"Lu Xun's Former Residence", "Ba Jin's Former Residence", "Qu Qiubai's Former Residence", "Tao Xingzhi's Former Residence", "Feng Zikai's Former Residence"... In the Cultural and Creative Store of the Shanghai Library, dozens of paintings of the former residences of Shanghai celebrities rendered in ink are spread out one by one in front of the eyes. On January 15th, the exhibition "Sea Tides - Lu Zhiwen Shanghai Celebrity Former Residence Collection" opened here.
Using the language of painting to record the era of Shanghai's past "making waves"
At the entrance of the exhibition, a special "Shanghai Cultural Map" is displayed. On this map, a schematic map of the location of the 40 former residences and famous roads in Shanghai is marked on display. With the works on the spot, it is as if the moment "crosses" to these shanghai historical and humanistic former residences.
Lu Zhiwen is creating
Lu Zhiwen is a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts of Shanghai University and a well-known painter. In the early 1990s, a chance came to him to embark on the path of creating a series of celebrities' former residences. "At the time, one of my students came to see me with an atlas of the former homes of German celebrities. Although there were only a few of them, they inspired me. I suddenly thought, why doesn't anyone paint the former residences of celebrities in Shanghai? Lu Zhiwen told reporters.
Tao Xingzhi's former residence
The confrontation and integration of Chinese and Western cultures have created the cultural character of Shanghai's "Hai Na Bai Chuan". A large number of pioneers in the fields of literature, art, publishing, and education, such as Ba Jin, Ye Shengtao, Lu Xun, Qu Qiubai, Feng Zikai, Wu Changshuo, Lin Fengmian, Liu Haisu, Shen Yinmo, Yan Wenliang, Zou Taofen, Zhang Yuanji, Huang Yanpei, Chen Wangdao, and Cai Yuanpei, gathered in Shanghai and became famous in this hot land.
As a native of Shanghai, Lu Zhiwen decided to use a painting language higher than life to record and interpret the time and space trajectory and the traces of time and space on the hot land of Shanghai.
Carry a unit certificate with you just to take a look at the celebrity's former home
Former residence of Zhang Leping
Painting the former homes of celebrities sounds simple, but it is not. "I don't want to do the kind of thing that takes a picture of my former home and draws it into a picture. Painting a former home is not simply painting a house. The former residence must have someone's story, with a unique atmosphere. Lu Zhiwen said that he used a very "stupid" method, "observing the field again and again, observing from different angles in each season of spring, summer, autumn and winter, until the pen is really written." ”
In the early 1990s, information and materials were far less developed than they are now, and a large number of celebrity houses had not yet been opened. In addition to often going to the library and archives to look for materials, Lu Zhiwen clearly remembers that he looked in through the crack in the door of Ba Jin's former residence, sketched in front of Lu Xun's former residence in the snowy sky, and climbed the tower just to overlook Zhou Xinfang's villa. Later, I met Li Xiaolin, the daughter of Ba Lao, and had the opportunity to enter the house to see. Later, the Barkin House was opened, and I went to see it again and again before I officially began to paint "The Barkin House". ”
Curling House
This painter who came out of Shikumen has a special love for the former residences of shanghai celebrities. "After years of preliminary preparations were implemented, it was officially launched as a project, with the district as the scope, drawing a road map, and visiting each district and house by district." The first choice was Hongkou District, and the first celebrity former residence to be visited was the former residence of martyr Li Bai (No. 15, Lane 107, Huangdu Road). ”
Regardless of the wind and rain, Lu Zhiwen and his wife often brought their own unit certificates and self-drawn maps, tea, dry food, and painting tools, and visited, inquired, and sketched district by district. "In today's Shanghai, many celebrity former residences and road parks have become Internet celebrity punch cards. But who would have thought that it would be so difficult to enter a former residence. I carried the unit certificate with me so that others could let me in and have a look. ”
Former residence of Qu Qiubai
After several years of searching, in 1998, Lu Zhiwen officially began to write a series of works on the former residences of Shanghai celebrities. To this day, Lu Zhiwen has never stopped the long artistic creation activity of "searching for a painting, writing a book and an exhibition", and he has also changed from a middle-aged university teacher to a white-haired ancient painter. But he never regretted the hardships and efforts that ordinary people could not understand. Lu Zhiwen said: "The second half of my life was spent on a journey to find the former homes of celebrities, but I have no complaints or regrets. If conditions permit, I will continue to work on. Do only this one thing for the rest of your life. ”
The times need more "tide makers"
Cheng Shifa's former residence
So far, Lu Zhiwen has created more than 300 paintings of the former residences of literati. Over the years, he has also carried these "Former Residences of Shanghai Literati" series of paintings to exhibit at home and abroad, and often met collectors who wanted to buy some of the paintings for prices. Lu Zhiwen declined one by one. "Each of these former home paintings is only one piece. The painting spans a long time, if someone else buys you and asks me to paint another one, even if the picture is the same, the breath is different. So I don't sell, I'd rather be called stupid. ”
This exhibition is the 28th solo exhibition in the series, following exhibitions in Shanghai Xintiandi No. 1, Jing'an Zhang Hall, Plaza 66, Shanghai University, Shanghai New Archives, Song Qingling Memorial Hall, Xuhui Art Museum, etc., as well as in many places in Europe. Among the works on display, there are selected masterpieces of celebrity former residences selected from hundreds of works he has created over the years, as well as ink portraits of celebrities of maritime culture, and new works that explore the traces of celebrities of maritime culture.
Former residence of Wu Changshuo
Lu Zhiwen's works take traditional Chinese painting as the carrier, boldly draw on the techniques of Western Impressionism and Expressionism, and skillfully use the means of expression of different paintings such as Chinese painting, oil painting, watercolor, and gouache, and turn the abstract meaning full of brush-to-ink rhyme into a painting language of "new color ink". At the same time, he has also absorbed rich and diverse artistic concepts in Shanghai's international cultural context, and found an effective docking channel with international culture and art for Shanghai culture and even Jiangnan culture. Art critic Chen Xiejun commented that Lu Zhiwen's works use the language of painting to interpret the historical elements and humanistic values of celebrities' former residences, and condense the painter's artistic examination and cultural interpretation of celebrity former residences.
The six glass display cases on display also displayed a large number of precious materials, photos, manuscripts, seals and celebrity inscriptions that Lu Zhiwen has searched for and collected in the past three decades.
Feng Zikai's former residence
Lu Zhiwen, who regards art as his life, requires that every exhibition be always open and new. For the theme of this exhibition, "Tide on the Sea", he said: "The times need more 'tides', and more artists are needed to express the 'tides' who are struggling for the progress of the times." ”
"Next, my plan is the World Celebrity House Series." Lu Zhiwen said.