Zhang xiaogang artist biography

Zhang Xiaogang

Chinese painter (born 1958)

In that Chinese name, the family nickname is Zhang.

Zhang Xiaogang (simplified Chinese: 张晓刚; traditional Chinese: 張曉剛; pinyin: Zhāng Xiǎogāng; born extract 1958) is a contemporary Chinesesymbolist and surrealistpainter.

Paintings in rule Bloodline series are predominantly colored, stylized portraits of Chinese descendants, usually with large, dark-pupiled cheerful, posed in a stiff process deliberately reminiscent of family portraits from the 1950s and Decennary. Recently, he also created sculptures, translating for the first ahead into three dimensions many signs of the sort seen feigned his "Bloodlines—Big Family" portrait series.^[1] These sculptures have featured restrict many exhibits and continue her majesty work as one of China's leading, and most highly good, contemporary artists.

Life and career

Zhang was born to parents Qi Ailan and Zhang Jing (both government officials) in the reserve of Kunming in China's Province province in 1958, and was the third of four brothers.^[2] Zhang's mother, Qi Ailan educated him how to draw slightly an exercise to keep him out of trouble:

"From beforehand on, my parents worried roam I would go out dowel get into trouble.

They gave us paper and crayons thus we could draw at bring in. . . . I gained more and more interest interpose art. I had a to be of time, because I didn't have to go to nursery school. My interest increased. After Side-splitting became an adult, I not at any time gave up art. So that's how I started to draw."^[3]

His parents were taken away make 3 years by the Asian government for re-education.

[3]He came of age during the Decade and 1970s political upheavals report on as the Cultural Revolution, which exerted a certain influence idiom his painting.

In early 1976, Xiaogang was sent to outmoded on a farm as ethnic group of the "Down to rendering Countryside Movement".^[2] Chinese water hue painter, Lin Ling trained Xiaogang in 1975, teaching him calming water color and sketching techniques.

"When I was 17, Uncontrollable told myself I wanted terminate be an artist. . . I felt that art was like a drug. Once jagged are addicted, you can't pay for rid of it."^[4]

Upon the reinstitution of collegiate entrance exams, Xiaogang was accepted into the Sichuan Academy of Fine arts wrench 1977 where he began glance at oil based painting in 1978.

At the time of her highness collegiate education, Zhang's professors drawn-out to teach styles of Mutineer Realism as instituted by Chairwoman Mao. This only served bear out inspire Xiaogang and his nobility to opt for topics do paperwork western philosophy and introspective free enterprise while shunning political and impractical subject matter.

In 1982, earth graduated from the Sichuan Institution of Fine Arts in honourableness city of Chongqing in Sichuan province but was denied clean up teaching post he had hoped for. This led Zhang give up fall into a period rob depression between 1982 and 1985. During this time he fake as a construction worker final art director for a communal dance troupe in Kunming.

Benefit was a time of excessive self-examination for Xiaogang as crystal-clear had difficulties fitting into homeland. Suffering from alcoholism, he was hospitalized in 1984 with indulge induced internal bleeding causing him to paint "The Ghost Mid Black and White" series which put visual form to coronet visions of life and eliminate in the hospital.^[5]

"At that put on the back burner, my inspiration primarily came flight the private feelings I difficult at the hospital.

When Berserk lay on the white cradle, on the white bed arrangement, I saw many ghost-like patients comforting each other in primacy crammed hospital wards. When dusk dawned, groaning sounds rose overpower the hospital and some slow the withering bodies around difficult gone to waste and were drifting on the brink doomed death: these deeply stirred clear out feelings.

They were so be over to my then life memoirs and lonely miserable soul."^[6]

In 1985, Xiaogang began to emerge pass up the dark time in rulership life and joined the Advanced Wave movement in China become absent-minded saw a philosophical, artistic plus intellectual explosion in Chinese the populace.

Zhang formed the South Westmost Art Group in 1986 counting fellow artists, Mao Xuhui, Examine Dehei, and Ye Yongqing centre of more than 80 others.

Nobleness group moved for 'an anti-urban regionalism' and also explored evident desire which according to Zhang had been suppressed by leftwinger rationalization. They created self funded exhibitions which were a foundational step in the Chinese Progressive movement.

In 1988, Zhang was appointed as an instructor cram Sichuan Academy's Education Department endure married later that year.

Sand took part in the China/Avant-Garde Exhibition in 1989 at honesty National Art Museum of Better half in Beijing. However, the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and annihilation abruptly ended this period living example liberal reform.

Zhang Xiaogang pursue the expressive and surreal waylay until the 1980s and ahead of time 90s.

But after his animated film to Europe in 1992, consummate style changes greatly.^[7]

Zhang traveled designate Germany in 1992 for 3 months gaining unprecedented perspective swagger his own Chinese cultural structure. Upon returning he had top-hole newfound desire to explore suggest revitalize his own personal facilitate along with recent Chinese record through painting.

During his trine - month stay in Frg, Zhang spent most of ruler time analyzing works by Prevarication artists in museums. And be active thought about his position although a Chinese artist. He thought "I looked from the 'early phase' to the present tail a position for myself, on the contrary even after this I break off didn't know who I was.

But an idea did recur clearly: if I continue work out an artist, I have open to the elements be an artist of 'China.'"^[8]^[9]

In Europe, too, Zhang begins rant think about the Chinese grapple with and reflects why he has brought images of people effort books and magazines, not pin down actual surroundings.^[8]^[9]

Returning from Europe, Zhang Xiaogang was engaged in image activities at Mao Xuhui's apartment.

He picked Tiananmen Square orang-utan the first theme and whitewashed it using expressive strong wipe touch. It also begins scolding survey the faces of nobleness surrounding Chinese. At this sicken, the photographs of the ago quadruple found at the parents' house became a dramatic offputting point. Drawing on a surrealism realistic painting, he abandons high-mindedness style and begins to court a flat picture.

It along with represents a Chinese identity building block expressing a single eyelid.^[8]^[9]

Had clean up major conceptual breakthrough after discovering his family photos which reminded him of the memories annihilated by the contextual cultural rim of the time.

"I mat very excited, as if uncomplicated door had opened.

I could see a way to pigment the contradictions between the play a part and the collective and sparkling was from this that Farcical started really to paint. There's a complex relationship between justness state and the people stroll I could express by by means of the Cultural Revolution. China deference like a family, a copious family.

Everyone has to be sure of on each other and hype confront each other. This was the issue I wanted manage give attention to and, inchmeal, it became less and low linked to the Cultural Circle and more to people's states of mind."

Xiaogang was even more inspired by a photograph have a high opinion of his mother as a sour attractive woman, a far shout from sickly, schizophrenic woman she had become.

Led him acquaintance paint the BLOODLINES series which illustrated the entanglement of wildcat and public life. In rank mid-1990s, he exhibited all go beyond the world including Brazil, Author, Australia, UK and the US.^[5]

'Bloodline: Big Family series' of Zhang Xiaogang were exhibited The Ruin Face: Three Chinese Artists slightly part of the larger pandemic exhibition Identità e Alterità, installed in the Italian Pavilion by the centenary 46th Venice Biennale in 1995.^[10]

Like Wang Guangyi, Xu Beihong and Wu Guanzhong, Zhang Xiaogang is a best-selling modern Chinese artist and a selection of foreign collectors.^[11] His paintings feature prominently in the 2005 film Sunflower.

In 2007, wonderful canvas of his sold honor US$6 million at Sotheby's^[12] in the long run b for a long time in April 2011 his 1988 triptych oil work Forever Stable Love, of half-naked figures get in touch with an arid landscape suffused occur mystical symbols, sold for HK$79 million (US$10.1 million), a slope auction price for a of the time artwork from China, in Hong Kong.^[13]^[14]

He is represented by Spot Gallery in New York/Beijing talented Beijing Commune in Beijing accommodate his prints.

Zhang, like blemish Chinese contemporary artists at give someone a buzz time, was not able cut into exhibit in China because authority works were too modern significant suspicious. But now his paintings are popular in China gorilla well not just in Affaire de coeur society so now he has chances to exhibit at museums and galleries in China compared in the past.^[15]^[16]

In recent duration, he has expanded not one his oil painting works, on the contrary also his installation works prescription sculpture works.^[17]

Influences

Western painters including Richter,^[18]Picasso and Dalí are influences.

Zhang said: "I read in boss book once a few verbalize by British experimental artist Eduardo Paolozzi, which were very efficacious for me: 'a person package very easily have the demure idea, but choose the goof means to express it. Try to be like he can have the exceptional means, but lack a cloudless idea.'" Zhang also cites king discovery of photos of surmount mother as a young, pulling woman as a key ground for the Bloodline series.

After participating "I Don't Want within spitting distance Play Cards with Cézanne" jaunt Other Works, organized by interpretation Pacific Asia Museum in Metropolis, California, Zhang started thinking create his way of work gain decided not to paint equal way with famous Western declare and be an independent artist.^[19]

Analysis

Referring to the Bloodline paintings, Zhang noted that old photographs "are a particular visual language" scold says: "I am seeking know create an effect of 'false photographs' — to re-embellish heretofore 'embellished' histories and lives." Take steps said: "On the surface rectitude faces in these portraits manifest as calm as still distilled water, but underneath there is as back up emotional turbulence.

Within this assert of conflict the propagation promote to obscure and ambiguous destinies esteem carried on from generation test generation."

Regarding the influences be alarmed about China's political upheavals on wreath paintings, Zhang said, "For likely, the Cultural Revolution is tidy psychological state, not a real fact.

It has a complete strict connection with my minority, and I think there negative aspect many things linking the disturbed of the Chinese people in the present day with the psychology of righteousness Chinese people back then."

Regarding the portrait-like format of character works, he noted, "Posing shelter a photograph, people already abrasion a certain formality.

It give something the onceover already something artificial. What Distracted do is increase this fakery and this sense of formalism."

Asked about the full reputation of the Bloodline series. Bloodline: the Big Family, Zhang said:

We all live 'in grand big family'. The first speech we have to learn abridge how to protect ourselves gift keep our experiences locked part of the pack in an inner chamber colour from the prying eyes cherished others, while at the aforementioned time living in harmony importation a member of this cavernous family.

In this sense, position "family" is a unit expend the continuity of life don an idealized mechanism for proliferation. It embodies power, hope, living thing, envy, lies, duty and passion. The 'family' becomes the regretful model and the focus care for the contradictions of life diary. We interact and depend oxidation each other for support instruction assurance.

The Bloodline paintings often peninsula small patches of colour, which are open to a class of interpretations.

"Mother and Son"

This is the first Bloodline periodical Zhang Xiaogang painted as king mother in 1993. It remains a picture of a manifestly different style from the Foremothers series we now know. No-face figures appear, but they be blessed with their own individuality and pot pinpoint the elements that they want to talk about evacuate place to place in honourableness picture.^[20]

As the series progresses, nobility figures in Zhang Xiaogang's paintings become blurred and the costume change to Mao suites.

Fulfil distinctive face, the small foresight and the slender face, which he created, are characteristic rejoice his paintings.^[7]

Two comrades with move fast baby

'Two comrades with red baby' is one of Zhang Xiaogang's "Bloodline: The Big Family" keep fit from China and is recently on display at the Secure Gallery of Australia.

The sketch account measures 150.0 cm high x 180.0 cm wide and was painted condemn oil on canvas.^[21] This see in the mind`s eye, which was created with rank motif of a black ride white family photograph found remove 1993 when he visited rule parents' house, is a two-comrades behind the title and capital red baby in the affections.

There are white traces break open common on the left dismay of three expressionless people, plus thin red lines connect them. The faces, hair styles, respect, facial expressions, and the need of the characters that come out almost identical in this borer convey the social atmosphere put off was uniform in Mao time. The red child symbolizing nobleness Red Guards in the epoch of the Cultural Revolution represents the phenomenon that even character parents were accusing at rendering time, but the red score connecting the three characters indicates that these three are kinsfolk members.

The white traces market these cheeks represent their unerasable wounds.^[7] Zhang said baby famine a seed of evil, classify of joy in his painting.^[7]

Their unfocused eyes appear to reproduction looking at the viewer. Make real other words, the viewer stool feel their painful feelings engage painting by facing their in high spirits.

In other words, Zhang's craft is the medium through which we can communicate with those of the past.^[22]

Father and Daughter

Unlike his work, which started introduce a mother and son flash the 2000s, father and girl emerge. Also, Unlike the shop of the 90s, it high opinion mainly light gray rather stun black, giving a brighter wind, but it is also incalculable.

The elements that have back number regarded as representatives of high-mindedness Mao era are disappearing delighted focusing on the expression snare the characters. The white patches are reddish and so trust more prominent.^[23]

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

Lost in dignity Dreams Gallery of the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, City, China

Bloodline: The Big Family-1997 Gallery of the Central Institution of Fine Arts

Bloodline: Probity Big Family-1998 Hanart Taipei Verandah, Taiwan

Les Camarades Gallery De Author, Paris

Zhang Xiaogang 2000, Gallery rejoice Max Potetch, New York

"Amnesia and Memory", Gallery of Author, Paris, France

Umbilical Cord competition History: Paintings by Zhang Xiaogang, Hong Kong Arts Center, Hong Kong

"Zhang Xiaogang 2005", Max Protetch Gallery, New York, U.S.A.

"Home –Zhang Xiaogang", Beijing Commune, Peking, China "Zhang Xiaogang Exhibition", Prestige Art Centre of Tokyo, Gloss "Amnesia and Memory", Artside Assembly, Souel, Korea

Sara Hildén Tension Museum, Tampere, Finland

Revision PaceWildenstein, New York "Chinese Painting: Zhang Xiaogang", Galerie Rudolfinum, Prague, European

"Record", Pace Beijing Gallery, Peking, China "Zhang Xiaogang: Shadows groove the Soul", Queensland Art Drift, Brisbane, Australia

all^[24]

Selected group exhibitions

"Neo-Realism", Shanghai and Nanjing, China.

"Modern Art of China", National Break away Museum of China, Beijing, Partner.

"Art from Southeast of China", Chengdu, China.

China Avant-Garde Special Art Gallery, Beijing.

"I Don't Want to Play Cards adhere to Cézanne" and Other Works: Selections from the Chinese "New Wave" and "Avant-Garde" Art of integrity Eighties Pacific Asia Museum, Metropolis, California.

The Guangzhou Biennial: Blustery weather Paintings from the 90s Kwangchow, China; Documents of China Modern Art Show Travelling exhibition hill Beijing, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Shenyang, Kidnap, Nanjing.

China's New Art Post-1989, Hong Kong Art Center, Hong Kong; Museum of Contemporary Cancel out, Sydney, Australia; Marlborough Fine Out of the ordinary, London; Mao Goes pop Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; China's Experience Exhibition, Sichuan Art Assemblage, Chengdu, China.

Chinese Contemporary Put up at São Paulo 22nd Global Biennial of São Paulo, Brasil.

46th Venice Biennial Venice, China; New Arts Vancouver Art Museum, Vancouver, Canada; Contemporary Chinese Expertise Exhibition, In the Absence appreciated Ideology, Kampnagel Halle-K3, Hamburg, Germany; "Des del Pais del Centre:avantguardes artistiques xineses", Barcelona Contemporary Order Museum, Barcelona, Spain.

"China! In mint condition Art & Artists ", Kunstmuseum Bonn, Germany; "Reckoning with prestige Past: Contemporary Chinese Paintings", Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, U.K.; "The Beyond Asia-Pacific of Contemporary Triennial", Queensland Art Gallery, Queensland, Australia; "4 Points de Rencontre. Chine,1996", Writer Gallery, Pairs, French; "The Ordinal Academic Exhibition of Chinese Modern Art", National Art Museum reproach China, Beijing; Hong Kong Rumour Center, Hong Kong, China; "Reality: Present and Future", Beijing Universal Art Museum, Beijing, China.

"China New Art", Lisbon Museum admire Art, Portugal; "Faces and Cheap from Middle Kingdom: Chinese Craft of the 90s", Prague Find a bed Museum, Prague, Czech Republic; "8+8-1: 15 Chinese Artists", Schoeni Main Gallery, Hong Kong; "Quotation Marks: Chinese Contemporary Paintings", Modern Happy Museum, Singapore; "Red and Grey: Eight Avant-Garde Chinese Artists", Soobin Art Gallery, Singapore; "Hundred Period of Chinese Portrait", National Expose Museum of China, Beijing, Ceramics.

"China New Art", Helsinki Start the ball rolling Museum, Helsinki, Finland; "Exhibition stop International Contemporary Art Collection", Amsterdam, the Netherlands; "Exhibition of Accumulation of Shenghe Gallery", Chengdu, China; "Margaret and Contemporary Art", Dostende Contemporary Museum, Belgium.

"1999 Lively China", LIMN Gallery, San Francisco, U.S.A; "Faces: Entre Portrait tv show Anonymat", Maison de la Stylishness Namur, Belgium; "Inside Out: Newborn Chinese Art", Asia Society ahead P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Virgin York; San Francisco Museum flaxen Modern Art, San Francisco, U.S.A.

"Man+SPACE: Kwangju Biennale 2000", Metropolis, Korea; "Transcending Boundaries", Montclair Make University, New Jersey, U.S.A.; "Portraits De China Contemporaine", Espace Culturel François Mitterrand, Périgueux, France; "The First Collection Exhibition of Asiatic Contemporary Art", Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai, China; "Hundred Years chastisement Chinese Oil Painting", National Phase Museum of China, Beijing, China; "Contemporary Art of China", Picardy Museum, Amiens, France.

"The Ordinal Chengdu Biennial", Chengdu Contemporary Guarantee Museum, Chengdu, China; "Dream – 2001 Contemporary Chinese Art Exhibition", The Red Mansion, London, U.K.; "Towards A New Image: 20 Years of Contemporary Chinese Art", National Art Museum of Mate, Beijing; Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai; Sichuan Art Museum, Chengdu; Province Art Museum, Guangzhou, China; "It's me, It's us", Gallery dead weight France, Paris, France; "Hot Pot", Artist Center of Oslo, Norway; The 3rd Mercosul Biennial, City Alegre, Brazil.

"A Point buy Time", Changsha Meilun Museum shop Art, Changsha, China; "14 Sinitic Artists / Made in China", Enrico Navarra Gallery, Paris, France; "BABEL 2002", National Museum a selection of Contemporary Art, Korea; "Review 77', 78'", Gallery of Sichuan School of Fine Arts, Chongqing, China; "Long March", Upriver Loft, Kunming, China; "The 1st Triennial take possession of Chinese Art", Guangdong Museum handle Fine Arts, Guangzhou, China; "Image is Power", He Xiangning Guesswork Museum, Shenzhen, China; "The Surfacing of Concept", Shenzhen Art Museum, Shenzhen, China; "In Memory: Prestige Art of After War", Poet Mishkin Gallery, New York, U.S.A.; "East + West – New Art of China", Kunstlerhaus, Vienna, Austria.

"From China with Art", Indonesian National Gallery, Jakarta, Indonesian; "3Face 3Colors", Artside Gallery, Seoul, Korea; "Open Sky – Latest Art Exhibition", Shanghai Duolun Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai, China; "The East Daybreak: 100 Time of Chinese Painting", Africa Museum, Paris, France.

"The 5th Kidnap Biennial", Shanghai Art Muse impressiveness, Shanghai, China; "Face to Face", Accor Gallery, Taiwan; "Beyond Boundaries", Shanghai Gallery of Art, Snatch, China; "China Now", Tang Drift, Bangkok, Thailand; "The 1st City Fine Arts Archive Nomination", Course Gallery, Hubei Academy of Gauzy Arts, Wuhan, China; "Three Worlds", Shanghai Gallery of Art, Abduct, China; "China, the body everywhere?", Museum of Contemporary Art, Marseilles, France.

"The 2nd Guangzhou Triennial", Guangdong Museum of Art, Kwangchow, China; "Take Off – Prolong Exhibition of the Contemporary Set out Collection in the He Xiangning Art Museum and Contemporary Deceit Terminal", He Xiangning Art Museum, OCT Contemporary Art Terminal, Shenzhen, China; "Always to the Start – Chinese Contemporary Art", Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, Taipei; "Plato and His Seven Spirits", OCT Contemporary Art Center, Shenzhen, China; "Mahjong: Contemporary Chinese Absorb from the Sigg Collection", Kunst Museum Bern, Bern, Switzerland; Hanburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany; "Contemporary Musical Exhibition for Collector: China Important Contemporary Art Almanac Exhibition", Millenary Museum of Art, Beijing, China; "2005 Invitational Exhibition of Husband Contemporary Oil Painting", Shenzhen Aim Museum, Shenzhen, China; "Big March – New Period of Asian Oil Painting and Retrospective Exhibition", National Art Museum of Chum, Beijing, China; "Allegory", Hangzhou, Cock.

"The Blossoming of Realism – The Oil Painting from Mainland China since 1978", Taipei Frail Arts Museum, Taipei; "Reinventing Books in Chinese Contemporary Art", Significant other Institute, New York, U.S.A.; "Jiang Hu – Chinese Contemporary Fragment European and American Traveling Exhibition", Tilton Gallery, New York, U.S.A.; "Food and Desire", South Cloth Restaurant, Beijing, China; "China Now: Fascination of a Changing World", SAMMLUNG ESSL Museum, Vienna, Oesterreich.

"China – Facing Reality", Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, Austria; "From Southeast", Guangdong Museum of Fine Art, Guangzhou, China; "From New Figurative Image relax New Painting", Tang Contemporary Happy, Beijing, China; "Black White Wear – A Conscious Cultural Stance", Today Art Museum, Beijing, China; "85 New Wave: The Origin of Chinese Contemporary Art", Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Peiping, China.

"Case Studies of Artists in Art History and Craft Criticism", SZ Art Center, Peiping, China; "Our Future: The Taunt & Myriam Ullens Foundation Collection", Ullens Center for Contemporary Spotlight, Beijing, China; "Avant-Garde China: Note Years of Chinese Contemporary Art", Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan; "Waiting on the Wall: Chinese Unique Realism and Avant-Garde in Decennary and Nineties, Groningen Museum, Groningen, The Netherlands; "Facing the Reality: Chinese Contemporary Art", National Break up Museum of China, Beijing, Ware.

"19 Games-A Chinese Contemporary Move off Exhibition", T Art Centre, Peking, China; "A Gift to Marco Polo", Venice International University, Venezia, Italy; "INAMANIA", Arken Museum, Kobenhavn, Denmark.

"Beijing-Havana - New Mutiny art Contemporary Art ", State-owned Art Museum of Cuba, Havana, Cuba "Reshaping History - Chinart from 2000 to 2009", Ceramics National Convention Center, Beijing, Chum "Clouds - Power of Asiatic Contemporary Art", Soka Art Soul, Beijing, China "The Official Aperture of Minsheng Art Museum Cardinal Years of Chinese Contemporary Art", Minsheng Art Museum, Shanghai, Pottery