Oil on canvas

72.5 × 91.2 cm. 28 1/2 × 35 7/8 in.

Signed in Chinese and dated on bottom right
EXHIBITED
23 – 26 Oct 2020, Pang Jiun's Art Ink Rhythm, Art Taipei, Taipei

PROVENANCE
Ever Harvest Art Gallery, Taipei
Acquired directly by present private Asian collector from the above

This work is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity issued by Taipei Ever Harvest Art Gallery and signed by the artist

Find Harmony in Eastern and Western Color, Create Wonder with Paint and Brush
Freehand Oriental Aesthetics of Pang Jiun

Born in a family of artists, Pang Jiun graduated from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, and learned from Lin Fengmian, Xu Beihong, and other great predecessors. Not only did he inherit the poetic painting style of traditional oriental literati, he also forged the enthusiasm and expressive power of Impressionism and Fauvism into his art. With freehand brushwork and interactive usage of gray and colorful tones, he combines Chinese and Western styles, forming his unique freehand oriental aesthetics.

In recent years, he has held solo exhibitions in the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, Ueno No Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, and Exchange Square in Hong Kong Central, which have received widespread repercussions. His works are also collected by the National Art Museum of China, the National Museum of China, Changshu Art Museum, and Kaohsiung Municipal Art Museum, demonstrating his achievements over sixty years.

Bright Breeze and Bright Moon, Tipsily Paint the Lotus Pond

In the past, Monet and Renoir sketched the same pond, yet presented completely different brilliance. As Pang said, art lies in the individual's re-creation of the landscape in front of him, and the core of “learning from nature” is “feeling the natural”. Pond in Moon Night (Lot 87) fully demonstrates Pang's personal aesthetic sentiment.

Monet's water lily has always been regarded as a masterpiece of Western impressionism, which was taken by Pang as the theme and a tribute to Monet. Throughout Pang's lifelong creations, only six paintings have lotus pond as the component. Vivid and elegant colors and neat brushwork endow this work the natural wit. In this painting, the artist intends to present the powerful expressive power of his style, “casting shape with color”. Rich colors are layered on the canvas, merging dozens of blue, green, and purple tones. The overlapping and intersection create an environment filled with gurgling water and gentle breeze, filling the work with the agile and visual experience. Pang soaks the lotus pond in the moonlight yet hangs no moon above. On the contrary, he left a blank space in the center as a space for “breathing”. In the melody of light and shadow, the green and round lotus leaves float with the water, welcoming people to walk into the boundless night in the painting.

Travel and Paint, Sketch the Beautiful Nature on His Canvas

There is always a saying in traditional Chinese painting, “poems and paintings share the same origin.” Pang expresses his aesthetic thoughts with poems as the subjects as well. His painting River Village (Lot 88), named after Du Fu's poem River Village, is a vivid example of that.

The composition and artistic conception of this work are closely linked to the theme, using a beautiful and clean river as the visual guide. The composition allows the scenery unobstructed and shows the natural and poetic atmosphere in gray tones created by Pang from far to near. The tint grayish green in distance shapes the green hills; the whitish gray creates the winding river; and the verdant green paints the lush green grass nearby. Several fishing boats travel across the river, bringing the sight to the distant sky rim. Lush greenery surrounds the red-tile houses along the shores of the river. Pang's layered houses in this painting resemble the endless red-tile houses in the paintings of his father, Pang Xunqin, adding a touch of vitality. Pang conveys his mood in poems. The vastness of the world in his painting is just like the pleasant of life. With poetic paint, he creates the rich charm of the freehand landscape.

Zhouzhuang, the Ultimate Realm of Poetic Watertown

As the birthplace of Pang Jiun Jiangsu not only entrusts the artist's thoughts of returning home and renewing his utopia in Jiangnan, but also an artistic soil that nourishes his freehand rhyme, poetic paintings. Among the works on Jiangnan, the famous The Double Bridge of Zhouzhuang represents the eternal beauty of the ancient town in Jiangnan and becomes an excellent example of the expressive Oriental oil painting by Pang.

Painting on New Year's Day, a Precious Representative Work of Zhouzhuang

The Double Bridge of Zhouzhuang presented this time was completed on January 1, 2008. Pang painted it at the beginning of the year, with an impressive size (180×226 cm) symbolizing his ambition and powerful spatial control ability. It stands as Pang's first creation on this theme, and only two works of the same subject have come out since then, in 2014 and 2017, indicating the rareness. On the day of the creation, Pang Jiun confidently and publicly painted in the studio, with many students and friends witnessing his completion of the masterpiece from sketch in one day. The work was selected into the important solo exhibition Pang Jiun Oil Painting Exhibition held by the National Museum of History in Taipei in 2008, becoming the largest work on watertown in the exhibition. It has been included in the artist's albums several times and could be regarded as the supreme representative work of Eastern aesthetics on the Jiangnan theme.

The Tension of the Color Shape, the Clouds Moving in the Sky

In this work, Pang organically combines the control technique originated in Chinese ink painting and brushstrokes and the texture of oil painting. In technique and color, he exerts the charm of impressionism and the freehand style. The light brushstroke in the painting brings out a gurgling visual experience of the reflections and the waves. The blue, gray, white, and black intersect, presenting an incomparably agile charm. The piles of bridge stones and railings are constructed by the interweaving of long and short brushes, presenting rich layers of line and surface. Pang adds gray tones of light blue, beige, and olive green, which fills the poetic sense into the ancient and mottled stone bridges, revealing the incomparable and moving tension of color,

The Rhythmic Beauty of Geometry, the Reflection Connecting the Bridges and Sky

Relying on the special scenery formed by the Jiangnan house and the Double Bridge, the composition of the work is full of geometric rhythmic beauty. The Zhouzhuang Double Bridge in the painting is the collective name of the Shide bridge and Yong'an bridge, one as a stone arch bridge and the other a stone beam bridge. With one curved and one straight, one horizontal and the other inclined, the painting creates a high rhythm within. With the bridge holes echo in the form of square and round, the two bridges in reflection seem to be connected into an old key, opening the door of multi-dimensional visual imagination. Pang cleverly divides the real scene and the water reflection in the painting in a half-and-half ratio, turning the Double Bridge a connection point between the upper reality and lower imagination, spilling the poetic image “In the reflection of the long bridge, we see the ‘connection' of water and clouds.” The bridge holes have become hubs connecting another imaginary space. In the interlacing of the front and rear scenes, the viewer is brought into the world in the painting, which is feasible, prospective, travelable, and habitable.

Price estimate:
HKD: 350,000 - 500,000
USD: 45,000 - 64,200

Auction Result:
HKD: 576,000