The first Chinese painter shown at the British Museum, Wu Guan Zhong is amongst the most prominent figures of 20th-century Chinese art. Wu's formalist works, painted in a time of government sanction, modernised Chinese painting by bridging traditions between West and East.
Read MoreBorn in a small village in Jiangsu, China, Wu studied engineering at Zhejiang University with the intention of becoming a teacher, until a chance meeting introduced him to Zhu Dequn, who was attending the National Hangzhou Academy of Art.
After a brief visit to the establishment, where the artist fell 'madly in love', Wu transferred to the academy against his father's wishes. There, Wu studied both Chinese and Western painting under the tutelage of artists like Lin Fengmian, known as the 'father of Chinese modernism'.
At the start of the start of the Sino-Japanese War in 1937, the campus relocated more than once to evade the Japanese army. The constant displacement was formative for Wu, who has claimed that it strengthened his character.
In 1947, Wu received a scholarship to study at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts in Paris. Paris was formative for Wu, effectively establishing him as one of the first Chinese painters to become acquainted with French modernism, Post-Impressionism, formalist painting, and cultural difference.
Wu's early inspirations include Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Gaugin, and other Post-Impressionists, whom he admired for their passion and commitment to painting.
Despite his appreciation of French modernism, Wu returned to China in 1950 as the country found new governance under the Chinese Communist Party. Wu was assigned a teaching position at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, where he was the only painter qualified to teach the theoretical frameworks of French modernism.
In a cultural and academic setting dominated by social realism, which favoured portraits of farmers and livestock over individual expression, Wu's formalist works were criticised as 'bourgeois'. Wu eventually left for Tsinghua University and took many trips around the country, precipitating his transition to landscape painting.
In 1966, at the dawn of the Cultural Revolution, Wu was banned from painting for seven years. He was sent to the countryside to perform hard labour in 1970 as a part of the Communist Party's re-education program.
When Wu returned to Beijing in 1972, he transitioned to watercolour and oil, later opting for traditional Chinese ink paintings, adapting his style to the commissions he received. When Wu returned to oil painting, his focus turned to the aesthetic beauty of formal elements and the human body.
After Mao's death in 1976, Wu returned to painting and art writing, expanding on the formalist style he loved. Once the country opened its doors to the world once more, Wu had his first solo exhibition in 1979, officially starting his career as an artist in the 1980s.
Over the years, Wu Guan Zhong has become known for landscape paintings that integrate elements of colour and composition from Western oil painting with the lightness and tones of Chinese ink painting.
Through oil painting, Wu hoped to modernise Chinese art and bridge the gaps between East and West. Twin Swallows (1981), a minimalist ink and watercolour work on paper that shows a traditional Jiangnan landscape and two birds caught mid-flight, hints at Wu's desire for synthesis by replicating his displacements and homecoming.
In the silkscreen print Lion Grove Garden (1983), the largest rock in Suzhou is abstracted as a cacophony of lines and planes dotted with yellows and pinks, resting on a serene body of greywater. Departing from realism and the conventions of traditional Guohua painting, the scenery is permeated with the artist's impression of the place.
Further abstracted, later line paintings like Spring Melody (2007) almost appear as a restrained reprise of Jackson Pollock's drip paintings, or a controlled composition that echo the musical undertones of Wassily Kandinsky.
Wu Guan Zhong became an officer of l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1991. He was also the first Chinese artist to receive the Medaille des Arts et Lettres, Paris in 2002 and the first to exhibit at the British Museum, London in 1992.
Wu painted until the very end of his life, passing away in 2010 at the age of 90 in Beijing.
Wu Guan Zhong's works have been shown at major galleries and institutions worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the British Museum, London; the Singapore Art Museum; and the Hong Kong Museum of Art.
Select solo exhibitions include Long Museum, Shanghai (2021); Tsinghua University Art Museum, Beijing (2020); National Gallery Singapore (2019); National Art Museum, Beijing (2019, 2011, 2010); Asia Society and Museum, New York (2012); and Singapore Art Museum (2011).
Select group exhibitions include Hanart TZ Gallery (2021); Sun Museum, Hong Kong (2020); Boise Art Museum, Idaho (2015); National Art Museum, Beijing (2011); and Singapore Art Museum (2009).
While many of Wu's early works were destroyed, later paintings regularly surface at auction. In 2016, The Zhou Village (1997) became the most expensive Chinese oil painting when it sold for $30 million USD.
Elaine YJ Zheng | Ocula | 2021
