Luo Jiang - Case Study of an Influential Painter in the 21st Century

Author: Jia Dejiang
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-07-01
Features: Luo Jiang, a Yi ethnic minority, was born in Yunnan in 1959. He graduated from the Chinese Department of North China Normal University and Hunan Province Art College of Fine Arts. He is currently the Deputy Director of the Yunnan Provincial Painting Institute, the Deputy Director of the Yunnan Provincial Art Museum, a National Level 2 Fine Arts Master, a member of the China Fine Arts Association, a member of the China Calligraphy Association, the Vice Chairman of the Yunnan Provincial Calligraphy Association, and a Council Member of the Yunnan Provincial Fine Arts Association. He is currently studying in the Advanced Research Class of the Chinese Painting Research Institute under the Liu Dawei Studio. His works have been selected for the 8th National Fine Arts Exhibition, the 12th New Talent and New Works Exhibition, the Jiangsu Painting Magazine National Academic Touring Invitational Exhibition, the National Art Institute Biennial Exhibition, and the Northern and Southern Figures—Academic Exchange Exhibition of Contemporary Chinese Figure Painting. He won the Excellence Award in the National Chinese Painting Exhibition and the Bronze Award in the National Chinese Painting Exhibition Commemorating the 60th Anniversary of the Victory in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression. In 1995, he held a personal painting and calligraphy exhibition at the National Art Museum of China. Many of his works have been published in national newspapers and magazines, and personal documentaries have been produced and broadcast by China Central Television and Yunnan Television. Many of his works have been collected by domestic and international art museums and museums. He has published specialized works such as "Luo Jiang's Freehand Figure Painting" and "Red Land Feeling—Luo Jiang." Luo Jiang's artistic style features distinct expressionist characteristics. The unrestrained and spontaneous brushwork forms a rough style that is neither sloppy in art nor vulgar in taste. His paintings reveal subtlety amidst roughness, sincerity within the bizarre, and discipline amidst the wild. Not only do his brushwork techniques show unique treatments, but his craftsmanship is also highly refined. He combines the (spontaneity) of literati painting with the richness that art expression should have, thus distancing himself from the simplistic and crude "brush-and-dash" popular style. In simplicity, he reveals extremely rich and varied brushwork and ink charm, profound and heavy.