LI DONGLU

A2Z Art Gallery is honoured to present Li Donglu’s fourth solo exhibition in Paris, Take root. Continuing with his series ‘Zao Wu At the Down of Chaos’, in which dawn’s light is revealing the origin of the Universe, in this time Li Donglu is embedded in European traditional Art, which is strongly influenced by Christian values and aesthetic’s codes. Sublimated by the technique of oil and tempera painting, Li Donglu’s universe lets us glimpse biblical echoes focusing on the contrasting elements: sky/earth, heaven/hell, water/fire and purity/polluted. The absence of human beings in the compositions, the viewer led the viewer to focus on the surrealist poetry of the external environment in which we evolve. Spiritual and strongly symbolic elements are then coming out of the painting. For Li Donglu, the glass box in his painting can also be seen as a reflection of the spirit of protection, the extreme nature would evoke situations of external crisis, the rock would recall the environment where the human being lives; the waterfall in a desert appears in a mystical way, which might spill a flood of uncontrollable emotions. The tree motif, in particular, can be repeatedly found in Li Donglu’s work. As Martine Francillon depicts the idea to us about the Cosmic Tree in the foreword of Ar(t)bre & Art Contemporain, which represents ‘the connection between heaven and earth’ in almost all tradition. The iconography of the tree is turning into an object of hope, playing the role of an intercessor of the human condition and connector between life and death. Jacques Brosse also writes in his book Mythology of Trees that ‘the tree is the companion of mankind and will keep inhabiting his imagination’. Through his surrealist, timeless and spiritual paintings, Li Donglu invites us to take root and to silently meditate on the notions of regeneration, mortality or immortality, history, and inherence.