Collection of Liu Wenxi's Character Paintings

Author: Liu Wenxi Illustration
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-01-01
Features: This book selects the finest works of Liu Wenxi created since the early 1960s, fully showcasing his "unique approach." It includes works depicting leaders and celebrating the people, as well as figure sketches of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the Loess Plateau, and landscape descriptions from his visits to Europe. The techniques and language are rich and diverse. The artist broke through the existing aesthetic conventions of Chinese painting and creatively incorporated the achievements of Western modern art, opening up new fields for Chinese ink painting in the great exchange between Eastern and Western art.
Looking at the contemporary Chinese painting scene, many renowned masters are often bound by conventions—either drawing inspiration from the past or revering Western traditions, or imitating modern artistic styles, which leads to repeating either predecessors or others. Liu Wenxi, however, is different. He once "reached out with one hand to tradition" and "with the other to life." Over half a century of tumultuous times and decades of changing circumstances have nurtured and forged Liu Wenxi. Yet he did not stop there. When the world shrank into a global village, he set a higher artistic life goal for the "Loess Painting School" he founded—this was to "reach out with one hand to the world." He would use his limited life to achieve a greater artistic transcendence.