Zhejiang Art Museum is a provincial-level art palace located by the West Lake, quiet and magnificent, and the large sculptures of great men in the courtyard are particularly positive.
This is the oldest art museum in Zhejiang, with 14 exhibition halls of various specifications and more than 20,000 different art collections. The key collections and exhibitions of Zhejiang Art Museum reflect the development of art in Zhejiang Province.
Traditionally, museums and galleries are closed on Mondays. We deliberately booked our flight back to Pu'er on Tuesday afternoon, and I took a taxi early in the morning from the hotel, and followed Shu Jianxin to the Provincial Art Museum, which is located on the edge of the West Lake.
In order to fully display Zhao Zhiqian's artistic experience and artistic style, ZJAM has borrowed nearly 300 works and documents from 18 museums, art galleries and other institutions across the country, and integrated them into four units: calligraphy, painting, seal carving and literature.
The exhibition comprehensively presents the splendid artistic achievements and distinctive style characteristics of Zhao Zhiqian's life, which is the culmination of Zhao Zhiqian's representative works, and is also the most thematic and largest exhibition of Zhao Zhiqian in recent years.
We strolled through the exhibition hall and savored the understanding and pursuit of art and life by this old local artist a hundred years ago, and his artworks showed his bumpy life.
Zhao Zhiqian, an outstanding calligrapher, painter, seal carver, and scholar in the late Qing Dynasty, who had a full range of cultivation and pioneering achievements, had a difficult life, but created an incomparably magnificent art world. Immersed in the exhibition, every viewer felt the subtlety of seal carving and the breadth of painting, so as to understand Zhao Zhiqian's artistic life.
Historical records: He has been a "prodigy" in the eyes of his neighbors since he was a child, and it is said that he can write with a pen at the age of two. When he grew up, Zhao Zhiqian rose to the pinnacle of art step by step with his extraordinary talent for painting - he was one of the most important "all-round" artists in the history of late Qing art.
Colleagues in the museum told us: "There are not many surviving works of Zhao Zhiqian, and many of the works in this exhibition have stayed in the warehouse all year round and have never been shown in public. Among them, 7 pieces of national first-class cultural relics are displayed in a centralized manner, which is relatively rare. ”
In painting, he was a pioneer of the "Shanghai School" and created the "Golden Stone Painting Style"; His seal carving achievements are even greater, and modern painters such as Wu Changshuo and Qi Baishi have been influenced by him.
I think Zhao Zhiqian should not have had the opportunity to get close to dolphins, otherwise how could he paint dolphins like pigs' heads? Shu Jianxin said: "Maybe Mr. was influenced by the description of ancient books, and he also combined the knowledge fragments of his predecessors to draw the shape of a 'pig's head and fish body' on paper." ”
Judging from this picture, most of the marine species are accurate and vivid, and they should be sketched by Mr. himself. There are also some sea objects, which may be created based on the descriptions of local fishermen or ancient records, and there is a certain gap between them and the real thing, but in this regard, he has pioneered the artistic creation of Chinese paintings to sea creatures.
It is said that ups and downs produce writers, romantic and sad poets, but the ill-fated Zhao Zhiqian presents his life with art!
During this trip to Hangzhou, we undoubtedly enjoyed the beauty of ancient and modern Chinese and foreign art forms on the art gallery by the West Lake, making us feel as if we were in the ocean of art.
I would like to conclude this article with a wonderful quote from Mr. Huang Binhong in the article "Art is the Highest Health Regimen", and encourage my friends.
There are two meanings of immortality: one is the life of the individual, and the other is the life of the nation and the state. Art is the highest regimen. It is not only enough to support the Chinese nation, but also to be able to raise and complete the well-being of mankind.
Wandering in the long river of art and enjoying the beauty of art in the world should be our pursuit in the twilight of our years.
(Source: On the Ancient Tea Horse Road)
Artist Profile
Shu Jianxin, ancestral home in Qingzhou, Shandong. Former director of the Art Museum of China National Academy of Painting, director of the Chinese Painting Society, director of the China International Cultural Exchange Center, and national first-class artist; In 2010, he held "Danqing Yunnan Shen Yun Chuxiong - Shu Jianxin Chinese Painting Exhibition" at the National Art Museum of China; In 2015, he held the "Silk Road Danqing Tea Horse Ancient Rhyme - Shu Jianxin Chinese Painting Exhibition" at the National Art Museum of China.