporary Artists 1910-1930, 'Sanyu'
The Dictionary of Contemporary Artists 1910- 1930, published in France in 1934, listed this entry under the column marked 'Sanyu': 'Sanyu, Chinese painter. Born 14 October 1900 in Sichuan...has shown Chinese ink-wash sketches and oil works at the Salon d'Automne...' It was 1921 when Sanyu, under the new 'work-study' policy instituted by the Chinese government, braved the high seas to travel to France, where he would gradually absorb the essentials of Western art and aesthetics. Sanyu was taught at home as a child; his family was well-to-do and he received good training and education, even learning calligraphy from the renowned Sichuan calligrapher Zhao Xi. During his subsequent 45-year stay in France, he enjoyed the freedom and romantic ambience of its art world, while his own uninhibited genius and sharp powers of observation allowed him to absorb the styles of the School of Paris in vogue at the time. Sanyu's creative work may have been founded on the Eastern tradition of ink and brush, but in the openness of this new culture he naturally moved beyond the interpretation of forms, colors, and space native to this millennia-old Chinese tradition. In the Montparnasse district where he lived, he made the acquaintance of any number of internationally known artists, including Modigliani, Picasso, Matisse, Tsuguharu Foujita, Chaim Soutine, and Giacometti, while also associating regularly with the elite of the overseas Chinese artistic and literary circles, including Xu Beihong, Xu Zhimo, Shao Xunmei, Chang Tao-fan, and Guo You-shou. Sanyu's works provide lasting enjoyment and always retain their fresh visual fascination and interest; they represent a meeting of tradition and modernity, Eastern and Western influences, lyricism and realism, trendiness and classicism, and the personal with the societal era. His art presents us with each of these, and the distilled essence of East and West, in models of accomplished artistry, and based on the mature techniques of the five-thousand year tradition of Chinese painting, his art also provided an Eastern form of visual experience in response to the questions posed by Western modernism.
SPARROWS ON A LIINE (LOT45) – THE ONLY CURRENTLY EXTANT STREET SCENE BY SANYU
Sanyu's art presents no special difficulty for the viewer; the visual experience it provides is often one of continued visual extension and great expansiveness. His presentation of space, color, forms, and lines is the product of an artist exploring Western art forms from the basis of his foundation in Eastern aesthetics. In the 1920s, rather than studying realist styles in a centuries-old academic institution, Sanyu chose instead the freedom and openness of the Académie de la Grande-Chaumiére, which also provided models for its painters. His work during this period, mostly nudes outlined with the strokes of a calligraphy brush, exudes an Eastern flavor, but by the end of the decade, he had begun painting oils, frequently depicting floral subjects, nudes, still lifes, animals, and a much smaller number of landscapes. In fact only three landscapes have so far appeared on the market: This Sparrows on a line is one of those three, and is the only known work of Sanyu's career to feature a street scene. Sanyu must be counted as the artist who brought the most avant-garde sensibility to the painting of landscapes, figure studies, and still life subjects in the modern history of Chinese art. Sparrows on a Line unusually and boldly makes use of pink in a street scene in which each aspect of the scene is presented in a simplified form. Sanyu's various considerations led him to see the importance of maintaining a harmonious whole; his presentation of near and far distance and the type of perspective he chooses make it necessary to abandon the rational presentation of individual objects in the scene. The result is that in respect of spatial presentation, color, forms, and lines, he still displays his Eastern aesthetic sensibility, while at the same time pushing forward the development of Chinese art through his adoption of Western elements.
BOLD COLOR, FREELY IMPRESSIONISTIC DEPICTION, AND PRESENTATIONS OF DISTANCE AND PERSPECTIVE PROVIDE AN EASTERN VISUAL RESPONSE TO WESTERN MODERNISM
The basic palette of Sparrows on a Line consists of white, grey, black, and pink. Sanyu's choice of pink for this street scene is a bold one, as prior to his career, no one in the history of either Eastern or Western art had chosen to use such large areas of sheer pink in depicting scenic objects. In the 1930s, when Sanyu began working in oil, he chose to base his palette around pink, producing a series of works referred to as his 'pink period.' Works belonging to that period include his Femme en rouge, Roses in a White Vase, and Two Standing Nudes, which achieved outstanding sales results at Christie's in 2013 and 2014. Sanyu's use of pink further differs from Western Fauvist artists such as Matisse, who primarily used lines and flat areas of complementary colors such as red and green to express space. Chinese ink-wash paintings use black to outline their subjects, while in Chinese calligraphy, visual movement and dynamism are derived from equal attention to black and white spaces. In his oils works Sanyu preserved much of the flavor of Eastern works in the ink medium, using pink to mediate between the white, grey, and black tones of his paintings and to harmonize his use of the Western oil medium. The enduring, classic nature of his work, its lasting appeal and meaning to both Eastern and Western sensibilities, derives from these elements.
Sparrows on a Line depicts a view of the ocean outside Paris, gazing from a rooftop across modern power lines and out to the distant sea. Sparrows congregate near the two poles supporting the power lines, while small blocks of white in the foreground can easily be seen to represent the classic chimneys of Paris streets, and the rows of red squares that dot those chimneys can be inferred to be red bricks set among them. Sanyu relies on visual experience and intuitive observation to depict the elements of the scene, using a freehand lyrical manner to show the sparrows dotting the two ends of the wires; recording his spontaneous impressions of the moment in this way is exactly the essence of the Chinese ink-wash method. Even though Picasso's Cubist work opened the door wide for Western art and its simplification of forms, and despite the many years that Sanyu lived in France and his familiarity with Western trends in art, he still responds here by choosing a more Eastern, freehand manner of depicting these forms.
Sanyu's concise lines earned him the label 'the Chinese Matisse,' and his presentation of space, too, displayed a consistently cultured style. In the Southern Song painter Mu Xi's Six Persimmons we can see what is meant by 'the five colors within black,' that is, the degrees of dark and light whose varied tones can be used to suggest the relative distances of objects. Sanyu spreads grey pigments across the canvas for his sky, while the black representing the surface of the sea creates enough contrast to automatically suggest the relative distances of sky and sea from the viewer. And despite the chimneys in the foreground and the sparrows near the poles being spread out toward the two sides of the painting, their size does not change with distance, which represents a use of dual perspective effects in painting that derives from the Chinese multiple-point or distributed perspective. A completely rational depiction of objects is thus abandoned in order to maintain the overall harmony of the composition, a feature that also appears in works by the 'father of modern painting,' Cezanne, and was one of the avant-garde viewpoints with which he helped advance Western painting. The tranquility and simplification of Sanyu's painting style hides within it a unique kind of visual experience, his rich painterly vocabulary reflecting a deeply knowing consideration of its elements.
By contrast with other Chinese painting masters of the same period, Sanyu's works are in a class of their own, and his style, difficult to categorize as belonging to any particular Western school of painting, thus constitutes a new kind of Chinese painting. Sparrows on a Line can be seen as the boldest, the most avant-garde Chinese work of the 1930s. In it Sanyu reveals the spirit of lyrical Chinese freehand at its most essential, his portrayal lifting the viewer to an intuitive level of understanding of the subject. He blends influences and impressions of Western modernism in the use of color, space, forms, and lines, creating the first example in the '30s of using this Western painting medium to depict a Western city scene while bringing Chinese ink-wash scenic painting into the new wave of modernism. In his recognizable, figurative subjects, his freehand, impressionistic portrayal stimulates the imagination and retains an essential inkwash character, and in his freehand approach his color contrasts create impressions of space, in a rare and treasurable modernist work from the early 20th century that blends Eastern and Western influences. This year, the National Museum of History in Taipei, Taiwan is holding a Sanyu exhibition for four months, beginning in March, that displays 49 works held by the museum for a half century yet never before seen. The exhibition includes genres such as the nude, floral still lifes, and animal paintings, but no landscape such as this. This work thus extends our understanding of Sanyu, as a rare and major work embracing scenic landscape, the old and new eras in China, and the confluence of East and West. It gains exceptional significance and value by embodying Sanyu's first steps in creating a new era in art.