Oil on canvas

39 × 50 cm. 15 3/8 × 19 5/8 in.

Signed in Chinese on bottom right
PROVENANCE
6 Jul 2003, Christie's Hong Kong Spring Auction, Lot 140
4 Oct 2010, Sotheby's Hong Kong Autumn Auction, Lot 240
Acquired directly by the present important private Asian collector from the above

In Charge of the Scenery in Paradise
The Monument of National Oil Painting——Landscape by Guan Liang

As the first practitioner that introduced Western Impressionism and Modernism into China, Guan Liang enjoyed the reputation of Four Masters of Chinese Early Oil Paintings together with Lin Fengmian, Xu Beihong and Liu Haisu. Not only did Guan obtain a high skill in oil painting and Chinese watercolour, but also lectured in many important art colleges all over China. Guan himself undoubtfully deserves the status of being the monument figure of the history of the development of Chinese modern oil painting and the reform of traditional watercolour painting.

Cultivate Diligently: The Gold Age of Reaching the Trophy of Chinese Modern Art
The year 1917 witnessed the 17-year-Old Guan going to Kyoto to learn Western fine art. After coming back to China in 1922, Guan got into frequent contact with watercolour masters such as Huang Binhong, Wu Changshuo and Pan Tinashou, which granted him a profound understanding of fine art and calligraphy. While actively promoting Western art, Guan also rooted in national traditional culture and combined the spirit of classic Chinese watercolour and Western painting skills and visual effects. He adopted the “simplicity of styles” well in his art and focused on the expression of personal feedback, using the combination of pure colours to compose “Impressionist Oil Paintings of Chinese own”, establishing the new trend of “Oil Painting Nationalization”.

The mid-autumn of 1942 witnesses Guan's travels along the mountain areas in North-West China. Within the long journey of more than two years, he made watercolour sketches that depicted many famous scenery views along his footprints. After coming back to Chongqing, Guan re-created the most satisfying works of the sketches into oil paintings. The artwork that is presented here was one the masterpieces that were born in this journey. It is the best representative of the career climax of Guan's.

The Spirit in Simplicity, the Source of life in Silence
Sh'an Xi is famous for “The Eight Scenery View in Hanzhong” within the provincial territory. According to historical texts, farmers living around the Han Mountain used to get in teams to climb up on hills to chop wood, as well as singing local music while they work. The form of the music was in conversations, called Mountain Singing Dialogs. Responding with the sky and the earth, the singing dialogs of the mountain is listed as one of the Eight Sceneries, called The Pastoral of Mountain Han. This painting of Guan's, Landscape depicts a similar context. In his painting, Guan uses the classic composition of oil painting, the S shape composition. From right to left, the shade of the mountains of the foreground, middle-ground and background are linked together, visually intermingled in a picturesque disorder. In terms of creating the soil, branches, leaves, houses and hills, the artist choses on purpose to use flat coating together with pallet knife colouring, demonstrating the thickness and heavy weight. The tree trunks on the right and the rocks on the bottom are both done within one single stoke. The artist used free-handed dark brown strokes to outline the geography of the mountains and gave it a grand and splendid view. The middle-ground is filled with green grass that is full of power of life that grow towards the sun shine, as well as farmers with their children, carrying water, holding scythes, heading uphill for a harvest. The figures are small and simple, yet full of energy and strength. Their being, as a correspondence to the bright green tree tops in the centre of the painting, deliver a sense of power that is rising and shining as well as gentle and caring.

The Review of True Insight, the National Characteristics of Compatibility
Guan's interpretation of the Chinese characteristic of “freehand” and his perfect skill of mastering the outlines, as well as his combination of personal features, allow his art a sincere atmosphere throughout the shape and spirit of this painting. In the space of art, nothing is added redundantly, nothing deprived, remaining an everlasting balance. It is just like the pragmatic characteristics of Chinese people who stick with agriculture without giving up. Landscape delivers this faith. Guan uses simplified outlines to depict the geography of mountains in Hanzhong, resembling the style of The Four Masters in Yuan Dynasty, which is quite the opposite of what Western school is used as straight lines. The vivid strokes and lines with various shades help the artist express the rustic and natural view. With details being focused, the hills in the background, as well as the trunks and rocks in the foreground, all look almost like a huge block of pure colour. On the contrary, this design is the deliberation of the artist. Rather than detailing the particles in his work, Guan chose to grasp the spirit of specific context. While less is more, rusticity is sincerity. Hence explains the childlike fun his art is filled with.

Landscape has three green trees in the middle ground that extent their tree tops toward different directions with various shapes. The artist gave each of them changing shades of green with a deeper one, a bright one and yellow one respectively, depicting how these trees are blown by the wind. Not only did he add an active tone to the picture, but also highlighted the energy that every live being is growing during the season of spring ploughing. The artist chose to give a darker tone to the rocks and trees in the foreground and lower the lightness of colour and depicts the mountains in the background with wash drawing, in order to drag the focus to the few strokes with heavy colours. Similar to using washed ink to allow space in traditional Chinese watercolour, to save the strokes wisely means to enable the flow of complexity beyond words. Guan master the perfection of keeping in order the relationship between landscapes, figures and colour blocks. All the elements in his painting are of well-arranged harmony with the combination of concreteness and imagination.

Throughout his life, Master Guan Liang cultivated himself into a higher moral pursuit with little interest in secular desires. As well as paintings theming operas that deliver various emotions of people, what he has left to the world most are works of art with landscape scenery that looks daily, simple, yet aloof and leisurely. Presumably, only what poet Zhu Dunru wrote, “I am in charge of the scenery in paradise” can resemble the ultimate spirit of freedom in Guan's art.

Price estimate:
HKD: 1,500,000 – 2,500,000
USD: 193,400 – 322,400

Auction Result:
HKD: 1,770,000