This Spring Festival, because of the epidemic, Shanghai sculptor Zhang Yongqian, like many people, has almost been "staying at home". But unlike most people, during the Spring Festival of the Year of the Tiger, he fiddled with his "mud" works at home, especially the newly baked pair of purple sand "tigers".
From 42 years of art, Zhang Yongqian has studied wood carving for many years, and has also been to the Shanghai Academy of Fine Arts for further study, and has visited 8 famous teachers, integrating sculpture, ceramic sculpture and wood carving national folk art, and has also become one of the few purple sand ceramic sculpture artists in the industry. He is a national first-class technician, senior arts and crafts artist, Shanghai craftsman, chief technician of Shanghai, and the inheritor of the intangible cultural heritage project in Minhang District, Shanghai.
Zhang Yongqian
"It is the artist's responsibility to paint a portrait of the times, to establish a biography for the times, and to create a moral for the times." Zhang Yongqian said. He actively pays attention to society, discovers creative themes from the great changes of the times, captures innovative inspirations, and creates works such as "Night and Day" and "Daddy, We Are All Good" that show the unity of the people of the whole country and the fight against the epidemic. In addition, he created red themes such as "Don't Forget the Initial Heart, Bravely Climb the Peak", "Loyalty and Filial Piety", and secular life themes such as "Responsibility", "Big Day", "Guotai Min'an", "Chicken Feathers for Sugar", "Paradise" and so on.
"Working Together - Not Disappointing the Mission" Purple Sand
Zhang Yongqian's female character themes, mythological character themes, ancient character themes and other purple sand sculpture themes are various, representative works include "Spring Light Unlimited", "Kwa Father Day by Day", "Heavenly Spirit", "Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea", "Wang Xizhi", "Guardian God", "True and False Li Kui" and so on. Whether it is a woman and a child, a literati warrior, or a legendary immortal figure, Zhang Yongqian's various characters are full of images, accurate in shape, and stretched in limbs, which is in line with the character characteristics and spiritual outlook of the characters themselves.
"Quao-Father Chasing the Sun" Purple Sand
Zhang Yongqian initially studied the art of wood carving, laying down the subtractive modeling law based on "carving"; later entered the field of purple sand art, accumulating the addition modeling law based on "plastic". This different modeling method of addition and subtraction is deeply combined in his creation to form a composite modeling law. As he himself said: "In fact, wood carving and purple sand sculpture are the same in terms of artistic modeling, but the techniques are different." ”
Compared with wood carving, purple sand sculpture has a more complex and special molding process, such as the molding process such as conception, small draft, clay draft, mold printing, inlay, drying and other molding processes, but also through the high temperature firing process, to take into account the proportion of drying and shrinkage in firing, to prevent warp distortion and crack spots and other unexpected situations. For Zhang Yongqian, after many famous teachers and his own years of hard work, he has a clear understanding of the clay, plasticity and firing changes of purple sand at different temperatures. Relying on the solid modeling foundation and space creation techniques laid by wood carving, and actively expanding the color, texture and plastic effect of purple sand, he "crossed over" purple sand from wood carving, which can be described as a smooth and easy to master.
"Li Qingzhao" purple sand
In his decades of creative career, he has continuously expanded the artistic language of purple sand ceramic sculpture, summing up twelve words: "looking for contradictions, using contradictions, and reconciling contradictions." In 2015, Zhang Yongqian created the work "Four Beauties" with a new vision, creatively subverting the traditional concept of arts and crafts. The work adopts the combination of lines and surfaces, leaving the facial features on the beautiful woman's face blank, giving unlimited imagination. "My concept is that no artificial carving can surpass the beauty of the world, so I leave the 'beauty' to the audience and let the viewer imagine the beauty in their own minds." In addition, he originally divided the costumes on the beautiful women into multiple pictures with the principle of modern composition, and one person wore different styles of clothing, becoming a changeable costume, expressing the beauty's love of beauty. The high integration of concepts and forms has been imitated by practitioners, and has been highly praised by the judges and won the gold medal of the "Hundred Flowers Award".
Creatively exerting the traditional spirit of writing "intention" and creating suspense to "leave blank" is a major feature of Zhang Yongqian's works. The work "Silence" uses the contrast between "movement and stillness". The old man on the left seems to be sleeping and sitting quietly on the side of the sofa, deliberately leaving a large blank space on the right, so that the audience has enough imagination space and creates more illusory space than the actual space. A moving mouse, arranged on the far right. Although the volume is small, it is full of movement, maintaining a visual balance with the dull and static old man, and also presents the artistic conception of "silence is better than sound at this time".
Zhang Yongqian is creating "Yin Hu Add Wings"
In the Year of the Yin Tiger, Zhang Yongqian's latest sculpture is a group of "Yin Tiger Wings" purple sand tigers. In addition to the pair of tigers appearing on the "Yin Hu Tian Wing" purple sand pot button displayed by Duo Yunxuan, the original sculpture will also be exhibited this year. For the sake of the tigers, Zhang Yongqian spent 4 months deliberating repeatedly, creating nearly 100 drafts before and after. After countless overthrows and restarts, the "golden wing pot" embraced by the tiger and leopard and the "love wing pot" where the two tigers snuggled were finally completed.
"Yin Hu Add Wings" Purple Sand Pot
"I have the title of 'Shanghai Craftsman' and cannot be ashamed of this title." Zhang Yongqian told reporters.