Yu Shouqi: An artistic life that started with carbon ash as ink
Hunan Daily New Hunan client reporter Li Zhi
During the first month of the Year of the Tiger in the lunar calendar, Yu Shouqi, a librarian at the Provincial Research Museum of Literature and History, received a plaque issued by the China Federation of Literature and Literature and other units. Under the solemn national emblem, several large red characters of the artistic heritage figures are particularly eye-catching.
A poor peasant boy in a mountain village, his father died at the age of 5, but with talent, love, stubborn head, full of kindness and sincerity to the world, in the vast world, created his own wonderful stage.
"I have dreamed that a person who has not studied art will actually get so many honors!" Yu Shouqi told reporters with emotion, "I paint, it is just a hobby, and I have never dared to become a family or a famous hall." In the 1970s, after graduating from high school in the township, I learned to drive a pump in the production team. At that time, I was in charge of a three-horsepower diesel engine in the team, and as soon as the machine started, a black smoke blew out of the exhaust pipe, and when I was maintaining the diesel engine, I took off the exhaust pipe and found a good treasure, black and shiny carbon ash. Gently sweep it down, put it in a magnetic rice bowl, and paint the old man's head with this charcoal ash. At that time, there was no photo studio in the township, and after the old man passed away, there was not a single portrait left for posterity. I started from my grandmother's head portrait, and the picture was still quite like it, and slowly more people asked for portraits. ”
Yu Shouqi is a person with strong hands-on ability and creative ability. He himself recalls starting a family in 1980. At that time, a guest in the township was "three velvets, six cards, and a body of hair, and a sewing machine to make a strip.".
The family did not have this condition, he renovated a bed, he painted himself, carved himself, self-qi, a week to make a Ningbo bed came out, two nights installed a red light brand tube radio, set up an antenna, the sound is quite good. And so we got married.
In the 1990s, Yu Shouqi was transferred from Ningxiang County to Changsha City. Occasionally hanging a piece of paper on the balcony and behind the door page, learning to draw Chinese paintings. "When it comes to learning to paint Chinese painting, I started from scratch. First of all, I don't know if I'll use rice paper, and I've seen it. My first teacher was Teacher Guangjun, art editor of the Armed Police Corps Newspaper, the second teacher was Teacher Chen Baiyi, the third teacher was Teacher Ouyang Ducai, the fourth teacher was Teacher Yan Jialong, and the fifth teacher was Teacher Lei Zhenmin, Vice Chairman of the China Artists Association. ”
These teachers taught by example and set an example for Yu Shouqi. He himself copied the mountain of Bai Xueshi, Xu Beihong's horse, Pan Tianshou's lotus, and Qi Baishi's shrimp. Yu Shouqi's most impressive Qi Lao's "Those Who Are Like Me Die, Those Who Learn From Me Live."
In 2009, the national organization of the Zodiac Chinese Painting Competition, Yu Shouqi painted three chickens, won the gold medal, and was also named the leading figure of the National Zodiac Chinese Painting Competition, and the painter Wu Huan received the award on the same stage in Beijing.
In 2011, Yu Shouqi accompanied Jin Shangyi, former chairman of the Central Artists Association, to London, England, when fifteen chinese calligraphers and painters exhibited a total of 60 works. Forty minutes after the opening ceremony, my work "The World Is Red" Lotus, a four-foot whole sheet, was taken by a buyer for £1,380. At the end of the three-day exhibition, only one of his "Red in the World" was sold. Six months later, the Royal Foundation for the Arts hired him as a permanent art advisor to the Society, and sent him a certificate and seal.
Liu Zhenming, a critic of calligraphy and painting, believes that Yu Shouqi's calligraphy and painting works are full of cultural connotations of oriental aesthetics, which not only have professional influence, but also have cultural feats that shocked the world. Therefore, lingering between his calligraphy and painting works is enough to witness the revival of traditional culture and win immeasurable self-confidence in the international art space.
Mr. Lei Zhenmin, former vice chairman of the China Artists Association and secretary of the party group, knew his deeds, and after seeing his calligraphy and painting works, he gladly inscribed: Yunshan Wanli.
"The inscription of the master who can be a Hanmo is the dao, and the creation of the master who can be a Danqing is the true meaning." Calligraphy and painting critic Shi Feng commented that Yu Shouqi not only has wonderful achievements in the practice of calligraphy and painting, but also has the height of theoretical research on calligraphy and painting. He is not only a creative calligrapher and painter, but also a meritorious person who is committed to cultural dissemination!
"In July 2021, the Artistic Talent Development Center of the Ministry of Culture named me a meritorious artist in the centenary of the founding of the Party. I know that there is no best, only better. Live to be old, learn to be old, life goes on, struggle is not stopped! Yu Shouqi said.