Written by | Monica
At present, Cheng Shifa Art Museum is exhibiting "Dedicated to Life - Exhibition of Cheng Shifa's Works from the Collection of Shanghai Chinese Painting Academy", which has aroused my attention.
As an outstanding representative of Shanghai school art, Mr. Cheng Shifa is a figure worth studying in the process of the transformation of traditional literati landscape painting into new Chinese painting. His lifelong study and creative experience has almost gone through the entire process of china's modern and contemporary artistic transformation.
In his youth, he was deeply influenced by the famous calligrapher and painter Chen Laolian (Chen Hongshou) of the Ming Dynasty, and studied literati painting, which was influenced by the tastes of traditional literati, and the aesthetics of painting had the "spirit of a scholar" with aristocratic temperament.
Ming Chen Hongshou's "Landscape And Water Figure Album", collection of the Freer Museum of Art, USA
In middle age, the environment of the times changed, and the painter began to innovate himself.
In order to actively respond to the new cultural construction of New China, since 1949, Cheng Shifa has gone deep into farm life, studied many folk arts with local flavor such as Nian painting and illustration, and transformed traditional Chinese paintings.
From the end of 1950 to the beginning of the 1960s, Cheng Shifa's innovative achievements were remarkable, and he created a large number of very wonderful works of themed figures such as "Singing the Spring of the Motherland" (1957), "Folk Songs" (1958), "A Scene on the Street" (1958), "People Dressed up for Life" (1958), "Around Chairman Mao" and so on. Some of the works have also won international and national awards. The aesthetic taste of his paintings began to move towards popularization and popularization, but it perfectly maintained a certain degree of artistry, and even absorbed a certain amount of Western oil painting techniques.
"Singing the Spring of the Motherland" in this exhibition is a representative work of Cheng Shifa's theme painting creation, and it is also his famous work, which won the first prize of the first national youth art exhibition in 1957. It perfectly explains the principle that "literature and art should serve the workers, peasants, and soldiers."
Exhibit wall content
During the visit, the works "Enamel Washbasin Painting" and "People Dressing Up for Life" particularly aroused my interest. Enamel washbasins are essential daily necessities for many post-80s children. This work is a record of Cheng Shifa in the 1950s and many well-known painting masters of the Shanghai Chinese Painting Academy, including Lai Shaoqi, Tang Yun, Cheng Shifa, Zhou Lianxia, etc., who participated in the design and creation of daily necessities, including very grounded objects such as enamel washbasins. The basin is printed with Xu Beihong's horse, Qi Baishi's shrimp, or many beautiful floral designs are many from these masters. It is reminiscent of some of today's "expensive" art derivatives.
"People Dressed up for Life" Cheng Shifa, 1958, 75.5×46cm
The work records the scene in 1958 when the Shanghai Academy of Chinese Painting organized painters to go to Shanghai Jiuxin Enamel Factory to go deep into life and create.
Mao Zedong once said at the Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art, "Art serves the people, first of all, it serves the workers, peasants, and soldiers." This is determined by the socialist nature of the state and is also a reaction to the spiritual aesthetic needs of the members of the main body of the state. The design and production of these "art derivatives" not only beautified the life at that time but also popularized art on a large scale.
Printed enamel pots, enamel pots, and porcelain plates with the words "Pangang Panorama"
The object was photographed at the Shanghai Art Emiss Art Museum
In the thirty years after the founding of New China, the general direction of artistic creation was to show the new national atmosphere, and art creators also had units hanging on to their posts. In terms of publicity, it is more from the national level of promotion. The art market in the modern sense did not begin to appear until the 1990s. But it is precisely thanks to the artistic production and creation mode of that era that comic strips, New Year paintings, prints and transformed Chinese paintings have entered thousands of households, decorated the daily lives of ordinary people, and are confident and comfortable in aesthetic expression, at least affecting the artistic concepts of the second generation.
Works from the opening exhibition of the ART BADAI Art Museum "Struggle - Echoes of the New Chinese Years"
The art of the early stage of socialist construction existed as a combination of revolutionary idealism, realism and romanticism. Originally, labor construction scenes such as factories, chimneys, and trucks began to appear in traditional humanistic landscape paintings, and the original leisurely and leisurely figures of scholars and doctors were replaced by the images of working people such as workers, peasants, and soldiers. However, the work is full of rich spiritual emotions and has a beautiful yearning for a new society under construction.
Although the overall picture may still have some humanistic atmosphere, in general, the picture can be understood and appreciated. Especially in the 1950s and 1970s, the figures of workers, peasants, and soldiers almost became an indispensable symbol of the picture. Character movements, expressions, costumes and even props have formed a symbolic language with a very clear meaning, the form of expression is relatively stable, and the artistic language is also full of epochality. For example, when shaping the image of the new Chinese workers, the broad mind, strong arms, iconic overalls and indomitable posture have become the language symbols that express selfless dedication and dare to take responsibility.
The paintings of that era also had a distinct style, red light, tall and complete. More on display are heroes and positive characters. Now many old people are still very familiar with this art form, in the social environment at that time, the works conveyed positive energy, with vitality of positive energy, the character image is also mostly a healthy and strong laborer image, they are on the road to building a new society, vigorous, full of energy, full of hope for life.
Selection of worksThe opening exhibition of the BADAI Art Museum "Struggle - Echoes of the New Chinese Years"
Some views believe that the art works of that era were too typical and stereotypical and lacked pluralism, but pulling back to the background of the social era at that time, the entire domestic social economy was still in poverty, the international environment was also particularly tense, the United States and the Soviet Union blockaded China in the 50s and 60s respectively, in addition, there were many agents lurking in the country who planned to counterattack the mainland, and political life was still an important part of the early days of the founding of New China.
Recently, in the May Fourth Farm where Shanghai Zhiqing was once decentralized, I saw an exhibition introducing the knowledgeable youth who went to the mountains and the countryside in those years, which introduced that the daily life of the young people at that time was mainly composed of four major parts, such as studying agriculture, studying workers, studying the army, and militia training.
Since it is necessary to continue the struggle, this will inevitably involve the need to make the image of the object of struggle clear and typical, just imagine if it is ambiguous or ambiguous, how can we fight? But one thing, the works of art from this period are very easy to understand, easy to promote, and at the same time beautify daily life. The analysis of any work of art needs to be understood in the specific social environment and historical era, which can help to better grasp the evolution of the creative direction.
After the reform and opening up, this creative direction began to gradually change. In the 1990s, the evaluation and publicity of artworks came more from the market, focusing on the numbers on the auction floor and various exhibitions such as galleries and art fairs. As a result of the operation of marketization, the work has gradually shifted from form to content. For the logic of capital is to buy only the scarcest, the most representative, the most special, and even with a certain irony. As a result, art is getting farther and farther away from the lives of ordinary people, and now there are many contemporary art exhibitions, but the appreciation experience is difficult to say, and the most common feedback is that it is not understood or the artist is too difficult to understand. This aesthetic confusion makes ordinary people form a cognitive circle, feeling that art seems to be on top, or it is inexplicable. Art began to degenerate into a small number of people's high-end social currency and financial investment objects, and aesthetic tastes naturally shifted. The figures that used to appear in the paintings also began to fade away, or exist in other images.
The footprints of an era must be reflected in paintings. Looking back at Cheng Shifa's work "People Dressed up for Life" created in 1958, its ideological and artistic nature is still touching and feels natural and intimate. Although the characters in the paintings live in an era when there are very few materials, the spiritual emotions reflected are so rich. Half a century has passed, society has undergone many changes, but I hope that the emotions retained in these works in the exhibition can touch you who are often entangled in the pressure of life, and I hope that your passion for life can be sublimated in these works.
Exhibition Title: Struggle - Echoes of the New China Years
Exhibition time: September 12, 2021 - March 31, 2022, 10:00-18:00 (closed on Mondays)
Venue: Shanghai Art PATH Art Museum
Exhibition Address: Shanghai Songjiang District Wangjiapu Road 885 Lane Yunbao Future City Art and Creative Park