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Artist showcases talent through various mediums
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BIG works, big name, and bold style, that’s what Pan Gongkai shows to visitors in his solo exhibition “Dispersion and Generation” at Zhejiang Art Museum.
Pan, born in 1947, is the son of Pan Tianshou, one of the most renowned Chinese modern painters, theoreticians and educators. Pan Gongkai is also the president of the China Central Academy of Fine Arts.
“This exhibition is my attempt at cross-field artistic practice,” said Pan. Known for his versatility, this exhibition shows some of his early works along with recent articles about his theories on ink paintings, installations and architecture.
The ink painting section forms the bulk of the exhibit with nearly 70 of his large masterpieces on display. A majority of his paintings feature the lotus, Pan’s favorite plant. However, he uses black-and-white to depict the flowers. This technique gives the lotus a sense of aloofness and removes the messiness of bent withered flower petals and leaves.
Pan is also known for his use of white space to balance a composition and allow viewers to use their imagination.
For instance, “Withered Lotus Made from Iron,” one of his signature works from 2007, is a square painting that leaves the top left corner blank. The rest of the painting shows messy and bent lotus flowers. “To Write What I See in West Lake,” a 25-meter-long scroll, uses empty space to represent water and separate lotus flowers in the fore and background.
“Melting” and “Sitting in a Ship of Obliviousness” are two of Pan’s recent installations.
“Melting” is a 20-meter-long corridor, of which the walls are screens of his ink lotuses. English words and sentences from the book “On the Border of Western Modern Art” appear randomly on the screens. It somehow looks like snow melting in a lotus pool. The work was shown in the Chinese Pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennale in 2011.
“Sitting in a Ship of Obliviousness” is a more imaginative work. Pan says he was inspired by Marcel Duchamp, whose work is associated with Dadaism and conceptual art.
Under the infinite starry sky, there is a huge “spaceship” in the middle. Inside the “spaceship” is Pan’s desk and books. Everything looks real and beautiful, but the work is illogical. The “spaceship” cannot fly and Pan’s desk and books shouldn’t be in a spaceship.
“I made everything illogical, but created a good piece,” Pan said.
The theory section presents his 100-meter long illustrated atlas of “The Road of Chinese Modern Art.” The architecture section shows his designs, including a model of the new building for the National Art Museum of China.
Also participating in the exhibition, American multimedia artist Clifford Ross said he likes to cooperate with Pan because they both “trust art and are willing to try from different angles and levels.”
Inspired by Pan, Ross shot a series of landscape photos with a special high-resolution camera designed by himself. Pan said Ross’ photos have the feel of ink paintings.
Ross also created “Another Perspective,” an interpretation of Pan’s ink brush paintings with multimedia art. Ross cut out parts of Pan’s small ink paintings and magnified them. He then recreated Pan’s work to show the powerful and skillful strokes in greater detail.
The exhibition also presents 15 other large-scale photographs from Ross’ “Hurricane” series, shot in 2008 on Long Island, New York.
Date: Through May 4 (closed on Mondays), 9am-5pm
Address: 138 Nanshan Rd
Admission: Free
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