PAINTING AFTER LIBERATION
With the foundingof the People'sRepublicof
Chinaon Octoberi, 1949,commonlyreferredto
in Chinaas the "Liberation,"
culturalactivities
cameunderthe controlof the state.Seekingto
reformtraditionalpaintingto makeit "servethe
people,"the Communistgovernmentmandated
realism"that
that artistspursuea "revolutionary
wouldcelebratethe heroismof the common
peopleor conveythe majestyof the motherland.
Takingthe social-realistart of the SovietUnion
as orthodoxy,Chinesepaintersfounda model
in theirown countryandemulatedthe Westernderivedacademicrealismof Xu Beihong
Painting fromlife ratherthancopy(pp. 20-22).
ing ancientmasterpiecesbecamethe principal
sourceof inspirationfor most artists.Butexcessivebureaucratic
oversightandthe shifting
demandsof politicsoften had a detrimental
effect.The Communistparty'seffortto encouragepluralityandfreeexpressionunderthe HundredFlowersMovementof 1956-57,for example, wassoon cut shortby the antirightistpurge
of 1957;whilethe GreatLeapForward,of
1958-62,andthe GreatProletarianCulturalRevolution,of 1966-76,althoughintendedto bring
societyinto conformancewith the party's
progressiveideals,actuallyled to the persecution
of manywell-knownartistsandhada stultifying
impacton creativity.
Two artists who managed to develop their
own stylesduringthis period,emergingfrom
the traumaof the CulturalRevolutionas
respectedmasters,wereLi KeranandWu
Guanzhong.These men representedstrikingly
differentapproachesto painting-traditional
versusmodern;nativeversusforeign-but both
were inspired and transformed by war and revolution to achievepersonal artistic expressions.
Li Keran
Li Keran (I907-1989)
mastered orthodox styles
of Chinese painting as a young man, studied
Western watercolor and oil-painting techniques
in his twenties, and then returned to traditional
Chinese idioms, selectivelyutilizing what he had
learned from Western methods to infuse his
works with a new expressivefreedom. Born to
poor, illiterate parents in Xuzhou, Jiangsu
Province, Li Keranbegan to paint at the age of
thirteen with a local artist who instructed him
in the landscape style of the earlyQing orthodox school. In 1923 he enrolled in Liu Haisu's
(pp. 23-25) Shanghai Academy of Art, where he
practiced traditional ink painting and studied
Western-style techniques for two years, winning
recognition at graduation for a landscape in the
manner of the Qjng orthodox master Wang Hui
(I632-1717). In 1929 he began sketching and oil
painting at the National Academy of Art, in
Hangzhou, then under the direction of the
European-trained artist Lin Fengmian (190oI991). The following year Li joined the Eighteen
Art Society (founded eighteen years after the
LiuHaichan
Opposite:Li Keran(1907-1989). TheImmortal
Playingwitha Toad.Dated 1937.Hangingscroll;ink and
color on paper,43 x 297/I6 in. (109.2 x 74.8 cm). Gift of
RobertHatfieldEllsworth,in memoryof LaFerne
HatfieldEllsworth,I986 (I986.267.384)
.48.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve, and extend access to
The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin
®
www.jstor.org
1911 overthrowof
the Qgng dynasty), which
advocated a Marxist approachto art. When Li
and other radicalmembers of the society
protested the lack of social conscience at the
academy,he was forced to leave school and
returnto Xuzhou. In the 1930SLi becamean active
organizerof exhibitions for the anti-Japanese
propagandacampaign,travelingwidely before
settling in the wartime capital of Chongqing,
Sichuan Province.There he became acquainted
with a number of leading artists, including Fu
Baoshi (pp. 38-43) and Xu Beihong. In 1946 Xu
recommended Li for a faculty position at Beijing National Art College. During the intervening decade Li became a devoted student of traditional painting, a course he was encouragedto
pursue in Beijing by fellow faculty members Qj_
Baishi (pp. 26-37) and Huang Binhong (18651955). After the "Liberation" in I949 Li contin-
ued to teach landscape at the Central Academy
of Fine Arts, in Beijing.Except for the decade
of the Cultural Revolution, when Li's family
was dispersed to the countryside and he was forbidden to paint for severalyears, he remained an
innovativepractitioner of traditional idioms
until the end of his life.
TheImmortal
LiuHaichanPlayingwitha Toad,
dated 1937, is an early example of Li's renewed
interest in ancient Chinese styles of figure painting. Li began experimentingwith traditional
freehand figural images in 1934 and was further
inspired by ancient works in the Palace Museum
that he had viewed during a trip to Beijing in
1935. This image depicts Liu Haichan (Liu
means "Sea Toad"), a minister in one of the
small kingdoms that existed briefly during the
tumultuous era following the collapse of the
Tang dynasty (6I8-906). One day a Daoist sage
warned Liu of the danger of his position, and
he immediately renounced his titles and became
a recluse.By Ming times Liu was popularly
referredto as Liu Hai and was veneratedas an
immortal. He was alwaysdepicted as unkempt,
unshod, and carryinga three-legged toad.
Li's bold portrait of this favorite symbol of
good fortune, done the same year that he led a
group of students to create posters urging
resistanceto the Japanese,reflects his interest in
both popular and high culture. Li's choice of
subject indicates his familiaritywith the ubiquitous New Year'sprints and woodblocks; the
ragged figuremay also indicate his direct experience with the suffering of peasants. But the
uninhibited brushwork and freely splashed ink
are related to the spontaneous ink-wash style of
Liang Kai (active first half of the thirteenth
century), who served as a painter in attendance
at the Song painting academyin Hangzhou
* 49
the artist'stransformation
of actualsceneryinto
thatpositionto workat a ChanBuddhisttemcompositionsthatvergeon total abstraction.
ple. As a monk,Liangachieveda boldlyabbrevi- Exceptfor the tinyboatsthat dot the highhoriatedstyle,rootedin the representational
goalsof zon line andthe blacksilhouettesof severalprois
his academictraining,thatgreatlyinfluenced
trudingrocks,the entiresurfaceof Seascape
suchearly-twentieth-century
mastersas Wang
givenoverto a mesmerizingdepictionof waves.
Zhen (pp. I7-19). Li Keran,who soughtan
Upon closeexaminationit is apparentthatWu
expressionbasedon observationratherthancal- paintedout a numberof his ink lineswith
opaquewhitepigment,somethinga traditional
ligraphicabstraction,clearlyfoundLiangKai's
Chineseartistwouldneverhavedone.Wu
style,andthatof Liang'sMing-dynastyfollowwishedto preventlinearpatternsfromdominaters,an idealmodel.
ing the illusionof light reflectedoff the water's
facetedsurface.In contrastto the literatiobjectiveof capturingthe essenceof the natural
Wu Guanzhong
worldthroughabstract,calligraphicbrushwork,
Wu exploitedthe tensionbetweencompositionalabstractionandthe vividevocationof
Wu Guanzhong(born I919), son of a schoolformsmovingin spaceto creteacherin Yixing,JiangsuProvince,studiedto be three-dimensional
to the
atean intenselyemotionalencounterwithnature.
an electricalengineerbeforetransferring
Art
in
the
of
fusionof modernWesternUnder
Wu Guanzhong's
1936.
HangzhouAcademy
influenceof Lin FengmianandotherWesternstyleabstractionwith traditionalmediaand Li
of ancient
Keran's
innovativereinterpretations
trainedartists,Wu specializedin oil painting.
Chinesemodelsrevealthe two directionsof
In 1947Wu won a governmentscholarshipto
modernismin Chineseart.One courseis to
Paris,wherehe immersedhimself in the works
of Frenchmodernists,particularly
Cezanne,
downplayWesternculturewhilepursuingperto
in
China
sonal
and
Matisse.
expressionthroughindigenousidioms;
Returning
Gauguin,
the otheris to turnawayfrommost of China's
1950,he becamea lecturerat the CentralAcadin
Fine
But
culturalheritagein favorof Westernmodels.
of
Wu's
modArts,
Beijing.
emy
Yetartiststakingeitherpathhaveselectively
ernistviewseventuallyconflictedwith those of
the academy's
director,Xu Beihong,andwith
integratedforeignandnativemethodsandideas.
Forthe foreseeablefutureWesternmaterial
the social-realiststyleof Sovietmodels;he was
cultureandartistictraditionswill exerta prosoon movedto anotherpost. Forthe nextthirfoundinfluenceon Chineseart;but China's
teenyearsWu held teachingpositions,but durhe
sent
into
the
Cultural
was
the
ancientheritage,the oldest continuoustradition
Revolution
ing
in the world,offersa uniqueresourcethrough
countrysidefor threeyearsanddid not paint.
whichChineseartistsmayfindrenewalin the
He wasrecalledto Beijingin 1972and,under
the directiveof PremierZhou Enlai (1898-1976), revivalandexplorationof theirpast.If the past
is anyindicationof the future,as Chinaenters
beganproducinglargepicturesfor hotelsand
otherpublicspaces.Latertheywerecriticizedas the twenty-firstcentury,the country'sartistswill
still drawupon the wellspringsof its natural
bourgeoisby a factionled by Mao Zedong's
wife,JiangQing.At this junctureWu began
sceneryandits culturalheritageto forgea new
in
ink
on
of
Chinese
The
end
identityfor themselvesandfor Chineseart.
paper.
painting
the CulturalRevolutionin 1976allowedhim to
pursuehis own work,whichhasbeenthe subject
of one-manshowsin Chinaandabroad.
of 1977,inspiredby a
atBeidaihe,
Wu'sSeascape
poemby Mao Zedong,is an earlyexampleof
from about I201 to
* 50o
I204
but later relinquished
atBeidaibe.Dated I97
Wu Guanzhong (born i919). Seascape
Hanging scroll;ink and color on paper, 381'/8x 45?4in. (96.8x
II4.9 cm). Gift of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth, in memory of
La Ferne Hatfield Ellsworth, i986 (i986.267.431)
--5I
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