● Our mission as painters is to reveal the beauty of the ordinary, and our perception of this beauty, so as to assist and inspire people to perceive this beauty themselves.
● We must face life, art and audiences with the utmost sincerity.
● The truth is what really moves people. This truth is emotional and artistic truth. My fundamental starting point is the transformation of emotional truth into artistic truth.
● Only when you establish a sincere and all-embracing love, and discard the self-deception of ambition and avarice, can the sparks of one`s spirit cast light on the vast world around us, and our art remain everlasting.
● When you are too concerned with how others judge your works, and even pander to them, you will never be able to find your own true appearance, and will never be able to grow your natural strengths to their fullest.
● There is no such thing as obsolescence for expressive forms. No matter the style or formal language, as long as it is developed to a high caliber, it will stand as the eternal wealth of mankind. For the individual artist, however, it is even rarer and more precious to achieve innovation and development in expressive forms.
● No matter how painting develops, realist painting will never wither, because it possesses deep soil and rich expressiveness.
Realism, however, is not the same as photorealism, the mere copying of the subject that goes no further than the initial stage of “semblance.” This vulgar so called realist painting is currently all the rage. The subjects are depicted in an outsized, unreal and empty manner, completely devoid of vitality or living flesh. Such paintings are inferior even to their source photographs. There is simply no painting art of which to speak. Absurdly, such painting is often hailed as the “leading painting” or as the “masterpieces” of “leading artists,” which has resulted in widespread misunderstanding of realist painting among young students, audiences and the market.
Like any other style of painting, true realist painting demands a clear expressive direction, individual pursuit, and corresponding formal language from the painter. Here, the painter is merely using the figures and scenes, through his individualized language, to express his aesthetic views and pursuits in life. Thus, the core issue that continues to face realist painting is the question of research and development within the rich and diverse linguistic system of realism. In other words, realism is not about whether the painting resembles an object (though this is still the foundation), but about how to paint things in a new light.
● The difference between realism and naturalism lies in whether or not the essence of the object has been discovered and revealed.
● The conceptual realm is a combination of the artist`s subjective mind and the objective object. It reflects the state of the painter`s life.
● The success or failure of an artwork rests not in the scale of its subject matter, much less the size of the painting itself. Instead, it rests on how well the emotions, atmosphere and formal language of the artwork are integrated.
● It is no simple matter to grasp a landscape study. It is not just the copying of an object. That is because it touches on a very important question in painting theory, that of the relationship between nature and the mind, between subject and object.
● The colors the artist must capture in his eye are not the riotous profusion of colors around him, much less the pigments on his palette, but the ephemeral, subtle and almost indistinguishable colors.
● Good colors reflect the painter`s aesthetic cultivation. Here are the necessary conditions for any painting with good colors: the colors must be rich but not chaotic, pure but not monotonous, clear but not restless, deep but not stagnant, both opposed and unified.
● In colors, power and brightness are not the same thing. The power of color stems more from the clear chromatic relationships that emerge from contrasts of warmth and coolness, and shifts from brightness to darkness between color fields, rather than from the dogged pursuit of brightness. Some dull colors do not look bright up close, but grow brighter at a distance. That is because as the field of vision expands, people are also able to see the surrounding environmental colors as well. This is the same reason some paintings appear quite gray up close, and more striking at a distance.
● The small color study should not be a short story but the outline of a long novel. Its main task is to provide the foundation of the relationships between color fields and various colors needed for the larger painting.
● Among the many painters I have seen, young or old, realist or non, those who are truly cultivated in color are rare. Their colors often feel weak, uncertain, or not quite “in tune,” like a poorly executed printing, as if missing a few color plates. A painting with imprecise colors is like a piano whose notes leak out from the cracks between the keys.
The sense of color still depends on accumulation and training, but it depends even more on natural talent, an inborn sense that is difficult to put into words. The hard part about teaching students is to reach that level of precision where words fail.
● The brushstroke is far more than just a means for modeling. Not only can it reflect the artist`s personality, it can also embody the great skill the artist has cultivated over the years. The brushstroke is also often brimming with the artist`s explosive emotions and living experiences. It is the highly refined product of the painter`s spirit.
● If the pursuit of painterly expression is not rooted in profound observation and analysis, if it is merely idle play in brush and color to satisfy a fleeting gaze, the resulting artworks will certainly appear empty and unreal, with no substance behind the splendor, nothing to stand up to scrutiny.
● To create paintings that encompass vast content in a few rushed, scattered brushstrokes is a task that is beyond most painters.
● The fastest route is to follow the paths already trodden by others for a while. Then you face the issue of how to set out on your own path. Those who proudly eschew the footsteps of others and seek their own paths from the beginning will have a difficult time making any achievements. Even if they are able to make it a way on their own, they will still be far from the pinnacle of art.
● It is not about what you paint, but how you paint it. There is no difficulty in the question of what to paint. The most difficult thing is how to paint it. Thus, as a painter, you must earnestly hone your craft, rather than thinking up fanciful concepts with which to gloss over the painting`s shortcomings.
● You must first look with your eyes, instead of thinking with your mind. If a painting has dissolved the language of painting and lost its visual allure, how can it be included in the ranks of art? You can call it conceptual art or graphic art all you want, but do not discuss it as painting art.
● The confident artist disdains deliberate mystification. He has no interest in proving his own profoundness. That is because he knows that simplicity is not necessarily shallow, and obscurity is not necessarily profound, and he also believes that simple, sincere expressions require much greater confidence.
● Opportunists may be able to shock the world for a while, but their works will certainly be short-lived.
● The future of Chinese oil painting is very promising. It has the potential to realize its own unique characteristics, and is in no way inferior to European oil painting. That is because China has thousands of years of traditional culture behind it, and has a rich wellspring of art all its own.
● Picasso has been raised to the level of legend in China and across the world. Quite a few people parroting this are certainly just following the crowd. I saw many of his original works in Russia. He truly did invent some unique painting forms, but I did not see anything particularly amazing among his specific works. He is dwarfed by the likes of Qi Baishi and Huang Binhong. Why can`t people see that China`s own masters are greater than them?
● Chinese painting seeks a point between semblance and non-semblance. This is precisely the effect pursued in Chinese freehand painting. Traditional Chinese painting differs from that of the West, in that it has always pursued metaphysical qualities, using form as a carrier for spirit, and focusing on the experience of the essence of the thing. It has never been concerned with conveying outer appearance, in everything from Tang and Song poetry to opera lyrics. Every aspect of traditional Chinese culture is marked by the pursuit of conceptual expression. There is the Li Bai passage, “A lone sail stands as a distant shadow against the vast blue sky. All that can be seen is the Yangtze flowing off the horizon.” Li Shangyin wrote, “The silkworm spins threads until death, the candle sheds waxen tears until it is reduced to ash.” Then there is the Sichuan Opera Probing Emotions, which contains the lyrics, “The night is tranquil, the color of sorrow. The moon seeps into the pavilion like water, releasing a cold breeze.” In this tradition, objects are used as carriers of expression, and forms are carriers of spirit. We could say that, from the perspective of conceptual expression, the West is walking down a path trod long ago by the Chinese.
Chinese oil painters who overlook the advantages of their own culture and blindly chase after the West are like beggars holding out golden bowls.
● I believe that a suitable fusion between oil painting and the spirit of Chinese painting will not be hindered in any way by the inherent traits of oil painting. No matter how it is changed, oil painting has an authentic flavor all its own. There is no risk of oil painting giving way to Chinese painting, much less of Chinese painting made with oil painting materials.
People have been trying to nationalize oil painting or to absorb Western elements into Chinese painting for many years, and most who have attempted it have ended up making art entirely unrecognizable; their oil paintings have lost the flavor of oil painting, and their Chinese paintings have lost the flavor of Chinese painting. Both have lost the aesthetic traits that belong to their type of painting. I feel that the only feasible path is to retain the aesthetic flavor of one type of painting while infusing it with the inner allure of the other type of painting. This is the only way to facilitate the development for a type of painting. When seeking fusion between two types of painting, if the flavors inherent to the original painting type begin to fade, or begin to “make way” for the other type of painting, success is not likely.
● I have increasingly come to feel that none of the many schools of oil painting, even expressive oil painting, which often has the feel of Chinese freehand painting, possesses the allure of Chinese calligraphy. That is a real shame. I feel it would truly be wonderful if one could imbue Western painting with the brush stylings of Chinese calligraphy.
This led me to experiment with using various concepts and brush techniques from calligraphy in oil painting. My goal was to make each stroke of the brush an instance of calligraphy, without losing the overall figurative framework as viewed from a distance. Or I would hope to draw from concrete objects, using the brush stylings of Chinese calligraphy to express a carefree and unbounded demeanor, while retaining the aesthetics of light and color inherent to oil painting. In this way, I could bestow realist painting with a new look, allowing it to retain some of the emotional expression in realist painting, while also taking on some of the visual effects of Abstract painting, so that emotional expression and visual pleasure supplement each other.
● Here is the kind of effect I am hoping for in my paintings: the overall image should be exacting and orderly, while the expression should be wild and unrestrained, with finite details visible within generalization, and a high level of detail without derailing the whole. In more specific terms, the brushwork should be bold and fierce, succinct and generalized, without being empty, and rich and dynamic, without being trivial, and would break with conventional formulas of brushwork. The brushstrokes would not follow the contours of the objects, but instead flow as freely as possible, with shifts in light, color temperature and thickness taking place within a single stroke of the brush. In the expression of the details, the brushstrokes should stack and intersect to produce mysterious, unfathomable impressions, while using rich and subtle combinations of this brushwork and colors to give rise to a sense of abstraction in the details.
Into the 1990s, in order to heighten the expressiveness of painting, I placed greater emphasis on brushing technique, which is manifested in the following three regards. First is the writerly feel of the brush, being the written nature of Chinese calligraphy and a focus on the rhythm of the brushstrokes. Second is the richness of brush techniques. I widely employed the many brushstrokes from Chinese painting, such as chapped strokes, scraped strokes, points, ink wash, and the eighteen depiction techniques, all in pursuit of dynamic brushwork and the allure of brushwork itself. Third is the sense of mystery of the brush. As various brushing techniques overlap and intersect, they form into a mysterious, thought-provoking visual effect. When a painting bares all, it seems devoid of flavor. It severely diminishes its power to affect.
● Huang Binghong`s painting truly could be called the height of Chinese painting. His art has had a great influence on my oil painting. His landscapes look quite unified from a distance, with great vigor and strength. From a distance, everything is so clear, but up close, it is as if there is nothing. The concreteness of the whole and the abstraction of the details fuse as one. His brushwork is loose and uninhibited, freely spreading ink across the painting without following the contours of things, yet somehow remaining cohesive. Each brushstroke is magical, and yet without intention, completely breaking the powerful formulaic framework of Chinese landscape painting. Huang Binhong`s great achievements in painting certainly pushed me to bridge the gap between realist and Chinese freehand styles.
Huang Binhong`s ink brushwork is richly layered. It emerges and disappears, and is full of mystery and change. From the inside to the surface, it has a strong sense of depth, of thickness, of unparalleled richness and mystery. It is very difficult to execute, and impossible to replicate. All of these things have driven me to pursue similar expressions in oil painting. Huang Binhong`s ink is weighty but not sunken, deep but not stagnant. This is just like the reasoning in oil painting that the dark colors must be transparent and vivid.
● Many have attempted to take the path of the so called nationalization of painting. Why do they have such trouble moving forward on this path, with most failing to move at all? That is because they do not realize that in order to fuse two forms of painting that are entirely different, from form to spirit, the mere superficial marriage of form is far from sufficient. I deeply feel that in order to effect this fusion of the painting of East and West, one will need a strong understanding and deep experience not only of their languages of expression, but their spiritual contents as well.
As a Chinese person, the unique living environment, growing experience, awareness of tradition, and various forms of poetry and folk art, are all sources of cultivation for the painter`s soul. They form into the most profound accumulation, and the traditional painting and calligraphy of China further provide a rich expressive language for this cultural content. The way to possess the spiritual essence of Chinese culture, while also retaining an authentic look for oil painting, is to first gain a thorough grasp of the expressive forms and language of oil painting, and then infuse it with the most substantive linguistic elements—such as brush stylings—of Chinese painting, and then to seek out appropriate subject matter and scenes for the expression of the sentiments of a Chinese person. The Europeans will certainly view such painting as pure oil painting, while the Chinese people will be able to find notes of national quintessence. Such painting will no longer be neither here nor there. Of course, this is not necessarily the only path for "fusion between East and West.”
Overall, my own experience on this path has been a progression from unconscious to conscious, passive to active, but I can be certain that without becoming fluent in the languages of both types of painting, and without the rich emotional and cultural accumulation of a Chinese person, one will not make any progress down this path. I also believe that one`s success or failure on this path is determined not so much by one`s exploration of expressive forms, but by one`s inner spirit and aesthetic orientation. That is because the inner spirit is the true root of all formal language, the soil that nurtures language.
Written in the late 1990s or early 2000s.