Oil and spraypaint on canvas

100 x 120 cm. 39 3/8 x 47 1/4 in.

Signed in Chinese, pinyin and dated on the center

LITERATURE
2008, Liu Wei, Red Bridge Gallery, Shanghai, p.169 and 257
2012, Liu Wei: A Solo Painter, Lin & Lin Gallery, Taipei, p. 91
PROVENANCE
Important Private Collection, Asia

Post-dissolution Brilliance
A Witness of Liu Wei's Creative Journey

“I delight to come to my bearings——not walk in procession with pomp and parade, in a conspicuous place, but to walk even with the Builder of the universe, if I may——not to live in this restless, nervous, bustling, trivial Nineteenth Century, but stand or sit thoughtfully while it goes by.”
——Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Liu Wei and his peers were hailed by Li Xianting as the emerging generation in the 1990s. However, Liu differs from his peers in the depiction of common people with his detailed yet casual strokes, which produce a natural smudging effect and express his reflection on individual's state of life. His avant-garde style and the universal values he champions paved him the way to high-profile exhibitions, including China's New Art, Post-1989, Sao Paulo Art Biennial and Venice Biennale. He let loose a disruptive wave around the world with his artistic lingua franca that is both globally and locally relevant.

An Iconic Milestone

Portrait is the most important component of Liu's portfolio. He started with Revolutionary Family in the early 1990s, and later moved on to the Meat series and then Who am I in 2000. This journey witnessed his exploration of alternative styles and increasing level of sophistication. After a brief down-and-lost time, a figuratively poetic picture with conscious serenity emerged from his creation some years after 2000. The turning point is 2004 when he started embracing landscape in his portrait paintings. The spring auction presents portrait No.3, the most iconic work in the 6-piece series. It is not only a milestone of his artistic expression, but also a prelude to his subsequent attempts across a range of media with traditional elements.

The Beauty in Common Things

In Portrait No.3, Liu depicted a vaguely shaped man on the one-meter-wide canvas. It also features the spraying technique that is nowhere to be found in the other five paintings in the series. Liu sprayed the white outline of the subject and topped it with layers of paint and fine lines, creating a foggy and mysterious effect against the green background. The painting constitutes a bold experimentation with art media. The wishy-washy white paint displays a translucent and undulating texture, which makes the wobbly figure appear detached from worldly affairs. Despite the ambiguous background, the subject strikes the viewer strongly as an old man uninvolved from the secular society after years of hardship.

Living in a rapidly evolving world, Liu and his contemporaneous peers shun the conventional grand approach and adopt a micro perspective to show the viewer how vicissitudes of society affect the fate of certain individuals. Liu dedicated himself to the realist reproduction of common people in the series of Revolutionary Family, and the Meat series later is infused with more individuality. When it comes to Portrait No.3, he had become truly well-versed in characterization. Liu stepped away from the linear tradition of oil painting and let out his feelings in an abstract fashion. “The most lasting beauty is hidden in the most common things,” said Liu. He took out the subject's social identity and blurred his outline to make it a convincing miniature of common people.

The Everlasting Nature

The green background, which displays rich texture and follows Liu's signature style, is no lesser than the portrait subject. With green as the base color, the background also nurtures a dynamic interplay of pink, green and light grey. The duo together creates a peeled-off effect and injects a sense of fluidity into the painting, cranking up the vitality of nature to full swing. The dense spots, the melting effect and the subject are in incredible harmony. The melting body, in line with the energy conservation law, shows how matters are transformed and transferred from one form to another. We humans come and go, but nature is forever.

Such shift of color use marks a major leap in Liu's artistic career. His early works feature an expressionist color mélange, followed by the intense passion in the Meat series and later the gloom in Who am I. On the eve of him turning 40, he broke new ground in Portrait No.3 with his lively presentation of nature, which demonstrates his unique life wisdom. As an embodiment of the artist's mentality, the painting dives deep into the oriental philosophy and the purpose of self-entertainment in Chinese literati artworks. This shift is powered by Chinese traditions and constitutes a solid basis for his artistic creation and thought experiment. The old man is not just somebody hidden in the incongruous landscape, but more of a lookout who is an integral part of the everlasting nature.

Thoreau enlightened the lost minds in the 19th-century Europe with Walden, and Liu also shows a flash of post-dissolution brilliance. It is an awakening call with individual signature and more importantly a lively petite corner that stands out from the grand scenery.

Price estimate:
HKD: 2,500,000 – 3,500,000
USD: 322,600 – 451,600

Auction Result:
HKD: --