Oil on canvas

92×75 cm. 36 1/4×29 1/2 in

Signed in Pinyin, dated on bottom left； signed and titled in Chinese, dated on reverse
PROVENANCE
Important Private Collection, Asia

The Soul of Rural Realism
Luo Zhongli’s Classic Daba Mountains Series： Peasant Woman on a Ladder
In the 1980s, Luo Zhongli’s work Father was a profound and emotionally laden depiction of the typical image of Chinese peasants. Through it, Luo elevated a realistic portrait into a spiritual symbol filled with human compassion, an act for which he received unanimous affirmation and praise from the Chinese art community. He later served as president of the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, where he cultivated new artistic talent and thereby further cemented his lasting status in the Chinese art scene. For a long time, Luo has committed himself to a style of creativity that is deeply rooted in the countryside and in real-life experiences. He is adept at capturing seemingly bland scenes from rural life and depicting peasants subjected to a life of hardship in a way that is superbly realistic. “I enjoy this process because I can always gain a lot of material and creativity from this theme, ” He once remarked. “Creating works that focus on rural themes is worth devoting my life to.”
A Delicate and Deeply Touching Portrayal of Motherly Love
The Daba Mountains Series’ Peasant Woman on a Ladder was completed by Luo in the year 2000 before it was submitted to the government, as it was originally intended to serve as a diplomatic gift to be given to another country, which itself attests to the piece’s inherent representativeness. At the time of the work’s completion, the artist was just over 50 years old, and at the peak of his creativity, he started to shift from rural realism and adopted a more confident freehand style to imbue his creations with a deeper level of personal inner feeling. The artist here has again used a farmer as the painting’s theme in an attempt to dig closer toward the beating heart of Sichuan, the artist’s homeland and place with which he has the most intimate familiarity. In Peasant Woman on a Ladder, the artist uses an up-close perspective to depict a young rural woman carrying a bamboo basket on her back as she holds an oil lamp in her hand and looks after the baby she is carrying in front of her, all this while carefully preparing to ascend the ladder. Under the lamp’s dim illumination, the slightly cramped indoor space suddenly warms up. The viewer can clearly see the look of love and caring in the peasant woman’s eyes, forming a contrast with the baby she is carrying, a baby who seems to be sound asleep and whose face cannot be clearly seen. The artist uses rugged, simple strokes to form a stable, harmonious composition consisting of the peasant woman’s body and the solid wooden ladder, naturally revealing the eternal theme of motherly love, and leaving the viewer touched and uplifted.

Price estimate:
HKD: 1, 200, 000 - 1, 600, 000
USD: 153, 800 - 205, 100

Auction Result:
HKD: --