Kaleidoscopic Reality
Paintings, Woodcuts, Sculpture by Fang Lijun ( de )

Alexander Ochs Galleries Berlin|Beijing, 2006

Whether gouaches of country idylls, pencil drawings of guys hanging about with their backs bent, ink drawings of powerful swimmers; whether drowning people in acrylics, grotesque footed heads cast in bronze, or woodcuts of crowds that burst out of the space of the picture: Fang Lijun (born in 1963) captures them with a distanced attitude, as if what is called for at a time of great social upheaval is to practice a form of individual historiography. With analytic precision, he defines the psychological state of the figures central to his work. The fact that since the 1990s each work is only titled with a date only serves to strengthen the impression that these works are a kind of visual diary.

Aquatic Dimensions

When we look at Fang Lijun’s works dedicated to the representation of water using the techniques ink, oils, acrylics, and woodcut, the subtlety and variety in the surface composition stands out. From soft transitions of ink using shades of gray, wave formations in royal blue and purple, to the lines in a woodcut, scratched into the material, in each work the artist achieves a redefinition of the visual space. There is a similar thematic breadth to the way people are shown responding to the water. Alongside works that show threatening situations, the artist also depicts swimming people with something that is otherwise impossible: flowing movements and relaxed faces. Attention is not focused on the outside, but is rather directed inward. Here, the harsh contours that normally separate people from each other and their surroundings have disappeared, replaced by a symbiotic flowing together. This dissolving effect of the water, liberating from all earthly weight, is fundamentally different from the way Fang Lijun represents the sky. Cloud formations move before a royal blue background. Colourful flowers lend the scenes a strangely fantastic appearance.

The Revival of the Woodcut

A direct, explicit correspondence between emotional dynamics and artistic expression is possible in the woodcut, where lines are cut into the actual material. The dramatic visual effect of this art form also inspired Kaethe Kollwitz in her anti-war woodcuts. Already in the 1930s, there was a great interest in the Kollwitz’ lamenting and accusing prints among the population of Shanghai, then suffering under civil war and occupation. The woodcut movement around the writer Lu Xun was inspired by the language of the German artist to use the woodcut to express the misery of their own living conditions. The traditional Chinese technique of woodcutting underwent a second heyday. Fang Lijun now once again refreshes this medium after the Cultural Revolution forced an interruption in China’s artistic productivity. On paper rolls of the kind that to this day can be found all over China, Fang prints scenarios charged with energy. Instead of the picturesque landscapes or calligraphy usually found on these rolls, groups or indeed crowds of people fill the visual space. These rolls put together side by side produce huge woodcuts, some of them in glaring colors.

Cynical Realism?

Fang Lijun has been considered the most renowned representative of ‘cynical realism’. ‘Cynical’ is how the Chinese art critic Li Xianting characterizes the attitude of many Chinese artists after the trauma of the events on Tiananmen Square in 1989. This label is hardly helpful for understanding of Fang Lijun’s entire body of work. But if we literally translate the actual chinese terminus technicus as- playing with the world - then it can indeed be made productive for Fang Lijun’s work. It is the artist’s kaleidoscopic view on the world around him. Formal distancing mechanisms like abstraction, contrasting, exaggeration, and unnaturally glaring colors lend the pictures an almost surreal character. Playfulness and the serious can no longer be thought of as opposites. Any claim to making conclusive statements about the state of reality - as done by socialist realism, for example - is clearly rejected.

Translation: Dr. Brian Currid

First published by: Alexander Ochs Galleries Berlin/Beijing