Mimesis - Figurative Art

Mimesis

EXPLORING THE MYSTERY OF THE SELF

What I am seeking is not the real and not the unreal but rather the unconscious, the mystery of the instinctive in the human race Amedeo Clemente Modigliani, Italian Figurative Artist July 12, 1884 – January 24, 1920

Min Yiyao In Min’s works, the language of the technique draws the viewer rather that the image itself. They seem to draw on certain elements of fauvism in an attempt to move beyond a mere impressionistic view. This is even more interesting on portraiture works such as Min’s.

That the technique serves as the primary focus is intriguing.

It is not to say that the arresting images on Min’s canvas are any less impressive. However, it questions whether this is a deliberate attempt by the artist to employ a different language of artistic communication. With seemingly wild brushstrokes, he manages to capture light and depth. The random strokes’ play on the canvas unwittingly forming an image that thought did not prior define. He limits himself to a palette of colours that are exceedingly dreary, but which consequentially, serves to highlight this exact use.

Indeed, Min’s works are fascinating because the viewer experiences a reversal of the norms that are expected of a portraiture piece. Instantly, the quality of distance is one that is experienced. The figures seem to be looking into mirrors in self-reflective gazes, pondering over a perennial existential dilemma. They have enclosed themselves within their own mirrored images with a ceaseless resonance of a single thought that does not transmit to the viewer. It is this deliberate disengagement that forces the viewer to crave for another mode of interaction with the art. And it is this self-inclusiveness of Min’s art that makes his work provocative to the eye.

Cover Page Chuang Tai No. 30 1200mm x 1500mm, Oil on Canvas Previous Page Chuang Tai No. 6 1500mm x 1800mm, Oil on Canvas Right Chuang Tai No. 8 1500mm x 1800mm, Oil on Canvas

Right Chuang Tai No. 22 1200mm x 1500mm, Oil on Canvas Min Yiyao was born in Xi’an,Shanxi Province. He graduated from Shanxi Industrial and Commercial College and following which he graduated from Xi’an Fine Art, Academy. He currently lives and works in Xiamen and Beijing. His figurative works have been featured in major exhibitions in China, with solo and group exhibitions spanning Beijing, Xiamen, Shanghai, Nanjing, Taipei, Belgium, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Singapore.

Dou Rong Jun Born in 1971 in Nanjing, Dou graduated from the Nanjing Art Insitute with a B.A. degree.

Life has made Dou an artist with a keen sense of awareness around him and a clear vision of life. His inspiration stems from a set of perspective of life arising from his wide knowledge and experiences.

In Dou’s series of male portraits, he explores the condition of man on his canvas. With viewing his manifestation of man in various forms of angst and his art technique of dripping acrylic on the canvas (which results in so accurately paralleling the emotions of his figures), one tends to conclude the interpretation of the work is done.

However, Dou wants to show the human spirit is so powerful that even in one’s anguish, the soul is searching for something deeper. His works truly reveal the presence of hope. The raw emotion of the work is artfully expressed in every sinew of the sculpted body, touched with light the hands are charged with anguish. Yet, the artist could have shrouded the subject in shadows and lingering darkness. However, his subjects emerge illuminated by light and acrylic takes on the impression of dreamy water colours and the detail and attention to lighting of oils Dou currently teaches fine art in Shanghai while persuing his art practice. In 2006, Dou had his works auctioned in POLY, a renowned art auction house in China.

Previous Page Retrospection Series No. 1 1200mm x 1500mm, Acrylic on Canvas Top Retrospection Series No. 2 1200mm x 1500mm, Acrylic on Canvas Top Retrospection Series No. 3 1200mm x 1500mm, Acrylic on Canvas

Me and You – Regarding Dou Rong Jun’s Oil Paintings All this while, Dou Rong Jun’s works have continued to portray youthful males, poised in different positions and expressions. Hiding in the background of cold grey or in the warm grey, they stare with blank gazes at the transitions of Man’s emotions.

At different intervals, everyone’s development leaves different memories.Youthful faces become old and fragile, innocent eyes grow numb. Different life experiences, different trails of emotions; every message about life is recorded on each of our individual bodies. Thus, we often can read one or many stories from minute details of the body.

Meanwhile, because of interaction with other people and the influence of the resulting relationships, those same stories may not be hard to read from the body. To compound the issue, every relationship has its own distances and perspectives and can be seen from different angles, leaving impressions on both bodies of the parties involved. As humans, much of our existence and sense of being is inextricably tied to the various relationships we have in society.

The principles and standards for various relationships adapt to the changing times. However, the most basic things about interpersonal relationships remain the same. In the artist’s works, many moments are condensed, making relationships between people more transparent and clear.

Intricate and moving depictions have always been one of the essential characteristics of paintings.

Dou Rong Jun chooses to use the language of paintings to capture the subject’s details and the subtle, delicate stories between people that are not always easy to grasp. In each of his works, there is sensitivity with every brushstroke in a highly appropriate conveyance of emotion. At the same time, he possesses an uncanny ability to control the picture’s surface, enabling every single painting’s overall appeal to be extremely strong, such that it arrests the attention and stirs up the feelings of viewers.

On the spatial plane of the canvas, the contrasts and positions of the subjects’ forms express the tension and melodious harmony between the subjects. All of this has been so well condensed into the artist’s language of art that it does not reveal traces in his artworks.

For the viewer, every single work by Dou Rong Jun impacts them with an unadulterated, cultural and sociological experience. Dou has transported his personal, inner thoughts onto his works, using similar youths as subjects to represent emotions, to express life.

I, as the artist himself and you, it can be anyone of you; any person with relations. It is this understanding of you and me that co-exists in the artists’ inner world.

Zhang Yexing “This series of works uses the motif of stage curtains as a main theme because people always have the desire of acting on a stage. Therefore, by placing some of my own intimate thoughts in front of the stage, that in real life cannot be revealed to others or disclosed in public, I’m researching how the human character exhibits itself in reality.”

There are two observable levels in Zhang Ye Xing’s paintings – the psychological and the political – and both intertwine to present an insightful work of art by a young artist trying to make meaning of the mind and the environment. The psychological aspect is not disassociated with the political aspects and in fact these two spheres overlap and it is in this overlap that we find Zhang’s ‘Stage Curtain’ series.

The stage is a place of performance, a space dedicated to the adoption of a different persona – when one is able to be someone else without any stigma. However, in Zhang’s stage, through the red curtains, we witness the artist painting himself in the basest of postures and shedding all pretenses.

Freud’s ‘superego’ and ‘ego’ disappears and only the ‘id’ remains. Thus on stage the artist is as he wants to be. He reveals to the public what should morally remain in the private sphere. Furthermore, the Red Curtains occupy an overwhelming space on the canvas making Zhang’s works engaging on another artistic level. ‘Red Curtain’ refers to a theatricalised form of cinema where the audience is conscious that they are watching a film. They are not allowed to engage in the film as it is directed in such a way that the audience is alienated. In Zhang’s works, we watch the performance of the artist, and although those are intimate moments we are never aware that it is only a performance.

It is hard to disassociate the Red Curtain from the politics of China and the communism of their past era. The ‘Iron Curtain’ was a term often used to signify the ideological and physical boundary that arose after the Second World War due to communism. It signified to the West the great differences of politics and also the ignorance of what happened behind that curtain. After the end of the revolution, it seems that the curtains remain, but assume different meanings. With the globalization of China, it seems she has had to put on performances for the rest of the world. What the country is, has become a façade for the world, and yet it cannot hide its true self. Perhaps then, the artist hints at the impossibility of prolonged pretense, whether in an individual or in a nation, as performance is futile because the audience is aware.

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