Wechat official account platan-art, June 16, 2018

Virtual Focus: Zhu Wei in UK

Written by A Serious Exhibition Reviewer - Qing Tong platan

Zhu Wei

Born in 1966 in Beijing,

He is a master of ink painting and takes painting as living.

He loves beer, as well as Rock ‘n’ Roll and jazz.

Zhu Wei is a typical Beijinger, a kind of human being who’re very good at criticizing contemporary problems humorously. He shows an extraordinary literary quality, that magazines often ask him to write essays or even a column for them. His writing is so funny and sharp, like his painting.

As an artist born and growing up in a military family in Beijing in the 1960s, Zhu Wei shows his reflection on the humanity of people in the political torrent. Although this kind of cold satires seems to be less discussed today, he has already created classics, and claimed his rightful place in art history.

Back in the 1990s, Zhu Wei was one of the earliest artists that emerged in the then burgeoning art market. Since 1993, he has been working with Plum Blossoms Gallery, a gallery that has branches and network in Europe, America and Hong Kong. Their tight-knitted cooperation lasted until 2005. In those 12 years, especially from the late 1980s to early 1990s, Zhu Wei’s ink paintings attracted a lot of attention, from overseas collectors to major art institutes. When numerous Chinese emerging artists were creating “political pop” and “satire-realistic” works with oil painting techniques, he keeps exploring the possibility of expressing the political life in contemporary China with traditional meticulous paintings. 

From his early work “Portrait No.2 derivative from Bada’s landscape brush style” in 1988, to his later 19 series “The Story of Beijing”, “Sweet Life”, “Supreme Treatise On Moral Retribution”, “Diary of the Sleepwalker”, “Utopia”, “Vernal Equinox”, “Hills Beyond A River”, “Red Flags”, and “The Ink and Wash Research Lectures series”, etc., Zhu Wei’s frames of reference are always ancient masters, such as Fan Kuan in Ming Dynasty (Ming Dynasty, 1368–1644), Shi Tao, and Bada Shanren in the late Qing dynasty and early Republic of China (Qing Dynasty, 1644-1912). Although the techniques he used, such as color selection, outlining and blending, have remained their basic traditional features, his works have been greatly distant from traditional meticulous ink-and-wash paintings.

Zhu Wei has kept painting ink and wash for over 30 years. It is even longer than the history of Chinese contemporary art. He is a witness, as well as a bystander. On the one hand, it is precious that he has reshaped our consciousness of Western Centralism and cultural subjectivity. On the other hand, since he has years of experience of overseas exhibitions, his professional history is not only valuable in the context of Chinese contemporary art, but also an important case of ink and wash research itself.

After his solo exhibition in the National Museum of Indonesia last year, Zhu Wei brought his works to London in 2018. The 15 new small paintings he created for the new show reveals the artist’s latest progress in his “Ink and Wash Research Lectures series”. After the exhibition, Qing Tong platan interviewed the artist, and we talked about his new works and the exhibition.

An Interview with Zhu Wei

Qing Tong: As an artist who are experienced in global exhibitions, this time you brought “Ink and Wash Research Lecture series” to your recent solo exhibition “Virtual Focus” in UK. In this series we can see your new exploration, including details of the subjects. For example, this time the newspaper is not only a medium, but also a carrier of information and cultural vocabulary. The image of human figure is faded, the concept is more profound, and even the mounting method is different. Could you tell us the conceptual implications of these latest works? And how does the British audience response?

Zhu Wei: Using newspaper as medium is to make the works less commercial. I want to convey my idea through ink and wash, while regarding it as a commodity will weaken the strength. For the mounting method, using the traditional format is a return. However, just like a frame of the Western oil painting, it has nothing to do with whether the work itself is contemporary.

The United Kingdom is not only an ancient civilization with a long history, but also a leading role in modern civilization. The British audiences are tolerant and peaceful, and elegant. They are easy to communicate, so there is no pressure for an artist in such a comfortable environment. In the past we loved to use words like “caused a sensation” to describe an exhibition that Chinese artists held abroad. It just showed our ignorance. Actually these audiences are very cosmopolitan and not easily astonished.

Qing Tong: Could you tell us some details of the exhibition?

Zhu Wei: This exhibition was planned two years ago. After that some of my new works went to the National Museum of Indonesia. So in this year, I created 15 small album-paintings for London, and they will go to Berlin in the next year. The gallery printed hundreds of brochures which have been given away quickly. Now I have only two brochures for myself.

Qing Tong: The subjects of your paintings are completely beyond the traditional ink painting’s scope, and so does your language structure. In the meantime, some of your rendering techniques are particularly traditional. How do you balance the inheritance and innovation? What are the difficulties and challenges?

Zhu Wei: I gave a lecture at the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts recently. Young people are the future of Chinese contemporary art, and learning from traditional painting can be contemporary - it will complete the contemporary art world. Our main task now is to protect our territory, and then the contemporization process will happen naturally. Today our contemporary art is just imitational, which cannot bear close inspection. It will be embarrassing to watch it in the future.

I found an interesting phenomenon when I went to exhibitions overseas: some foreigners, including young college students, didn’t know where China is, nor where Beijing or Shanghai is. Some people were even flushed for this question, but they were sincere, because they really don’t care about other countries; they just focus on doing their own things, and then wait for others to pirate their products. Therefore, if you accomplish something best in the world, then it is the best in the world. If you always think it’s greener on the other side of the fence, it only adds workload to yourself. This kind of difficulty is asking for trouble and meaningless.

Qing Tong: You have created 19 series over 30 years, and each series changed greatly from the beginning to the end, but it’s a process of gradual and continuous evolution. As for your own creation, have you ever encountered any problem? How do you do trial and error and make adjustment?

Zhu Wei: Objectively speaking, these 19 series are all explorations on the subject. What I do is only one thing - trying to turn the contemporary world into image. Although almost all ink artists have been doing the same thing in the past 30 years, few succeeded. Me neither. Sometimes there are some clues in my works, but it’s not clear enough, and it’s hard to judge it accurately.

These adjustments, at present or in a rather long period afterwards, have nothing to do with ink or materials. It’s impossible for contemporary people to create ink painting like ancients, and it’s even more nonsense to paint some archaistic artistic conception. This is a dead end.

Qing Tong: Just like Chinese language and English, Chinese painting and oil painting are two different ways of thinking. In the long run, we have all been affected by the West. However, as more and more ink paintings are exhibited abroad, can we say that Chinese painting also has some impact on Western culture?

Zhu Wei: There is no impact, that is, just overseas Chinese support it right now. The Western culture is very logical, and today's contemporary art is a natural result of it, thus it looks good. As for us, if we want to be influential on others, we have to be superior than others, including better values, etc. Artworks are only carriers. The truth of an undeserved reputation will be exposed sooner or later.

Qing Tong: Each era has its own aesthetics, nevertheless, in the past decades or even hundreds of years, we have been pushed forward by the West in a one-way street, and it seems that we have not yet developed our own "content". If we want to be unique in a homogenized world, the cultural genes in art is increasingly important. Since ink and wash is our unique form of art, as a long-term practitioner, what do you think we should do to perfect China’s traditional painting system?

Zhu Wei: It needs to be clarified that the so-called our contemporary art is a result of mad plagiarism and unscrupulous plundering, even to a point where it is too much to digest. The ZTE chip incident a while ago is a similar embarrassing example, which, and our imitated contemporary art, are the true level of our science and art. Imagining that we are forbidden to imitate Andy Warhol, Richter, David Hockney, Freud, Giacometti, Beuys, Chuck Close, and Nam June Paik, what’s left in Chinese contemporary art?

Then again, those who have traditional genes have the potential to establish our own style of contemporary art. We should have our cultural heritage, which will lead us to the real Chinese contemporary art, and such art will be an integrated part of the world contemporary art.

二零一八年六月十六日 微信公众号青桐

虚拟的焦点：朱伟在英国

原创： 认真写展评的   青桐platan 

 6月16日

朱伟

1966年出生于北京

以画画为生，擅长水墨画

爱喝啤酒，喜欢听摇滚乐、爵士乐

朱伟，典型的北京人，针砭时弊、嬉笑怒骂，他的文学素养高，常应杂志之邀撰写专栏，或自写散文，恣意的行文与画风一样的戏谑灵动，一针见血。

朱伟的作品以他六十年代出生于北京的军人家庭背景为底色，对政治激流中的人性的思考凌厉不羁，虽然这种冷峻的讥诮现在似乎已经少有人论及了，但他仍然构成了一个经典，并坐获相应的历史地位。

朱伟是90年代初最早一批进入正规商业运作的艺术家，从1993年开始与分支机构遍布欧洲、美国和香港的万玉堂画廊合作，一直持续到2005年。在这十余年中，朱伟以水墨为创作媒材的作品得到了海外藏家和艺术机构的极大关注，尤其是在1980年代末到1990年代初，当大量的中国新锐艺术家以油画媒介创作“政治波普”和“讽刺现实主义”作品时，他探索的是用传统工笔画表现当代中国的政治生活的可能性。

从1988年的《仿八大山水》开始，《北京故事》、《甜蜜的生活》、《太上感应》、《梦游手记》、《乌托邦》、《开春图》、《隔江山色》、《红旗》、《水墨研究课题》等十九个系列中，宋代的范宽、明末清初的石涛和八大山人一直是朱伟的参照系，他的作品在设色、勾勒、晕染等技术层面保留了传统工笔画的基本特征，但精神构成已经与传统的工笔画拉开了巨大的距离。

朱伟对水墨艺术30多年来的坚持，甚至先行于中国当代艺术，是亲历者也是旁观者，极为珍贵的是他为我们辨析了西方中心主义和文化主体的重塑，将他的个人历程与中国当代艺术的脉络进行比照，具有重要的参考意义，多年来在海外展出的经历和观察，也构成水墨研究的重要个案。

继2017印尼国家博物馆的展览之后，2018年朱伟的作品再次在英国伦敦展出，在这个最新个展中，艺术家特意创作的十五张小型册页作品，让观者看到了《水墨研究课徒》系列的最新演进。展后，“青桐”采访了艺术家朱伟，探寻新作和展览的更多细节。

 对 话 朱 伟

青桐：对于海外的展出经历您可谓是相当丰富了，最近英国的展览中，有看到《水墨研究课徒》系列的最新演进，包括画面主体的一些细节，譬如报纸不仅作为绘画的媒介在新作品被采用，报纸本身还承载了信息和文化语汇，人物的形象在消减，在观念的表达上更显深刻，甚至外在的装裱形式也都有了些不一样的趣味，这些最新的作品还有哪些观念上的深意？英国观众有何反应？

朱伟：报纸作为媒介是为了去掉更多的商业色彩，我只是通过水墨传达观念，不希望大家把它当作一件商品，削弱艺术作品本身应有的力度。传统的装裱是回归水墨应有的范式，有点像西方古典油画框，它和作品当不当代无联系。

英国也是一个历史优久的文明古国，对现代文明更是起到引领潮流的作用。英国的观众是宽容平和，甚至是优雅的，具备交流的基础，作为艺术家没什么压力，这是一个舒服的环境。以前我们动不动就引起轰动之类的词汇来描绘中国艺术家在国外的展览，显得既愚蠢又无知，人家什么没见过，又不是车祸现场。

青桐：能否具体介绍展览的一些情况？

朱伟：这个展览是两年前计划好的，中间部分作品去了印尼国家博物馆的展览，所以今年又特意画了十五张小型册页在伦敦做了这个展览，这批作品还会在明后年去德国柏林展出。展览印制了几百本小册子分发一空，我现在手里只有两本。

青桐：你的绘画主题可以说完全脱离了传统水墨的题材和程式化的语言结构，但是你的一些渲染技法又是特别传统的，在“守”“创”之间，您如何平衡？这之间的困难和挑战在哪里？

朱伟：我前一阵子在四川美院做了个讲座，和学生们交流了自己的心得。孩子们才是中国当代艺术的未来，向传统绘画学习才能当代，水墨画当代了我们就迎来了自己的当代艺术，世界当代艺术才有了一个完整的面貌。我们现在的主要任务是守护好我们的地盘，水到渠成自然就当代了，现在这种生硬莫名其妙的当代艺术禁不起推敲随着时间以后再看会很不好意思。

出国做展览多了发现一个很有趣的现象，很多外国人老的少的包括大学生在内大部分人不知道中国在哪儿，不知道北京在哪儿上海在哪儿，有的人被问的不好意思脸都红了，他们的态度是真诚的，但他们是真的不太关心其他国家的事儿，他们只是专注把自己手中的活儿做好，等着别人来剽窃盗版。所以说做好自己的做绝了它自然就是这个世界上最优秀的，如果吃着碗里看着锅里的就需要平衡，其实是给自己增加了劳动量，这种困难是自找的且毫无意义。

青桐：30多年的创作，到现在已经有19个系列了，虽然每个系列前后变化都很大，却是一个渐变和不断往前推进的过程，就你自身的创作来说，有没有遇到什么具体的问题？如何进行试错和调整，可否跟读者分享下的？

朱伟：这十九个系列客观的说是题材上的摸索，试图让当下进入画面，其实是做了一件事。三十年来几乎所有的水墨艺术家都在做这件事，把握准确的几乎没有，当然包括我在内，偶尔有些作品中隐约出现了些端倪，但是指向不固定，让人还无法判断准确。

这些调整和笔墨和材料无关，今后相当一段时间内也不会和这两个指标有关系。现在的人画水墨画无论如何都不会和古人一样，再画些仿古意境更是扯淡，这是条绝路。

青桐：就像语言的一样，中文和英文，国画和油画，思维方式本质上是不同的，长期的，都说我们受到了西方的冲击，反过来，随着越来愈多的水墨作品在国外展出，中国画是否也对西方文化产生某种撞击？

朱伟：目前不会有冲击，也就是海外华人捧捧场而已。西方的文化逻辑性很强，发展到今天的当代艺术是水到渠成，所以不难看。我们想冲击别人方方面面都要优越于他人才行，比如价值观什么的，艺术作品只是载体，名不副实的作品迟早会穿帮，那是件糟糕的事情。

青桐：虽说每个时代都有自己的审美，但这几十年甚至百年来，一直被西方推着往前走的我们，似乎还没有生长出自己的“内容”，在同质化中寻求差异，艺术的文化基因在这样的背景下，愈发值得深究，水墨是我们特有的，作为水墨艺术的长期实践者，您认为应该如何完善中国的传统绘画系统？

朱伟：这一点需要正名，几十年来的所谓当代艺术是我们疯狂剽窃和毫无顾忌的掠夺西方当代艺术知识产权，甚至都到了一时半会儿难以消化的地步。前一阵子的中兴芯片事件就很让人脸红，芯片事件再加上模仿来的当代艺术，就是今天我们科学技术和文化艺术的真实水平，如果安迪·沃霍，里希特，大卫·霍克尼，佛洛依德，贾科梅蒂，博伊斯，克鲁斯，白南准都禁止我们用，可以想得出中国的当代艺术还有什么。

话又说回来，不像这些艺术家同时又带有传统基因的，反而有可能成为中国自己的当代艺术样式。所以说我们应该有自己的文化传承，这种传承做好了走进当下就会出现我们自己的当代艺术，这样的当代艺术和西方的汇在一起才会是一个完整的世界当代艺术格局。