The sun in the heart brings its own light - a small note about the Jinling painter Wang Cheng

Text/Xiao Zhong

Wang Cheng, born in 1965 in Wuhu, Anhui, now lives in Nanjing. He graduated from the Fine Arts Department of Jiangsu Provincial Institute of Education in 1991, and from 1996 to 1997, he was awarded the Heinrich Burr Foundation Scholarship to study and exchange with the Heinrich Burr Foundation Art Studio in Bonn, Germany, and is now a primary school teacher affiliated to Xiaozhuang Normal College, engaged in modern art creation and exchange.

Poster of "Pairing Shadows - Exhibition of Wang Cheng's Paintings"

Holding a painting exhibition in a beer bar, many people think it is incredible, but I heard that the painter Wang Cheng wants to hold a "Pair of Shadows - Wang Cheng Painting Exhibition" at the High Master Beer House in Nanyi Back Street, and friends who are familiar with Wang Cheng think that this is too normal! He has the reputation of the "Prince of Beer" in the art world of Nanjing, where friends gather and beer is drunk in boxes; in addition, he is also a life master in everyone's eyes.

Interior view of the High Master Beer House

From 1996 to 1997, Wang Cheng was awarded a scholarship from the Heinrichberg Foundation to go to Bonn, Germany, to engage in modern art creation exchange activities at the Heinrichberg Foundation Art Studio. Germany is the birthplace of artistic expressionism. Expressionist art, popular in Germany at the beginning of the last century, advocated the expression of "spiritual beauty" and "the expression of the interpretation of natural sensory impressions from a metaphysical point of view". Among Wang Cheng's works, the two series of "Remembering the Big Factory" and "Re-remembering Jiangnan" are the most representative. The two series of Wang Chengdu are created with memory materials, using paintings to express the special emotional state of "nostalgia" and "memory" in human real life, not only with unique materials and exquisite conception, but also with unique expression methods, and the form and content complement each other. Let's start with the "Big Factory" series. On the gray and yellow tone color, the old and wide factory building is empty, the road surface is no longer busy forklifts, mountains of raw materials, piles of semi-finished products, the small trees with eaves outside the window are already towering trees, and the lush branches and fallen leaves that are either flat or clustered seem to tell people that the owner has not come to take care of them for a long time. It can be said that the "big factory" is probably the loneliness, emptiness and a wisp of sadness that can never be removed after its prosperity has ended, which condenses the image of an era and contains the enthusiasm and faith of a generation. No matter who it is, when you see such a painting, the feeling of nostalgia will inevitably fill your mind. Look at the "Remembrance of Jiangnan" series. Still old and even damaged old photos, fragments of pavilions and terraces, streams and stone bridges, hidden between the dense and hazy trees and wilderness, the water surface blurred the reflection, as if to take us into the dream piece of the previous dynasty, we can hear the innocent laughter of chasing and frolicking under the cloister on a snowy day, and faintly see her beautiful face reclining on the pavilion pillars in the smoke and rain season. Wang Cheng deliberately depicted the scenes that were very familiar to the Jiangnan garden in his memory as phantom fragments of virtual reality, flickering light and darkness, and its humorous situation, like the long sound of drizzle gently falling on the oil-paper umbrella, and like the distant bell sound knocked on the patina door knocker, haunted the brain for a long time. Since ancient times, the theme of "Remembering Jiangnan" has been that the literati are full of sorrow and sorrow for the old. The artistic context of Wang Cheng's "re-recalling of Jiangnan" is a kind of remembrance after the prosperity, tracing the golden years that have changed with the passage of time and are difficult to let go, and the traces of youth and ignorance in those years.

Wang Cheng/Big Factory Series/Oil Painting

Wang Cheng/Yi Jiangnan series/oil painting

The predecessor of Xiaozhuang Normal Affiliated Experimental Primary School is The Xiaozhuang School founded by Mr. Tao Xingzhi, working here, Wang Cheng has a deeper understanding of Mr. Tao Xingzhi's educational ideas, especially emphasizing that DXN comes first, and students should become moral people; they should have a creative spirit. Under the guidance of this idea, Wang Cheng has successively opened pottery courses and established a pottery museum, and the children have given full play to their imagination and created many animal shapes, animal character shapes, historical idiom story character shapes, campus family life scenes, etc., bringing the children into the clay sculpture art world full of innocence and childlike fun. On April 3, 2017, Wang Cheng led his students, as well as relevant people from the Jiangsu Provincial Cultural Relics Bureau, the Propaganda Department of the Nanjing Municipal Party Committee, the Nanjing Municipal Education Bureau, the Nanjing Municipal Bureau of Culture and Guangzhou, teachers and students of the Affiliated Primary School of Nanjing Xiaozhuang College, volunteer representatives, and the elderly Shi Xiuying and Wu Xiuying, survivors of the Nanjing Massacre of the Japanese Army invading China. The opening ceremony of the "Qingming Festival" series of activities - pottery shoe exhibition was held in the sculpture square of the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall of the Japanese Invasion of China. According to reports, the ceramic shoe display cabinet arranged on the spot is 1.2 meters wide and 13 meters long, which means the human catastrophe on December 13. A total of 80 pairs of ceramic shoes were displayed at the event site, symbolizing the 80th anniversary of the Nanjing Massacre. The bottom of the cabinet stores about 40 centimeters of sand, and in the form of placing ceramic shoes on the soil, half-buried and fully buried, etc., the imagery reproduces the pain and depression of the compatriots in Nanjing in 1937 who experienced fragmentation and destruction. "Every pair of shoes represents a group of people, a class, toddlers, teenagers, adult men and women, the elderly, and even babies in their arms! One of them is the shoes of a family of seven, symbolizing countless families who have been slaughtered and compatriots who have been brutally slaughtered!" Wang Cheng said that he reproduced history through this form and paid tribute to the compatriots who were killed; at the same time, he taught children not to forget history, study hard, and become the pillar of national construction. In the summer of 2021, in order to further promote Tao Xingzhi and other educators of the older generation, Wang Cheng consulted a large number of written materials and image materials, which lasted more than a month, accumulated more than 70 hours of work creation, and created a large-scale oil painting (700X150) of "Xiaozhuang - The Fire Sower of Modern Civilization" for xiaozhuang Tao Xingzhi Education Center, vividly reproducing the vivid images of Yang Xiaochun, Liang Shuming, Chen Heqin, Tao Wenmei and his son, Wang Chunyi, Tao Xingzhi, Cai Yuanpei, Huang Qisheng, Zhang Zonglin, Chen Zhiqian, Zhao Shuyu, Xu Shiqi and other characters (from left to right).

Wang Cheng/Xiaozhuang - The Sower of Modern Civilization/Large Oil Painting/(700X150)

The Sculpture Square of the Nanjing Massacre Victims of the Japanese Invasion of China Commemorative Hall Sculpture Square "Qingming Festival" series of activities - Pottery Shoe Exhibition

In reality, Wang Cheng is handsome, heroic and unrestrained, and can be described as a person in temperament and a master of life. Friends often joke that in addition to the title of beer prince, Wang Cheng is the best riding among Nanjing painters, he has participated in the French Roubaix bicycle race, around Taiwan Island, around Qinghai Lake, around Taihu Lake, Jingma Highway, Xinjiang Duku Highway and other places of cycling; he also said that he is the best table tennis player among cyclists, and won the eighth place in the Nanjing Municipal Staff Table Tennis Competition; in addition, he also insisted on winter swimming in the Bamboo Forest Reservoir of Zhongshan Mausoleum, and occasionally rowed to Xuanwu Lake, which can be described as a colorful life. Wang Cheng in life is also romantic, warm and enthusiastic to help others, in December 2013 by the Nanjing Gu'an Art Center, the portrait of the dog - Wang Cheng oil painting exhibition, as a birthday gift to his daughter when he was twenty years old, is undoubtedly an artistic expression of love and warmth. Rider Zhang Zhihui and Wang Cheng are the same year, and their birthday is only 6 days younger, but in Zhihui's mind, Wang Cheng is the eldest brother of his life! Only for that year's road through Daocheng, Zhihui altitude sickness was serious, the people accompanying him did not care, only Wang Cheng alone accompanied him to the hospital, due to the road collapse, the hospital blackout, in the dark Wang Cheng was busy before and after, accompanied By Zhihui spent the most memorable night. Although affected by the epidemic in the past two years, the team of art appreciators, riders and winter swimming enthusiasts around Wang Cheng has been expanding, among which there are industry elites and ordinary people, Wang Cheng uses his artistic charm and spiritual appeal to lead and drive more people around him to be uplifting.

Wang Cheng rides

Wang Chengdong swims

In my opinion, there is no difference between viewing a painting and looking at people. When appreciating the works, we integrate the factors of the author's personality, look at the character from the paintings, and then observe the thoughts and concerns of the author's inner world from the painting environment, and the understanding of the art works will be much richer and more comprehensive. Appreciating Wang Cheng's works will make people feel enlightened: the original really good art works, it can not only bring people the enjoyment of beauty and beauty, but also let such beauty spread out and last forever.

The sun in his heart brings his own light, and Wang Cheng is exactly such a person! Sincerely wish this artistic fermentation project that combines senses and taste - pairing shadows: Wang Cheng's painting exhibition a complete success!

Wang Cheng's painting exhibition is set up at the scene and some of his works