Fragment is Yangbiao Zhang's 4th solo exhibition at Studio Gallery. The exhibition will run from 9th March to 24th April 2024 and it will be an important milestone in his artistic journey over the past ten years. His increasingly matured techniques and unique yet high-resolution visual sensibilities profoundly illustrate his achievements and in-depth realisations in life and painting. __
Fragment is a sum of feelings, which are fragmented emotional experiences observed and perceived in daily lives, processed through time, all of these feelings will be condensed into fragments in one's memory. Living in Chengdu, a trivial life takes up a large part of his time, and therefore Zhang's works often require a lot of time to present those rare and beautiful feelings. Therefore, he needs to constantly strive to recapture the right moments in certain fragments when he paints. As the fragments of feelings are constantly superimposed, just like a filter, all of these will be formed together and atomised onto the still lifes under his brush. Adding the richness of uncertainty in sketching: the variation of lights, feelings, materials, and techniques, each element plays a relaxing and dynamic jazz tune, making the painting process full of imagination. It is only at this point that the perfect painting in the artist's eyes comes into being; it is only then that he will not regret of painting and himself because he firmly believes that only painting can transform transient beauty into eternity.
In this exhibition, Zhang will be showing a new series of paintings which are painted with airbrush as before but their images are greatly different. They present a more intense, heavy, and extremely high-resolution visual effect. He has once again set a more stringent standard for the quality of his paintings: from the polishing of the canvas base to the delicate treatment of the edges, highlights, projections, and even the curvature of each part of the still life in the picture, he has innovated every aspect of the airbrush painting techniques: from the preparation of the canvas to the order of the colouring.
For example, in the work An Enamel Bowl with Green Edge, he shaped the edge of the bowl by cutting the oval acrylic plate, and through repeated multi-layer hand-painted transitions, the edge of the bowl not only presents a clear sharpness and perfect curvature but also adds many details to make the edge of the transition lubrication, gives a more vibrant and three-dimensional visual sense. Presenting a unique enamel texture, soft yet hard, without losing the sense of delicacy the final work is full of visual impact.
Unlike conceptual works, Zhang considers sketching to be the most important aspect of his practice, which not only provides a wealth of information about visual details but also is a way to directly translate feelings into visual language. In the process of sketching, improvisation and detailing intertwine and collide to form a unique pictorial language and varied images. This kind of subtle processing led by fresh feelings is just like the spices in a main course, illuminating and separating out the most 'Biao Zi' characteristic flavour in his paintings.
From his solo exhibition Capture in 2016, What's the time? in 2020, Cool Colour in 2021, till now Fragment. Over the past ten years, Zhang Yangbiao has found his very own working path. Attracted by light and shadow, he ignites a sense of projection in his mind, which is repeated over and over again to form a projection superimposed in the process of sketching, thus presenting the sense of what he "sees". The viewer stands in front of the work and sees a magnified sense of freshness, deja vu, and time. Pure images, high-resolution textures, and intriguing colors all become a visual comfort that blurs time and virtual reality.
About the Artist
Zhang Yangbiao (b.1990, China), currently works and lives in Shanghai and Chengdu. Zhang Yangbiao, as one of the earliest artists in China to use airbrush in painting practice. For so many years, he mainly sketches from everyday still life or daily fragments. He pays attention to the connection between creation and objective reality and uses the subjective expression of painting to carry his current state and thinking. The subject may be simple for the artist, but the final picture can be rich. Zhang Yangbiao used the airbrush to present a delicate, soft, layering picture on the canvas. The daily item seems to be covered by a layer of poetic beauty; the out-of-focus texture attracts viewers to step forward and observe. It's intuitive to perceive the granular texture of film photography brought by Zhang's technique, which also brings a hazy feeling. As the margin is weakened, the tranquility is infinitely magnified. Important collectors have collected Zhang Yangbiao's works in Shanghai, Beijing, and other places.
Press release courtesy Studio Gallery.
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