HOLD IN HEART | EXPLORING THE DIMENSION OF APPLYING WESTERN ARTISTIC STUDIES INTO CHINESE OIL PAINTINGS

With respect to the western culture,there are three different ways to handle it: domestication, integration and foreignization. Similar opinions have been reflected gradually in the art circle, which are manifested in the persistence and innovation of the Chinese traditional painting, the integration of Chinese traditional painting with western painting and the introduction of western painting in an exclusive way. Specific to the western oil painting,it has merged with Chinese traditional painting to varying degrees.

The first formal and independent introduction of western oil painting to Chinese mainland happened in the period of Chinese modern education when the nation promoted learning. The oil painting was taken as teaching subject at first. Later on, Chinese people chose to study abroad on a large scale. The first generation of Chinese oil painters, represented by Wang Yue,Lin Fengmian and Sanyu, shouldered the dual tasks of introducing western oil painting and inheriting Chinese traditional painting. However, the changes in the art circle have brought us new thinking and mindsets today with extensive cultural exchanges and diversified arts. At the same time, it is undeniable that Chinese traditional values and aesthetic conception have also changed in the cultural exchanges between China and the West.

Significantly, the cultural transformation doesn’t happen in a one-way direction. In the course of learning oil painting, on the one hand, Chinese painters learned the skills and the observing and expressing pattern of western fine art influenced Chinese painters; on the other hand, Chinese traditional culture also changed western oil painting because of the painter’s local culture consciousness, the cultural genes deep in veins, as well as the profound local cultural traditions.

Considering the above situation, it is worthy of conscientious study and careful consideration that how Chinese modern oil painting enters the global era with its own unique cultural identity, how to take the advantage of Chinese cultural resources, how to mark the oil painting ,originating from the West, with Chinese culture, how to keep the Chinese tradition while learning the western oil painting skills and art values, and how to inherit Chinese traditional cultures.

This exhibition was led by Mr. Liu Quan, consisting of other seven artists including Fu Qiang, Liu Lidong, Wang Zhen, Niu Rong and Pan Wenqing. They considered and explored the Chinese contemporary oil painting’s reference, integration and significance to Chinese culture. Having interpreted their absorption and reference of Chinese traditional art in a multiple structures and levels way, these artists put forward a deeper prospect to the value of oil painting art.