Throughout the history of the development of Chinese painting, the painter who took the lotus flower as the theme and won with brush and ink was the Bada Shanren, and the lotus flower was an important part of his artistic life. His ink and lotus art can be described as a unique ancient and modern, pure pen and ink to win, behind its pen and ink and concise form, leaving people with endless aesthetic space.
Lotus flowers painted by bada mountain people
Among contemporary painters, the one who is famous for painting Lotus is Zhang Daqian, who paints Lotus directly after the brushwork of the Bada Shanren and Shi Tao. Zhang Daqian is well versed in the momentum of the Eight Great Strokes, and often observes and sketches in the pond, taking the law naturally. The eight paintings mostly use wet pens, while Zhang Daqian also uses thirsty pens. The wet pen ink is lively, rich, deep, condensed and not lagging, and the thirsty pen is white, vigorous, smooth, and huazi but not dry. Zhang Daqian's skills and brushwork with freehand, using pastel, ink, splash ink, splash color and other methods, can paint a variety of lotus flowers.
Lotus flowers painted by Zhang Daqian
The works of the chinese painters of these two different dynasties have long entered the international art market and have been favored by Chinese and foreign art connoisseurs, whose works have been auctioned at staggeringly high prices at international auctions, and the commercial price of an artist in the international art market often represents the status and artistic value of the international academic community.
On March 25, 2015, the spring auction of Zhenguan International Auction Company in New York covered the masterpieces of calligraphy and painting in Chinese history for more than a thousand years, the most famous of which were "Three Sheep KaitaiTu" by Wei Yisheng of the Tang Dynasty; Shi Ke, Juran and Huang Quan of the Five Dynasties; Wen Tong, Song Huizong, Mi Fu, Su Dongpo, Huang Tingjian of the Northern Song Dynasty; Ma Yuan, Liu Songnian, Su Hanchen, Qian Xuan, etc. of the Southern Song Dynasty; Zhao Mengfu and Zhao Yong of the Yuan Dynasty; Lin Liang, Wen Zhengming, Tang Yin, Qiu Ying, Chen Hongshou, Emperor Xuande, Wang Duo, etc. of the Ming Dynasty In the Qing Dynasty, there were Eight Mountain People, Shi Tao, Wang Shimin, Wang Yi, Wang Yuanqi, Hongren, Jin Nong, Zheng Banqiao, Fu Shan, etc.; modern masterpieces such as Xu Beihong, Zhang Daqian, Qi Baishi, Fu Baoshi, Huang Binhong, Pan Tianshou, Li Keyan, Yu Youren, Wu Changshuo, and Ding Yanyong.
In this spring auction, 149,000 US dollars were sold for 149,000 US dollars for 10 albums of the eight landscapes; 233,000 US dollars for Zhang Daqian's "Deep Mountain Tibetan Ancient Temple"; 197,000 US dollars for Qi Baishi's "Grasshopper Leaves"; 200,000 US dollars for Xu Beihong's "Ten Juntu"; 3.525 million US dollars for Shi Lu's "Chunmei Independence"; and 81,250 US dollars for Li Keyan's "Shepherd Boy".
Nan Wuqiang Buddha's Chinese painting "Mohe"
However, at the international auction where ancient and modern masters gathered, a Chinese painting "Mohe" appeared in a shocking way, with a starting price of 10.5 million US dollars. Buyers from around the world competed, and after several rounds of bidding, a white American foiled competitors from Paris and Southeast Asia to win the collection of Ink Lotus for $16.5 million (pre-tax price). Auctioned this unprecedented price record.
The ink lotus, which won the crown of ancient and modern paintings, is a mirror heart ink paper, ten square feet in size, and at a unit price, it is $1.65 million per square foot.
In addition to being shocked, people can't help but ask who is the author of this work? It turns out that the author of this painting is the world's top artist Nan Wuqiang Buddha.
At this auction, collectors and connoisseurs unanimously agreed that his painting art inherited and developed the oriental literati painting tradition, and brought this ancient painting genre to the pinnacle of art.
"Ink Lotus" is a large freehand style, the ink color is full of flowing, the ink color from light to dark level has almost reached the extreme, and the spicy and loose brushwork has created an ethereal and lush living atmosphere. The lotus pond in the painting seems to have a gust of wind blowing, and the lotus leaves of the field suddenly dance with the wind, and the delicate lotus flowers and lotus puffs seem to dodge and mischievously hide in the lotus leaves. The withdrawal of simplicity and line strength, while lyrical, more cleverly strengthens the momentum and balance of the composition.
Nan Wuqiang Buddha uses a unique philosophical painting language to profoundly express the impermanent nature of the surface world. The picture is fresh and flexible, the water rhymes, and it exudes a strong poetry. He has a profound and comprehensive quality of ancient and modern Chinese and foreign painting art, and this "Ink Lotus" integrates abstraction and expressionism into figuration, which greatly broadens the breadth of expression of human painting art. (Some pictures from the Internet)
Text/Han Dong