Oil on board

23.5 x 32.6 cm. 9 1/4 x 12 7/8 in.

Signed in English and Chinese， dated on bottom left
PROVENANCE
Important Private Collection, Asia

The Brilliance of a Life that Never Fades
The blossoms of the art of Chen Chih-chi
If life were to be drawn out and long, I would prefer it to be brief but brilliant! I yearn for bursting vitality.
— Chen Chih-chi
The colorful Chen Chi-chi was a legendary artist in the history of art in Taiwan. Born in 1906 in Hsichih, with the help and encouragement of Japanese masters Kinichiro Ishikawa and Shiotsuki Toho, he began the study of painting and was admitted to the Tokyo Art School, at the time the highest institution of learning for students going to study in Japan. He was one of Ishikawa's best students and a key founder of the modern Taiwanese Seven Stars Painting Society and Red Island Painting Society. His works were chosen for the Taiwan Fine Arts Exhibition four years in a row and selected twice for the highly respected Imperial Art Exhibition. At the height of his fame, he was unmatched in art circles in Taiwan. Unfortunately, his untimely death left only 50-odd works which are accordingly very valuable, among them a series of landscape works （the two works shown in the Imperial Art Exhibition）. It is therefore all the more worth understanding the lesser known life of this gifted artist through the painting Home.
In his youth, Chen Chih-chi had an outstanding ability: to be a leader among his friends. Moreover, young people hoping to study painting regularly gathered at his home at Hengke. In 1927, before a colleague left for Japan, Kinichiro Ishikawa also came to Chen Chi-chi's home to offer guidance to young students. It was there that Chen Chih-chi and other artists of the same age shared fond memories of their time together. In August 1930, in order to go to the Imperial Art Exhibition, Japan, Chen Chih-chi arrived in Tokyo by ship. He was delighted that his work was chosen for the event, but he had to go to the hospital due to complications from pleuritis. Home thus must have been created while he was in a Tokyo hospital at the beginning of 1931, making this the last work of his life. Perhaps when his illness was critical, he thought of the old house in his native land and the group of avid colleagues dreaming of ways to promote art, leading him to pick up the paintbrush and create Home, a clear record of the experiences and feelings of a generation.
Chen Chih-chi's works, like the artist's own personality, are forceful and powerful. In Home, he paints a natural scene with rhythmic brushstrokes and harmonious composition. The forest paths seem to connect to quiet, secluded places that invite a sense of mystery. The contrast of light and shade directs the observer's gaze to the pavilion meant for rest. The tall straight tree trunk is like the artist in his prime, and it is in it that he reveals the deepest depths of his heart's passion and dreams without reservation on the canvas. Apart from the skilled use of light and shade over the whole painting, there are the heavy brushstrokes and perspectives Cézanne himself would have appreciated. Here, patches of brown and green intersect naturally. To compare this with Chen's works from when he had just begun his artistic career, for example Taiwan Landscape, this work more closely approaches the essence of abstract art. This is indirect confirmation that Chen Chi-chi was at the forefront of Taiwanese artists of that time.

Price estimate:
HKD: 600,000 - 800,000
USD: 76,400 - 101,900

Auction Result:
HKD : --