PREFACE
Article: Chen Rui
Painting and photography are a pair of "twin" concepts in art history.
In the process of mutual development, the two have confronted and merged. At the beginning of the birth of photography, someone directly announced the "death of painting", which also became one of the incentives for painting to turn to modernism; of course, some critics did not agree. Recognizing the artistry of photography, I just think that photography is a "memory tool" for painting. With the passage of time, painting and photography have also continued to merge, and even become the fulcrum of mutual creation. Some clues can be seen from the names of photography genres such as "painting-like photography", "collection photography", "painting photography" and "combination of shadow and painting". As well as genres and painters such as Gerhard Richter and David Hockney had a major influence. This is just a technical and visual discussion, not to mention the same frequency resonance at the spiritual core level.
Based on such a perspective and context, this exhibition brings together nine artists including Dong Wensheng, Li Lang, Li Shun, Lin Shu, Mu Ge, Bird Head, Sun Xiaozhou, Sun Yanchu, Wei Bi, Xue Ruozhe, and Zhang Xiao. And practice enriches the connotation based on painting and photography. Dong Wensheng hand-colored the black and white silver salt works to extend the core of the video image infinitely; in Li Lang's "Father" series, he wrote the date of every day of his father's life on the relevant photographic works, which is complex and sincere. Emotions are overflowing on paper; Li Shun formed a mirror image of each other through the appropriation and transformation of painting, negative film and other elements; Lin Shu used his personal painting language to paint classic photographic works on paper, completing the transcendent image Muge's new works show an intention between virtual and real through the combination and arrangement of "objects and shadows" mostly from perspectives, forming a dialogue with the abstract paintings of Mono-ha; The painting and photography works also showed the prints created by photography technology, forming a unique echo between the two groups of works; Sun Xiaozhou was not satisfied with simple video records, and used lacquer painting materials and classic frames to integrate the "picture" into photography; Sun Yanchu As a "photographer", he paints through the particularity of the developer and negative film, showing a distinctive appearance, which is impressive; Wei Bi's "Mengxi" series incorporates the mottled texture similar to ink into photography, and in the The inscriptions and postscripts in small script in the blank space of the picture are like a picture scroll of memory; Xue Ruozhe, as a contemporary painter of neo-realism, has been exploring the potential relationship and internal logic with the picture through photography; Zhang Xiao transfers the photographic image with its own symbolization to the prints of ancient books On top of that, a new image carrier full of imaginative space has been formed.
In the context of contemporary art, the boundaries between photography and painting are becoming increasingly blurred, but their interaction is becoming clearer. Starting from the concept, breaking down the barriers between photography painting and painting photography, there are still many things we can look forward to and imagine.