The model of making historical achievements for Chinese artists is almost deemed, namely, to build a modern form of Chinese painting in the framework of China - Western interaction. Such a huge historical subject is not only a torture but also a significant opportunity for Chinese artists. Ironically， only a few artists step into the history while most escape it. It is mostly the case in the art circle. Fortunately, some artists are persistent on the creation. Their innovative practices sustain all hopes of contemporary Chinese painting and maintain the basic dignity of the creativity of Chinese artists. He Jiaying pioneers in this dynamic team with his characteristic creation conception and style over more than 30 years.
From series of fine brushworks in 1980s like Mountains, 19 Autumns, Sour Grapes and Women In Mizhi to slight free brushworks in 1990s like Sun Yat-sen In Tianjin and Round Moon In The Sky, He Jiaying creates a legend of successful development of contemporary Chinese painting with his works which integrate realistic spirit and Oriental poetry. His development of the shape, structure, lines, dynamics and colors to such a sensitive, delicate, exquisite, rigorous and lively height has successfully fulfill the transformation of fine brushwork from classical form to modern form. In the trend of appreciating ugly in contemporary art, He Jiaying re-manifests unique Oriental harmony and great beauty with his aesthetic art. He does not only correct the visuals of contemporary people but also endows his works with natural moral connotations. His aesthetic narration of personal psychology also enriches and elevates traditional realistic creation. Critically, we still cannot deny the fact that He Jiaying will one of the evidences of the successful development of contemporary Chinese painting in the way of new classics.
Firstly, integration of Chinese and Western painting.
The art circle know very well about He Jiaying’s characteristics of technique and form in painting. The glamour of his aesthetic forms even has formed a long-lasting infatuated mood in public field. He Jiaying showed his spiritual maturity very early. His works are not only created by craftsman-like work but also incubated on the spiritual bed of independent thinking.
“Integration of Chinese and Western painting” is just a proposition out of his thinking. He asked himself: since “Integration of Chinese and Western painting” is an inevitable historical trend, why don’t well follow it and form a tradition of integration of Chinese and Western?
“Chinese painting, at least Chinese fine brushwork painting, to a great degree, can hold Western painting in spiritual sense and method. ” “The observation, inspection, understanding and refining in Western painting are the same with the traditions in Jin and Tang dynasty. ” “The general idea of my painting is integrating Chinese and Western, ‘integrating’ instead of ‘combining’, not stiff. If we can find common essences, we can integrate the two naturally on aesthetic taste, techniques and methods. ” From these quotations we can his emphasis on the position and value of Western painting. His wit lies in that he does not place the fact of integration of Chinese and Western in substance-function relationship for evaluation.
From the very beginning, he has made a wish to re-activate the great quality of traditional fine brushwork painting on the basis of integration Chinese and Western visual experiences to fulfill the building up of modern fine brushwork figure forms while presenting modern life.
The idea began to take shape in his early works Street Office Director (1981) and Mountains (1983). His Street Office Director surpassed the “Red, light and shining” style which sustained from the Culture Revolution and pulled the figure painting back to “human” level from abstract political conception. Besides, the painting changed the delicate and slumping style of figure painting since Ming and Qing dynasties with sound shaping and restored the spirits and splendid style of figure painting in Jin and Tang dynasties. It was the aesthetic idea of integration of Chinese and Western what lifted He Jiaying to such a high level. Similar language was enhanced in his subsequent work Mountains in which he applied classical hues of Western oil painting.
After Mountains, He Jiaying saw his creation peak. Since then, in about five years, he created a series of works like 19 Autumns(1984), and Women In Mizhi(1985), Sour Grapes(1988), Haunting at Mawei Hill(1989) which have made a hit. His skillful realistic depiction, exquisite scene design and strong lyrical effect have manifested the glamour of fine brushwork figure painting in a new age. If we say He Jiaying’s early works feel amazing visually, his works during this period feel joyful, sad, confused or even beyond description. 19 Autumns is his representative work during this period has pushed his idea of integration of Chinese and Western to a new height. Starting with this painting, to form a microcosmic psychological narration by exploring the innermost emotions and dispositions of the figures has become the pursuit and quality of He Jiaying’s figure painting.
In his classroom sketches like Soundless, Red Apple, A Leaf, Embroider, He Jiaying elevated his creation to the level of portraiture. The figures no longer reply on scenes to express their emotions, but completely rely on psychological narration and dispositions discovery. In his view, the infinity of the figure’s psychology was just the new filed for painting narration. Thus, in 1991 his work Dark Autumn became a milestone of new age and also marked his shift from depiction of poetic country life to the spiritual world of urban figures.
At early 1990s , while creating fine brushwork paintings, He Jiaying also started to try slight free-style figure painting. He paid more attention to elegant, pure and harmonious appearance language of the painting . In 1992, in his work Hazy he transferred his achievements in fine brushwork figure painting in the same period into a language form which centered on line and ink. And fulfilled another breakthrough on Chinese ink wash figure painting with both combination of fine brushwork and free brushwork. His slight free-style figure painting sustained rigorous shapes and poetic images in fine brushwork and created a different flavor which made the painting appear more easy and elegant with sparse and slight yet rhythmical brushwork.
Secondly, resurgence of emotionalism.
In 1980, 23-year-old He Jiaying outstood himself in art circle with a free-style painting Spring Flowers Are Blossoming All Over The City. In the painting, every girl seems to just free from the abstract mode of “Red, shiny, bright” and acquire unique individuality. This change makes a painting of industrial subject full of strong lyricism. Although such new atmosphere and new quality is still immature under the shade of the “Culture Revolution” style, it indicates the future direction of He Jiaying’s art.
It took only one year for He Jiaying to shift from free-style painting to fine brushwork painting. In his young and pure heart, he just intended to avoid the “Culture Revolution” style in the field of free-style painting and turn to the reality of real life and endow the figures under his brush with soul and individual value.
At that time, fine brushwork painting was exactly a barren field. By profound study on the development history of fine brushwork painting, He Jiaying found historical basis and approaches for his own reform on fine brushwork painting, he wrote in his essay, “The art mode in Jin and Tang dynasties must be based on personal feelings…later, people only copied some set patterns so that the painting became more and more empty… its lifeblood still lies in basing on life and feeling. “
In his art practices over years, He Jiaying always faces life and nature with a pious heart. The life and nature have become a great training ground which has successful cultivated his outstanding ability of feeling. We can all him a sensitive person. His pure heart always keeps extraordinarily sensitive to the nature and social affairs.
With the deepening of creation practices, his pure interest in fine brushwork painting gradually became an awareness of mission. In summary, to revive fine brushwork figure painting, he confronted two tasks, firstly how to acquire the reality of life by feeling; secondly, how to convert the “reality” of life into “beauty”.
To convert the “reality” of life into “beauty”, he creates fine brushwork paintings with free-style spirits and “artistic conceptions” with the core of poetry. He believes the artistic conception of a painting is not simple depiction of a real scene but a poetic conception, a dream world.
Thirdly, ultimate beauty of confusion
He Jiaying stated in his creation talk, “In respect to scenes, I always have an autumn sentiment. Such sentiment was very strong when I was painting 19 Autumns. I don’t see autumn as a season of harvest, rather more of gaunt , empty and elapsing sentiments.” Confronting the elapsing beautiful time, he was delicate and sensitive, however he soon found a beautiful embodiment to detain the passing time, namely, maidens. Although his aestheticism were insufficient to dispel people’s confusion and upset, it can give some comfort to their souls. Thus, in contemporary Chinese art circle, He Jiaying is the only artist who deserves “aestheticist”.
How come such aesthetic images, poetic confusion and indescribable sentiments became the most precious and touching things in our age? Firstly, it was a sentimental temperament formed in his individual growth. Such sentimental temperament was converted into a lonely homesickness and elevated to sympathy for the vulnerable farmers as he was sent down to the countryside like many intellectuals at that time. Secondly, the ideology during “the Culture Revolution” has made unprecedented destroy on his memory of beauty. He felt fearful and disgusting at the over exaggeration of visual stimulation and ceaseless revolutionary romantic sentiments in the mode of “the Culture Revolution”. Thus, his aestheticist image has been endowed with distinctive political implication. Since his aesthetic form grew out of special ideological background, it has great humanistic and moral strength inherently. His Dark Autumn is the representative work on this regard.
The field of beauty usually neighbors with affectation, vulgarness and categorization. He Jiaying knows this very well. On such subjects, the author and audience easily fall into a mindset of seeing female as beauty and neglecting their original abundant, natural and healthy connotations. So while shaping an aesthetic realm, he always keeps distance from these boring and vulgar neighbors by deeply understanding the individuality of the object and intensifying it in the painting as well as endowing the image with transcendental quality.
Although He Jiaying’s works have distinctive surreal quality, as far as his artistic conception and creation method concern, they are still realistic. “Ultimate beauty of confusion” has contributed a brand new aesthetic form for realism. Moreover, it also develop a microcosmic psychological narration path beyond grand realistic narration. He Jiaying also creates new aesthetic images of Chinese females.
Fourthly, glamour of language
In the history of fine brushwork painting, it was easily linked with “academy painting” or “artisan painting”. Due to simple lining compositions, plain coloring and structures of no vitality, fine brushwork became more and more vulgar . Thinking over this, He Jiaying realized the strongest support for fine brushwork revival was to build up a new language system for fine brushwork painting. He argued in his essay, “Fine brushwork figure painting should have artistic conception. Language should not be simply regarded as a matter of technique. It is determined by an artist’s talent and taste.”
Take an overview of He Jiaying’s works, it is hard to find absolutely independent techniques which separate from expression of emotions and intentions. In his paintings, techniques always emit specific vitality and rhythm while expressing the artist’s emotions and intentions and thereby dispel the inflexibility and artisan habits. Besides, his fine brushwork is rigorous yet not complicated or tedious because he is more skillful at handling the relationship of various language elements than other artists.
Talking of He Jiaying’s painting language, apart from his fine brushwork, we cannot overlook his achievements in free-style ink wash painting. In his artistic conception, “free style” is not only a painting form, but also the essential spirit and ultimate value of Chinese painting. He is greatly influenced by literati painting in Yuan dynasty. His mild, simple and light brushwork in leisurely subjects is meaningful for refutation of complicated and bustling real life. Therefore, an aesthetic ideal and form centered with “leisureliness” is set up. In his process, he understands the spirits of Chinese painting more deeply and draws distance from predecessors of free-style figure painting. He develops a brand new school of free-style figure painting.
We refer He Jiaying’s free-style ink wash painting to slight free style. In his slight free-style painting, he successfully controls his freedom on composition, lining and ink use to slightly loose the rigorous and neat composition and smoothen the forceful lines; yet his free use of ink is restrained by his self-restrained consciousness which is not easy to perceive. On this regard, his representatives include Sun Yat-sen In Tianjin, The Round Moon In The Sky and Dust-Free Autumn Water.
Fifthly, lonely lookout.
In contemporary bizarre art trend, it is extremely difficult for an artist to keep his uniqueness. However, in this respect, He Jiaying did it. Beyond the trend, his sensitiveness to real life, his unchanged lookout for realistic artistic ideal, his talent and poetry, his humanistic aesthetic glamour and his confident paces together form his unfashionable yet respectable posture. Over more than 30 years such posture has almost become classic. “The success of an artist is the success of personality.”Although he is over 50, he keeps childish innocence which is exactly the source of his creativity. As a lookout, his keeps belief in the nature, either on art creation or destiny. The lonely path of a lookout is also a self-cultivation path. As he said, “Loneliness is the greatest wealth for an art.”
Written by Zhang Xiaoling
Oct. 2009