Time
Until Oct. 20
Tickets
Exhibition explores versatile artist's prolific life| Until Oct. 20
Venue
Metro
Line 3 or 4, Children's Palace Station (少年宫站), Exit B
Please Note
Hours: 9 a.m.-5 p.m., closed Mondays
Exhibition explores versatile artist's prolific life| Until Oct. 20
Writer: Cao Zhen | Editor: Nan Nan | From:
An exhibition featuring 100 masterpieces by renowned Chinese painter and designer Zhang Ding (1917-2010) is underway at Guan Shanyue Art Museum, reflecting the versatile artist's prolific career.
"Guan Shanyue Art Museum is engaging in an academic project to pay homage to Chinese designers in the early period of China's founding and Zhang is the first person for this project. The exhibition is also commemorating Zhang's 100th birthday," said Chen Xiangbo, curator of the museum.
In Zhang's lifetime, he created political cartoons, watercolor paintings, ink paintings, calligraphic works, murals and designed stamps and expo pavilions. He is best known as one of the four designers of China's national emblem when he worked in China Central Academy of Fine Arts. He also engaged in the design of the first set of commemorating stamps for the founding of the People's Republic of China, the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference's emblem, as well as the decoration of Tian'anmen Square for the Founding Ceremony of China in 1949.
Born in Beizhen County in Liaoning Province, Zhang moved to Beijing when he was 15 and studied Chinese painting at Beiping Art School. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Zhang created a string of political cartoons to portray China's serious situation and people's hard lives. In 1938, he taught at Luxun Art School in Yan'an, Shaanxi Province, the center of the revolution from 1936 to 1948.
"During his stay in Yan'an, he designed an entertainment club in a yaodong (house cave), a particular form of earthen dwelling common in the plateaus of Northwest China. He also did stage design and costume design for a theater, which stunned Chinese and foreign reporters in Yan'an," said Wang Luxiang, who co-curated the exhibition with Chen.
It was in 1934 that Zhang was first introduced to the works of Picasso when he saw a couple of Picasso's painting books in a friend's home. He was immediately startled by Picasso's wide variety of styles. Later his works were very much influenced by Picasso. In 1956, after designing the Chinese pavilion in the Paris exposition, Zhang met Picasso in France. During this visit Zhang researched impressionism, post-impressionism and cubism. Some of his paintings depicting Chinese city life have a strong Picasso influence due to his adoption of bright colors and distorted objects.
Zhang contributed significantly to the fields of painting and industrial design. He also created murals for Beijing's metro stations, hotels and airport, but it is his innovation of Chinese ink painting through the approach of jiao mo (焦墨) that propelled him to his status as a modern master. Jiao mo is an ancient painting technique in which painters use very thick, dry ink to transform the look of classical art. As a Chinese northerner, his paintings mainly depict snowy landscapes. He once said, "It takes a lot of study to paint in only black, white and gray. In a dazzling world, the combination of black, white and gray brings me great comfort."
At the exhibition, visitors can also enjoy Chinese animation movie "Nezha Conquering the Sea" (1979), with Zhang as the art designer.