The Passing of a Great Master
By admin on 2015-01-14

Wu Guanzhong, one of the most revered and collected contemporary Chinese art masters passed away at Beijing Hospital late Friday night, at the age of 90.

Known as a fighter of "saying the truth," Wu's death was announced Saturday by his family.

"It is a great loss for the Chinese art world," Xu Jiang, director of the National Academy of Art, where Wu studied in his youth, told the Global Times. "Wu's excellent paintings and his diligence in exploring artistic innovation have set an example for all of us in the art circle."

"Without Wu, there will be no artist who is mastered both at traditional Chinese culture and Western painting spirit, which is a great loss to us all," commented Yu Weiping, owner of Thread Gallery in Beijing.

Born in Yixing, Jiangsu Province in 1919, Wu graduated from the National College of Art in 1942, the then most prestigious art school and precursor of the China Academy of Art. Taught by famous art educators such as Lin Fengmian, Wu learned both traditional Chinese painting and Western oil painting at the college.

He went to Paris to study Western painting in 1947 after graduation and returned to China in 1950 after the founding of the People's Republic of China. A professor at Tsinghua University, Wu made significant innovations both in artistic creation and art education in China.

Adeptly integrating Chinese ink and wash with Western painting skills, Wu was widely acclaimed as a contemporary art master with achievements on par with art masters Qi Baishi, Xu Beihong, Lin Fengmian and Liu Haisu, all who made great contributions in modernizing Chinese art in the 20th century.

"Master Wu's most precious quality lies in his lifelong exploration of artistic innovation in integrating Western painting skills and traditional Chinese art and culture," Fan Di'an, director of the National Art Museum of China, told the Global Times after learning of Wu's death. "With a profound understanding of Western art, Wu also attached importance to traditional Chinese art and culture, which is especially hard to achieve for contemporary artists."

"I love both traditional Chinese art and the bold way of expression that lies in Western oil painting. I always garnered inspiration from the two aspects in my art career," Wu told the Global Times at the opening ceremony for his good friend Chu Teh-chun's retrospective at the National Art Museum of China on March 4.

In his lifelong artistic career Wu insisted that Chinese ink and wash should be developed with the times and integrate Western painting elements. He also determined that while creating oil paintings, Chinese artists needed to find a path to connect traditional Chinese culture.

Fan explained that Wu made great contributions in filling the gap between art and everyday people, with many of his works focusing on familiar, everyday subjects.

"In one aspect, master Wu's works are of high value in terms of both painting techniques and aesthetics, which are hard to be surpassed. On the other hand, he always chose something people loved to see as his subjects," Fan wrote in an essay commemorating the art master. "It is no easy task to unite the two aspects perfectly."

Wu's representative paintings include The Three Gorges, Hometown of Lu Xun, Spring Snow and The Great Wall, all with simple subjects and valued artistic merit.

Wu's works are in high demand on the world art market and command exorbitant prices. One of the most heavily-collected contemporary Chinese artists since 2000, Wu's works are hotly pursued both in and out of China. Total sales of his work at public auctions reached 1.78 billion yuan ($262 million) late last year, according to Huran Report data, second only to top-selling Chinese artist Qi Baishi.

Among many of his works commanding extraordinarily-high prices, his oil painting Ten Thousand Kilometers of the Yangtze River, created in 1974, sold for 57.12 million yuan ($8.4 million) at Beijing Hanhai's auction earlier this month. Wu's Northern Landscape sold for 30.24 million yuan ($4.5 million) at China Guardian's 2009 autumn sales.

Dong Guoqiang, general manager of auction giant Bejing Council, Sunday predicted that prices of Wu's works will soar rapidly after the master's death, due to the artistic achievements he made and the important position he will always hold in China's contemporary art world.

The number of works by Wu is far less than other contemporary artists, since he was very strict with himself in his artistic creations, according to Dong, who pointed out that it is widely known Wu would destroy pieces he was dissatisfied with, no matter how long they took him to complete.

Despite seeing his works frequently auctioned for millions of dollars, Wu's ambition was far from making money, he often donated his art to public museums and organizations, with the aim to "let more people have a chance to see my works," as he said during an exhibition at Shanghai Art Museum last year.

The exhibition featured 160 pieces that Wu donated to the museum and was a great success, with hundreds flocking to view the works each day, according to Li Lei, vice director of Shanghai Art Museum.

Wu's most recent donation was five ink paintings to Hong Kong Museum of Art, bringing his total donations to the museum to 52 pieces. At a press conference to mark the donation Friday, Wu's son, Wu Keyu, said that "despite the hefty prices, my father's cherished wish is to enable more people to enjoy his works. So he insists on donating his best works to public museums instead of selling them."

"There is no boundary in terms of art, art belongs to the world, not to a certain nation or country," Wu Guanzhong said after donating 113 pieces of his work to Singapore in 2008, a move that generated heated controversy in the Chinese art world.

Wu is well-known for such straightforward actions and words, standing true to his core beliefs and often criticizing not only other artists' attitudes on taking art as a way to earn money, but also China's art education system. He called for canceling fine art associations and academies funded by the government, saying that removing them would encourage artistic innovation.

"It was a long way to go from a painter to an artist, most stopped as painters, working to earn a living and getting famous," Wu once wrote in an essay. "Art is inspired from the heart and soul and there is no way to sell them," he wrote.

According to Wu's wishes, a public funeral will not be held.

Wu is survived by his wife, three sons and their families.