When enjoying a painting by Pingjun, you should watch it quietly with bated breath. First look at the overall composition at a distance; then step forward, stand close to it, and try to find the secrets behind dots and brushstrokes, ritualized and sacred. But you must be reminded not to expect to find in it rosy clouds, first rays of the morning sun or evening mist, let alone rising dragons, leaping tigers, or rolling waves. Bamboos, lotuses or attractive landscapes are not to be found in his painting either. What Pingjun depicts in his paintings is the mental images. His mental images seem something with no or little traces. They are in fact a kind of realm, a realm that Pingjun yearns for, that looks misty and remote, that gives free rein to his thinking, and that is buried in the innermost recesses of Pingjun's heart.
　　Pingjun is fascinated by philosophy and believes in Buddhism. Perhaps Pingjun's mental images have something to do with philosophy and Buddhism, for they both have something traceable. Though the scenes in the mountains-and-waters paintings of China in the Song and Yuan dynasties are concise and simple, they are still responses to the secular society and their distance from the secular society is measurable. Therefore Pingjun seems not content with them. Abstract painting of Europe and America seems to have discarded images; however, its visual traces, hard and full of bumping force, seem to be something Pingjun is unwilling to accept. He has another kind of traces in his heart, traces that belong to himself or to himself only. Where will the traces lead him? He is seeking them with some expectations. The works before us are the result of this seeking.
　　To what extent is it possible for paintings and mental images to corroborate each other? Artists of all ages have made an unceasing exploration of it. But the exploration is far from being exhausted. It seems that every new exploration have brought something new. Just as the universe originating from the big bang is expanding forever, this exploration will always continue.
　　The possibility of mutual corroboration between paintings and mental images by no means denies the distance that actually exists between them, and this distance is almost absolute. If you try to find, too perseveringly, some basis on which painting and mental image may corroborate each other, you will find yourself in a dilemma and feel helpless. Sometimes it may be sensible to admit the gape between them. It is a choice that makes the viewer or even the artist feel relaxed. If we can consider a painting simply as it stands, things will be much simpler. However, history is always complex. If paintings are really unexplainable, then all one can do is to view them. Everyone has his own independent eyes, and therefore has his own distinctive explanation of the painting he beholds. Too many explanations are the same as no explanation. Art today is also landed in such a predicament by and large. At this point, I suddenly feel that my explanation of Pingjun's works is perhaps superfluous.
　　In any case, mental images are something traceable. Even in Pingjun's mental images, we can still sense vaguely, more or less, that people's voices and birds' singing coming intermittently from inside and outside the door or before and behind the window resound faintly between heaven and earth. Pingjun is after all an honest man. He is always honest toward life, toward himself, toward the world and toward art. It is unimaginable if there is nothing traceable between his paintings and his mental images.

July 15, 2013

(Dakai Du: Professor of the Painting Faculty, Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University)

作者：Du,Dakai