The individual exhibition, for this year, of Zhao Mengge is titled "Ideal World" (Li Xiang Guo), due to the evolution that has already, recently, occurred in her idea and thinking of creations. In art, she, in comparison with and in reference to those a few past years, has realized, together with a more concrete aim, a more advanced spiritual orientation.

　　I have ever, a few years before, consecrated to her an article, titled "Classical Feelings and Poetical Senses," the main idea of which is to explore her works from two angles, one being that she was actually seeking the formative interest of ink painting in the media of oil painting, the other that the harmony of humanities and nature was the final object of her pursuit. The most typical character of Zhao's painting technique was reflected in the domination of lines for modeling and the abundance of black ink in color, thus giving her works a tendency to be mistaken as ink painting while, in fact, she was endeavoring to realize the reintegration into the aesthetical experiences of ink paintings. It is not only the external characters of forms, but also the poetical senses akin to nature that are hidden in her heart, that have, for that particular period, made her artistic creations the heir of classical tradition. It is possible, therefore, to summarize the main idea of Zhao's painting works for that period as "nature and humanities." Man, as a part of nature (naked bodies in the deprivation of clothes can be seen as "the natural man" without any social identities), has the obligation to integrate himself into nature, and to stay in harmony with it. Women in her paintings, in consequence, have no concrete activities, apart from forming a kind of "affirmative relationships" with nature. The scenes in her works, in most cases, were no objective, real ones, in which there exists no difference between man and man, and in which women, generally beauteous in bodies, white in skin and elegant in comportment, indolent, leisurely and sexy, only exist as a kind of spiritual symbol. It is special in that they, though occasionally projecting themselves as a concrete being in nature, were, in most cases, "blurred" into "blankness" analogous to that in an ink painting, serving as a background to nature as the subject-matter of her paintings. Zhao, actually, was employing a kind of "turn-from-a-guest-into-a-host" technique to nullify the tensions between man as subject and nature as object, in order to attain the harmony between them.

　　Zhao, however, didn't detain herself for long in such oriental, classical sentiments, because she always has more worthy ideas to cope with, which replaced her addiction to those poetical senses. Women in her works, subsequently, changed their identities as objects with nature and emerged as subjects, to accomplish her conceptual narrative. Such has been, in those recent two years, the more advanced ideal as reflected in some of her larger works.

　　It is due to her concept that an ideal world can be constructed in art that women in her paintings, as the subject of narrative, are projected against natural sceneries. Her ideal world is close, in kinship, to Plato's Republic, Tao Yuanming's "The Peach Garden," Thomas More's Utopia, and etc.

　　Plato (ca. 427-347 BCE) depicted an ideal prototype of society, a unity of truth, goodness and beauty, a just and ideal world, in his Republic. Such a perfect world as he has designed, however, has never been realized in any zones or in any nations. His republic, thus, becomes the earliest utopia in human history.

　　Coincidentally, nearly 800 years (421 BCE) after the birth of Republic, Tao Yuanming in China, in his "The Peach Garden," created as well a perfect world which has become the object of pursuit even till nowadays, and it is known as "land of idyllic beauty." The peach garden is a world different from the real one, and an idealized free land. It is, in fact, nothing but a "shelter" in which the poet is taking refuge from the existing society. It has every reason to be called an oriental republic in that Tao has depicted it as an infinitely perfect, completely isolated paradise.

　　Even if an ideal world is difficult to be realized, men's desire for it is never to be quenched. In 16th century, one thousand years after "The Peach Garden" was born, Utopia of More saw its publication. Utopia, as a word, is composed of the Greek ο? (no) and τ?πο? (place) and those two words combine to make a new one, signifying "nowhere." Utopia, a novel, having Plato's Republic as the precursor, enjoys an important role in western literature and exercises a profound influence on politics. Later, many anarchists, such as Irving, St. Simon and Fourier, devoted themselves to the building up of a utopian community. Though their maneuver came into nothing, the beautiful dreams of humanities never died. One century after More, The City of the Sun (Italian: La città del Sole; Latin: Civitas Solis), by Tommaso Campanella, an early utopian communist, came into being (1623). This Italian, in his work, was depicting an ideal social institution: in the city of the sun, there is no private property, each man needs to participate in working, daily commodities are distributed according to need, working duration is four hours, reading is the occupation in non-working hours, children begin to receive education from two or three years, and they learn knowledge of all subjects before yen years old. Campanella, in The City of the Sun, gives the idea of a utopian communist social system and it inspires many other prototypes of utopian communist social systems, thus making his work an important document in the history of communist ideas.

　　In the same way as the above thinkers live in an ideal world created by themselves, Zhao, too, creates an "ideal world" of her own. She, for one time, tried to express, in her works, the bewilderment, sadness, confusion and restlessness that she had, in her heart, experienced. She, for one time, grew, in a reality sometimes in opposition to her wills, to be herself in stumble, having to experience the obstructions in life, the difficulties in career and the trials in love. She, for once, had metamorphosed all her experiences into artistic creations. Now, Zhao, in her metamorphosis, has turned her focus from the depiction of her own individual experiences to the construction of a splendorous, grandiose spiritual kingdom. Her works, gradually, are beginning to concentrate upon a kind of idealized narrative, accompanied by an insight into humanities, and she is aiming at a kind of justice and equilibrium, a calm, tranquil and beautiful world.

　　"The Land of Promise," in Zhao's recent works, is the largest in dimension, and a most representative one with magnificent momentum, full composition, rich level and many persons. The title is derived from Genesis, Old Testament: Sacred Jehovah "promised" to Abraham, the ancestor of the Jews, "a land that flows with milk and honey"-that is, the land of Canaan, Jerusalem nowadays. It is a land of extreme abundance and beauty. The painter, by means of the reference and according to her own will and technique, creates a feminine world to which she is aspiring. Everyone, in this world, feels happy and satisfied, but this world can only exist in her heart, being the peach garden hidden there, being the nest of her spirit. In the painting, none of the women, pump in body, free in spirit, doesn't feel full and free. Such internal ecstasy in spirit is not to be discovered in a depressing, confusing reality.

　　In another work, "The Thirteen Gentlemen," Zhao is trying to redeem "women's" fame. Confucius places "women" and "commoners" in polarized opposition to "gentlemen." In the eyes of the painter, however, woman and man can both become the "gentleman" as the object of respect, and can both realize the attainment in moral, actions, knowledge and cultivation. The pursuit of women after an independent character and a free spirit should become a kind of idealized social custom, so that the moral regulation that women have three obediences and the four virtues, and that women be docile to her husband and instructive to her children, can be surpassed.

　　The ideal of "The Thirteen Gentlemen" is, furthermore, derived from the twelve Jinling Beauties, in A Dream of the Red Manson. For the reason of the oppression by feudal ethics upon women, the twelve beauties all end in tragic fate. The painter substitutes "thirteen" for "twelve;" "gentlemen" for "beauties;" "athletic, healthy bodies for delicate, sick faces; strong, firm hands and feet for weak, faltering fingers and three-inch golden lotuses; broad, responsible backs for slim, feeble shoulders; nude, naked bodies for extravagant, decorative clothes; broad, healthy breasts for plain, dry chests, and etc. Such substitutions are the negation and subversion of the feudal ethics, the salvation and solicitude of humanities. The bodies of thirteen women, full, healthy, calm and confident, resemble a manifesto of women to the society: they are facing the audiences, consistent and firm, neither faltering nor evading, feeling neither shameful nor feeble any more.

　　"Day, Night, Dawn and Dusk" and "The Depth of the Bamboos" are similar to "The Thirteen Gentlemen" in technique. Both works, by referring to those classics and allusions in the history of art, reflect the ideal and hope that the painter has for the group to which she belongs. The object of her expression, when she is changing the postures of the women in accordance with the "Night," "Day," "Dusk," and "Day" by Michelangelo, becomes clear at a glance. Women, in concordance with her idea, should be as strong, healthy and energetic, as men are supreme and powerful. Such an ideal, it is obvious, doesn't come from the masculine perspective. In the same vein, in "The Depth of the Bamboos," it is, not the "seven sages in the bamboo grove," care-free and each particular in character, but a group of naked women, some lounging while others crouching, that are playing in merriment with each other in the bamboos. They are brandishing, ravaging and enjoying their freedom.

　　If it can be justified that Zhao, in those past a few years, cared about the development of the freehand brushwork in her heart, the aim of her creation, when she has achieved her individualized style, passes to those subjects that has been being deliberated, and that is her ideal in life, or her ideal life. She is determined to, in her art, "create a wholly new world." She says in a firm tone, "I am the God in my world. I create the heaven and earth, myself and everything in the world, in my ways." Those feminine bodies full of vital vigor, which are seen in her paintings, are "the symbols of beauty, warmth and peace, and they, with undercurrents flowing deeply and waves coming in silence, are the guardians of beauty. There is sacrifice whenever there is guarding, and there is always sublimity accumulated from such sacrifice."

　　Zhao is creating in her ideal and, step by step, approaching it.

作者：Jia Fangzhou