Kamloops Art Gallery Hosts 20th Century Chinese Paintings

Friday, 14 July 2006 09:52

Kamloops, BC, Canada - The Kamloops Art Gallery is delighted to offer visitors a rare chance to view works of art from an outstanding and precious art collection this summer.

Tradition and Innovation in 20th Century Chinese Paintings will be exhibited until September 3, 2006.  Tradition and Innovation is organized and circulated by the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (AGGV), which holds one of the finest collections of Chinese art in North America.

Tradition and Innovation in 20th Century Chinese Paintings brings together 66 Chinese scroll paintings (watercolor and ink paintings mounted on long hanging scrolls) that date from the first days to the last days of the 20th century. 

Part of the collection of Brian S. McElney, one of the greatest collectors of Chinese watercolor paintings in the world, and now in the care of the AGGV, the works in Tradition and Innovation focus on three major themes: romantic landscapes, flowers and birds, and figure paintings.  These three categories are the traditional mainstays of scroll painting, yet works within each grouping vary widely and reflect one hundred years of change and development in Chinese society.

Traditionally, Chinese landscape paintings differ from Western realist landscapes and relate more closely to impressionism in that artists freely omit objects that are not essential to their thought process.  Their paintings create an inner poetic reality rather than an outward likeness and are often very romantic and tranquil.  Painted with great elegance and frequently with humor, the Chinese portrayal of creatures and plants are also quite different from Western depictions—they have an underlying simplicity not bound by time or place and are aimed at being in harmony with nature.  On the other hand, Chinese figure painters often exaggerate features and facial expressions of people, and often prefer to paint old, wrinkled people, in order to best capture the inner poetic reality of an individual.

With work by traditional Chinese masters, socialist realist painters under Mao, Taiwanese folk artists, and contemporary conceptualist painters, this exhibition offers a rich and rewarding overview of the complex, dynamic, and poetic art of Chinese scroll painting in the 20th century.

Visit The Kamloops Art Gallery at : http://www.kag.bc.ca/