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“For an artist like me, the most impor- tant thing is the pursuit of change,”Hong Xuguang said during an interview with Beijing Review several days into 2013.
Hong’s Beijing studio is filled with paintings and calligraphy, which hang on walls and stand in corners. Most of the work he refers to as“modern ink-colored painting.”
The artist was born in Wendeng, east China’s Shandong Province, during 1959. In 1983, he graduated from Hubei Fine Arts Institute (HFAI), majoring in Chinese painting before taking up a position as art teacher at a university in the south for 10 years.
HFAI is famous for its sketching classes: Its students often rank tops in contests. As an alumnus, Hong’s sketch work has been included as examples in university text books.
The artist spent most of the 1980s capturing scenes from across the country.
“I like sketching people or landscapes while traveling,” Hong said. “It has become a habit of mine.”
In addition to sketching, he has focused much time on studying ink painting, calligraphy, photography and graphic design over the past decades.
“If I adhered to only one type of art, I would never have formed my own style. I think it’s good to experiment,” Hong explained. “Perhaps deep down I’m just a rebel.”
Learning abroad
Hong, with a thirst for learning, left China for Europe in the 1990s to further his studies over the course of eight years.
During this time he visited many cities, absorbing Western culture as well as classic and modern art. It was at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) that he first came to grips with graphic composition, which came to play a significant part in his later paintings.
“My time at TUM had a major impact on my style,” Hong said. Germany played an important role in the development of modern art during the early 20th century via establishments such as the Bauhaus Movement of 1919.
“As far as painting goes, Western artists often pay more attention to composition, while the Chinese emphasize painting as an experience, resulting in relatively loose structure,” he explained.
“One of the most important lessons I learnt was the necessity to follow the times and pay attention to composition,” he said. “Studying in Germany was an uplifting experience for me.”
To broaden his horizons, Hong traveled to Australia and Singapore to attend advanced studies. “I like to learn from different cultures and art,” he said.
During this time the artist discovered a common lack of knowledge concerning Chinese ink painting. “In many foreign eyes, all such work looks alike. For this reason, European galleries seldom display ink paintings. “I think there is a cross-cultural obstacle,” Hong stressed. Wu Guanzhong (1919-2010), a famous Chinese ink and oil artist, once commented that the country lacked painters with a thorough knowledge of both Western and traditional styles.
In 1992, the artist and Wu made contact.“Master Wu pioneered the exploration of Chinese oil painting. Though we follow different lines, his efforts inspired me to become a crosscultural artist, combining both Western and traditional local styles,” Hong said.
Bringing forth fresh variations
Discovering new avenues in art is not an easy process.
“It’s like finding a window in a dark room. You have to grope around blindly,” Hong said.“For about seven or eight years I couldn’t find a new way. I felt so frustrated that I wanted to jump from a tall building,” he recalled.
In 2000, the artist created a series of abstract ink paintings based on the theme No Subject Variations, stumbling on a new style in the process, catapulting him to fame. Variations normally refer to a set of short musical pieces, repeated and developed in alternate form based around a central motif, Hong said. Similarly, he utilized graphic elements such as point, line and depth to depict various views on the same theme.
“I don’t want to pander to the mainstream aesthetic standard,” he admitted. “Abstraction underlines intuitive feelings and is hard to put into words.”
However, Hong emphasized that his work is still based on tradition. “We must bring forth fresh variations on age-old practices, however,”he explained. “In art the only thing that never changes is change itself.”
In ancient China, artists worked with black ink of different shades due to the monotone pigmentation of past materials. However, mod- ern painting is not limited by aspects of color, demonstrated by artists such as Hong, who prefers to use bright pigments.
In 2007, he was honored at the An Entrance to Classics of Chinese Water-Ink Painting ceremony while in 2008, his paintings were collected in the Chinese Paintings and Calligraphy Dictionary.
Since 2009, Hong has resided in Beijing, a center of converging culture and art where he feels like a fish in water, spending much time on sketching lotus flowers.
“In Chinese culture, the lotus represents cleanliness and honesty of an upright person,”he explained.
In 2011, Hong splashed an ink painting Harmonious Flourishing Time of Colored Lotus on a CCTV show as a representative work of contemporary Chinese art.
In addition, he won a gold prize at the Third East Asia Art Exchange Exhibition in South Korea during 2010 while, in the same year, his work scooped the best original award at the Fifth China Beijing International Cultural and Creative Industry Expo. In December 2012, Hong was short listed for the nation-wide Huaxia Star of Chinese painting and calligraphy master contest.
Hong’s Beijing studio is filled with paintings and calligraphy, which hang on walls and stand in corners. Most of the work he refers to as“modern ink-colored painting.”
The artist was born in Wendeng, east China’s Shandong Province, during 1959. In 1983, he graduated from Hubei Fine Arts Institute (HFAI), majoring in Chinese painting before taking up a position as art teacher at a university in the south for 10 years.
HFAI is famous for its sketching classes: Its students often rank tops in contests. As an alumnus, Hong’s sketch work has been included as examples in university text books.
The artist spent most of the 1980s capturing scenes from across the country.
“I like sketching people or landscapes while traveling,” Hong said. “It has become a habit of mine.”
In addition to sketching, he has focused much time on studying ink painting, calligraphy, photography and graphic design over the past decades.
“If I adhered to only one type of art, I would never have formed my own style. I think it’s good to experiment,” Hong explained. “Perhaps deep down I’m just a rebel.”
Learning abroad
Hong, with a thirst for learning, left China for Europe in the 1990s to further his studies over the course of eight years.
During this time he visited many cities, absorbing Western culture as well as classic and modern art. It was at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) that he first came to grips with graphic composition, which came to play a significant part in his later paintings.
“My time at TUM had a major impact on my style,” Hong said. Germany played an important role in the development of modern art during the early 20th century via establishments such as the Bauhaus Movement of 1919.
“As far as painting goes, Western artists often pay more attention to composition, while the Chinese emphasize painting as an experience, resulting in relatively loose structure,” he explained.
“One of the most important lessons I learnt was the necessity to follow the times and pay attention to composition,” he said. “Studying in Germany was an uplifting experience for me.”
To broaden his horizons, Hong traveled to Australia and Singapore to attend advanced studies. “I like to learn from different cultures and art,” he said.
During this time the artist discovered a common lack of knowledge concerning Chinese ink painting. “In many foreign eyes, all such work looks alike. For this reason, European galleries seldom display ink paintings. “I think there is a cross-cultural obstacle,” Hong stressed. Wu Guanzhong (1919-2010), a famous Chinese ink and oil artist, once commented that the country lacked painters with a thorough knowledge of both Western and traditional styles.
In 1992, the artist and Wu made contact.“Master Wu pioneered the exploration of Chinese oil painting. Though we follow different lines, his efforts inspired me to become a crosscultural artist, combining both Western and traditional local styles,” Hong said.
Bringing forth fresh variations
Discovering new avenues in art is not an easy process.
“It’s like finding a window in a dark room. You have to grope around blindly,” Hong said.“For about seven or eight years I couldn’t find a new way. I felt so frustrated that I wanted to jump from a tall building,” he recalled.
In 2000, the artist created a series of abstract ink paintings based on the theme No Subject Variations, stumbling on a new style in the process, catapulting him to fame. Variations normally refer to a set of short musical pieces, repeated and developed in alternate form based around a central motif, Hong said. Similarly, he utilized graphic elements such as point, line and depth to depict various views on the same theme.
“I don’t want to pander to the mainstream aesthetic standard,” he admitted. “Abstraction underlines intuitive feelings and is hard to put into words.”
However, Hong emphasized that his work is still based on tradition. “We must bring forth fresh variations on age-old practices, however,”he explained. “In art the only thing that never changes is change itself.”
In ancient China, artists worked with black ink of different shades due to the monotone pigmentation of past materials. However, mod- ern painting is not limited by aspects of color, demonstrated by artists such as Hong, who prefers to use bright pigments.
In 2007, he was honored at the An Entrance to Classics of Chinese Water-Ink Painting ceremony while in 2008, his paintings were collected in the Chinese Paintings and Calligraphy Dictionary.
Since 2009, Hong has resided in Beijing, a center of converging culture and art where he feels like a fish in water, spending much time on sketching lotus flowers.
“In Chinese culture, the lotus represents cleanliness and honesty of an upright person,”he explained.
In 2011, Hong splashed an ink painting Harmonious Flourishing Time of Colored Lotus on a CCTV show as a representative work of contemporary Chinese art.
In addition, he won a gold prize at the Third East Asia Art Exchange Exhibition in South Korea during 2010 while, in the same year, his work scooped the best original award at the Fifth China Beijing International Cultural and Creative Industry Expo. In December 2012, Hong was short listed for the nation-wide Huaxia Star of Chinese painting and calligraphy master contest.