In recent years, there has been an unconscious trend amongst Chinese oil painters to shape an identity for Chinese art. There is a sense that Chinese art needs to be recognizably Chinese, but should be contemporary in its ideas and capture the humanism of individuality. Different generations of Chinese artists have reflected deeply on this artistic problem, and it seems that the use of subtle lines and the free expressive technique associated with Chinese ink-painting have become somewhat of a recognizable characteristic in Chinese oil paintings.

　　The late Luo Gongliu’s interest in this subject can be traced as far back as the early 1960s. Thirty years later, he was to make a profound treatise on Chinese poetry, calligraphy and painting. Combining his creative experience and talent as a wood panel and oil painter and the influence of calligraphy in all manner of Chinese art and culture, he encapsulated the idea of ‘free expressionism’ and how this concept defines the fundamental difference between Chinese and Western art. ‘Free expressionism’ has no simple equivalent in Western understanding of art. It is a concept developed in Chinese ink painting and calligraphy which emphasizes on the inner spiritual culture of the artist in the expression of a visual subject. It is the seemingly effortless stroke of a brush that expresses a multitude of meanings. In his book entitled ‘Record of Dialogues’ Luo Gongliu advises artists to incorporate Chinese poetry into their paintings and to stress the power of the poetic feel through the brush stroke. He clearly understood the crucial transition from realism to expressionism. In his view, it was not enough for Chinese oil painting to make a leap from focusing on drawing to focusing on painting. Chinese oil painting had to make a fundamental breakthrough to ‘writing’ a painting. The artist had to be able to make use of the movement of the brush to freely express one’s mind and heart. Luo Gongliu’s views neatly captures the long years of search by the earlier generations of Chinese oil painters to find a specific Chinese identity.

　　In the last decade, I have seen many oil painters put this theory into practice. In particular, the recent works of Wang Chengwen and Chen Tianlong are good examples of this trend. The exhibition and publication of the works entitled ‘Harvest Scenery’ is one more milestone achievement in the promulgation of ‘free expressionism’.

　　Born in year of 1973, young and talented Xu Zhiguang has created huge canvases measuring 180x170 cm. I am greatly impressed by his work ‘A Fine Spring’ painted in 2009 and other newer works such as ‘Merry Snow’ , ‘After the Rain’, ‘Glittering’, ‘Moonlight’, ‘Early Spring’ and ‘Golden Autumn’ created in 2010. These are the results of deep soul searching and express his youthful passion and life experience.

　　retains much of the technique of Western oil painting, it departs significantly from the traditional western oil painting’s obsession with perspective and depth, accurate depiction of form and perfection of colour. By combining Western and Eastern traditions, he has created a distinct path of his own. One can find in Xu’s paintings an emphasis on positioning, a contemporary construction of forms, a harmonious unity that successfully reconciles the vitality of contemporary art with the ‘free expressionism’ of traditional Chinese art. His technique borrows heavily from Chinese calligraphy and the expression of self through the subject.

　　Xu Zhiguang has traveled to different parts of China including the remote Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and Tianshan area in the western Xinjiang Province. Despite personal privations and hardship, he believes in traveling in search of artistic inspiration. He is not satisfied with depicting general scenes of mountains, rivers and scenes of traditional minority folk activities. Instead, he has found a wellspring of inspiration in the powerful and unbending life force demonstrated by wild apple trees. These century-old trees live in isolated loneliness braving the elements. With stems and branches distorted and injured by snow and unrelenting winds, these elemental forces of life continue to fight and grow against all odds. Xu Zhiguang captures this so succinctly with his scene of snow-clad wild apple trees beneath the mighty Tianshan mountains. I’m guessing the artist, with the sentimental mind of a poet, must have philosophized about the tragedies and triumphs of human existence.

　　Xu Zhiguang’s work does not conform easily to the classic Western still-life format or the flowers presented in traditional art albums. His huge canvases are at times filled with explosive movement, and at times gentle as a reflective pond. These are silent poems of colours. The artist’s in-depth understanding of the changing seasons and the passage of time has been realized on canvas through the contrast of colour and the calligraphy-like brush strokes. From the traces of line and the movement and flow of colour, the viewer will experience the vastness of mother nature and the assertion of the artist’s will.

　　Xu Zhiguang declares, ‘I want my work to be recognizable as the creation of a Chinese artist’. I venture to pronounce that he is well on his way. While we are beginning for some Chinese oil painters to start acquire their own unique features, the vast majority of Chinese oil painting continues to lack identity. Much work is still required to raise the overall standard of Chinese oil painting.

　　‘We need to scale new heights in order to catch the scenes a thousand li away’. This famous line from the Tang Dynasty poet testifies to far-sightedness and lofty ambitions. I quote this to share the wisdom and spirit of the ancients with my fellow artists!

　　2010.10.26

作者：Wen,Lipeng