On September 10, 2021, Shanghai Liu Haisu Art Museum, the "Haipai Oil Painting Master Chen Junde - Art and Documentation Special Exhibition" was opened. On the wall of Hall No. 1, there are two works with very similar styles of brushwork, the large one is Chen Junde's "Fuxing Park Xueji" in 1977, and the small one is donated by Mr. Liu Haisu's family, without payment, for a long time, it has been lying quietly in the warehouse of the art museum.
(Xueji, Fuxing Park, 1977, oil on canvas)
Across the long river of time, Mr. Liu Haisu's daughter, the painter Ms. Liu Toad, recalls the snow in 1977, and everything is still as clear as yesterday. "More than sixty years ago, I met Brother Jun dehua, who followed my father and called me 'Little Chick'."
They are teachers and students with similar personalities
In the early 1960s, Liu Toad's family still lived in a small French-style bungalow on Chongqing South Road, Fuxing Middle Road, with a garage and kitchen in the basement, a dining room and living room on the first floor, a study and a master bedroom on the second floor, a bedroom on the third floor, and a mother's studio and a few children's bedrooms on the fourth floor. Father and mother would put newly painted works in the hallway, and the whole house was filled with a special smell of pine. Young painters often knocked on the door to visit their fathers, circulate precious foreign albums in the living room, or talk about art.
(Morning in Shanghai, 1978, oil on canvas)
Liu Toad, who was in his teens, had not yet begun to learn to paint, sometimes practicing the piano in the living room, sometimes sitting in the corner watching his father and students talk. There was also a young girl who came to learn painting from her father, that is, Chen Junde's sister Chen Lijun. I remember that there was a big plaster head of David in the living room, and one day, Chen Lijun was standing there drawing, and her father said approvingly to her mother that the painting was good and the brushstrokes were firm, not like girls. It was based on his sister's relationship that Chen Junde and Liu Haisu met.
At that time, Chen Junde had already been assigned to the Shanghai Garrison District Combat Force Literary troupe as a senior student in the stage art department of the Shanghai Theater Academy. In that era, everyone was wrapped up in the torrent of the times, and it was too late to control their own destiny. While playing the role of a screw in the "red and professional" post, Chen Junde did not let go of his longing and love for art, especially modernist art. Chen Junde's pure and warm feelings for art are like candles in the night, and they also warm Liu Haisu in the cold winter. He was happy to share his insights with this hairy young man, who sometimes read albums, made seals or read books, and often the old gentleman was painting, and the young man was watching from the side.
(Dream Poem, 1986, oil on canvas)
Xia Yiqiao loves flowers, and many students who have been to their hometown in the past will not forget the flowers blooming on the steps, in the living room, and in the corridors. The "black, blue and gray" outside the house and the colorful inside form a wonderful contrast, and every time you step into the gate of No. 512 Fuxing Middle Road, it is like walking into a mysterious garden of art, birds and flowers.
(Lemon flowers, 2007, oil on canvas)
Liu Toad still remembers his father's evaluation of Chen Junde at that time, "very character, has his own thoughts", personality, like a "hot water bottle", words are not speculative, muffled, when excited, dancing with their hands. Gradually, the parents regarded the young man as "their own family". In those years, there will be some girls who will be introduced to their mother, Shaycho, to learn to draw. Among them, there is a girl named Luo Zhaolian, who regularly comes every Sunday. Luo Zhaolian was born into a famous family, her grandfather Luo Jiaheng was a famous jurist in modern times, and her girlish temperament that was different from that of ordinary girls attracted Chen Junde, and the girl who was at the bottom of the valley of fate also noticed this big brother in military uniform who was quite valued by Liu Haisu and his wife.
While the flower of love was slowly blooming inside the house, outside the house, the storm was coming unstoppably. Overnight, Liu Haisu, who was in his old age, was thrown out of the bungalow and moved with his wife and daughter to a dimly lit hut on Ruijin Road. When others avoided it, the couple often quietly came to visit the teacher and the teacher," which gave my parents great comfort." In particular, the careful Zhaolian also went to the Huaihai thrift store to buy a seven-light table lamp for my father, so that he could paint at night. He always remembered this, and he would often mention it later. ”
Faith in art is a beacon
On Chen Junde's artistic path, Yan Wenliang, Min Xiwen, Lin Fengmian, Guan Liang and many other famous teachers were his leaders, but in his heart, Liu Haisu's status was unique and irreplaceable. Many years later, in a conversation with the writer Ding Xilin, Chen Junde said: "Liu Haisu is not my formal painting teacher, but he is better than any tutor he has ever had before. He was the spiritual pillar of my pursuit of painting in the Grey Years. He has always lived tenaciously, painted tenaciously, and her attitude and spirit are the strength that really shakes me and inspires me. ”
(Dreamland, 2011, oil on canvas)
At that time, because of the worship of Liu Haisu and familiarity with the techniques of Hai Lao, Chen Junde once painted a lot like Hai Lao, in order to break through, in that era of imprisonment to suffocation, Chen Junde had a satchel every day, a few simplest pigments, a kettle, riding a bicycle out to sketch, as if enchanted, immersed in the creation of nature, Cézanne and other modern masters, like a night ferryman who was not afraid to float in the "ocean of art", looking forward to the appearance of the other shore.
Every dark cloud is studded with gold, and those who have light in their hearts will surely wait until the sunrise.
(In 1977, Chen Junde accompanied Mr. Liu Haisu to sketch in Fuxing Park.) This picture shows Chen Junde painting intermittently, and the couple watch liu Haisu painting)
In the winter of 1977, Mr. and Mrs. Chen Junde went to see the teacher as usual. At that time, Chen Junde had been transferred from the factory back to teach at the Shanghai Theater Academy, and Liu Haisu's family had been allowed to move back to 512 Fuxing Middle Road. That day, Hai Lao was very interested and said that he was going to fuxing Park to sketch, so all the people went out together, carrying easels, supporting the old man, and laughing and laughing. "I remember that later my father painted a painting like this, and he also dropped a long section like a Chinese painting, mentioning that chen Junde and his wife, Xiao Yan and other people went to Fuxing Park to see the snow clouds that day." The next year, the same heavy snow, Hai Lao, accompanied by Chen Junde and Li Youbai, went to Fuxing Park to make "Snow Scene of Fuxing Park", with the inscription: "On January 9, 1978, the snow fell heavily, and I sketched at minus ten degrees to Fuxing Park, and my hands were stiff and fearless. ”
(Liu Haisu, "Snow Scene in Fuxing Park" by January 1978)
Guessing that it was that day after getting together, Chen Junde painted "Fuxing Park Xueji". Ultramarine and ochre outlines underline the silhouettes of plane trees, stone chairs and French gardens in Fuxing Park, with light blue, gray and white snow, and the sky and trees paving the impressionist loftiness and dreaminess. Two years later, this painting appeared in the "Twelve-Person Painting Exhibition" together with "Shanghai Morning" and "Street with Pushkin Bronze Statue" and "Street Garden" painted in the Shanghai Mansion studio used by Liu Haisu in 1978, which for the first time after the "Cultural Revolution" collectively showed the painting practice of Shanghai painters who did not trend, did not follow the trend, and did not yield, leaving a rather weighty mark on the history of Shanghai art.
(1992 Letter from Chen Junde to Liu Haisu provided by Liu Toad)
At the end of the 70s, Chen Junde went to Beijing on a business trip, and Liu Haisu wrote twice, introducing Chen Junde to consult Xu Bangda and Zhang Boju to help him broaden his horizons and appreciate the vision and character of a generation of masters. Therefore, when the "Eighty-Five-Year New Wave" arose in China, Chen Junde, who had been trekking in the field of modernist painting for many years, turned back to the works or writings of Bada Shanren, Shi Tao, Yangzhou Eight Monsters, Huang Binhong, Wang Guowei and others, and integrated the freehandness of Chinese painting into his modernist creation.
In 1980, a painting exhibition entitled "Liu Haisu, Guan Liang, Yan Wenliang and Chen Junde" was held at the Shanghai Exhibition Center. All three are important predecessors in the history of modern and contemporary Chinese painting, and the curator of the exhibition is the middle-aged Chen Junde, who is eager to take out the results of his twenty years of creation like an ascetic monk to test the society. Liu Haisu was not in Shanghai at the time, received Chen Junde's invitation, and immediately returned a letter, instructing Chen Junde to borrow paintings to participate in the exhibition, helping Chen Junde to complete this wish. In this rare teacher-student exhibition, people saw the inheritance, mutual integration, and rebirth of the two generations of Haipai oil painting in the artistic context.
(Self-portrait, 1963, cloth oil painting)
Chen Junde has the habit of keeping a diary, writing fluently, passionately, and thinking from time to time. One day, he wrote: "Life is full of sunshine and joy, but it is more difficult and dangerous. However, I am always full of passion, because the path I choose is from my heart. For the sake of the other side of the distance, I am prepared enough to enjoy loneliness and loneliness in the struggle... Man does exist by ideals. Although Chen Junde's artistic achievements have been widely recognized by the art circle and overseas markets since the 1990s, in the face of worldliness and money, he realized that he could not reconcile the persistence, truthfulness and purity of an artist, so he took the initiative to choose a "hermit" path, and thus gained the freedom of heart and pen. The brightness of the sun and the delicacy of natural life are presented in the collision of colors, just like the inscription of Liu Haisu at that time: "Junde sleeve bottom Wang Yang", just healthy and graceful, dignified and beautiful.
(Tsim Sha Tsui Church, Hong Kong, 1991, oil on canvas)
Standing in front of the painting "Hong Kong Tsim Sha Tsui Church", Liu Toad said, "In 1991, Chen Junde and Luo Zhaolian came to see me, and he was still sketching around, and Zhaolian and I stood on the side and chatted. Time passed too quickly, and he must still have his own artistic ambitions that had not been achieved, but alas, it was a pity. ”
(Don't Forget Me, 2019, oil on canvas)
Behind the painter's last oil painting" "Don't Forget Me" at the end of his life, Chen Junde wrote: "... Yes, I grasp life with sincerity, and burn life with art until the fire of life withers... "The Slovaks have gone, and the fire of the spirit will not be extinguished." (Wu Nanyao)