Wu Yi was born in 1934 in Yokohama, Japan, a native of Guangdong, China. He grew up in China, and studied traditional calligraphy and painting from a very young age. He graduated from the Nanjing Academy of Art in 1962, but with the onset of the Cultural Revolution he quietly honed his craft without exhibiting for over 10 years. When he began showing his paintings in the late 1970s, Wu Yi quickly rose to become a prominent figure in the Chinese Art world. In 1984, Wu Yi traveled to Japan to research modern Japanese art, and later that year he and his wife immigrated to New York, where they still reside today.
Read MoreWu Yi is celebrated not only as an artist, but as a scholar as well. His insight into the history and philosophy behind traditional Chinese calligraphy and painting is highly sought after by international scholars, and his articles have appeared in Fine Art publications across China and the US. In 1994, Wu Yi founded the Association of Chinese Modern Art in New York, and organized several symposia and international art exchanges, including the 2008 International Fine Arts Conference on Aesthetics and Theories on Chinese Ink Art, held at Asia Society New York, which was very well-received. In 2013, Wu Yi was featured on CCTV as one of China's great overseas masters, and in 2014, featured on CNTV for a discussion on his 'Xiang' Thought.
Text courtesy Kwai Fung Hin Art Gallery.
