F2 Gallery Hosts Wang Fei’s Solo Exhibition ‘Relationship’

Saturday, 22 July 2006 10:21

Beijing, China - An exhibition of Wang Fei’s works, organized by the F2 Gallery from Spain, opened in Beijing on the 15^th of July 2006.  As a result of the artist’s exploration in contemporary inkwash and other modern media in recent years, the featured works not only stand for Wang Fei’s personal artistic development, but also stand at the forefront of Chinese ink painting.  Despite the allure of increasingly diversified artistic forms, he sticks to his own ideas and focuses on the potential evolution of a traditional medium.  By engaging the gaze of the West through his works, he attempts to introduce Chinese culture to a wider audience.  ‘Ink and wash is the soul of Chinese culture, not to be replaced by any Western import.  It stands for our right of speech.  Only by adhering to ink and wash can we retain our identity and bridge the gap between the Chinese and the global cultures’, said Wang Fei.  He therefore believes in propelling the development of Chinese art with the modern ethos of ink and wash.

The exhibition curated by Lu Hong features a selection of Wang Fei’s recent works《Relationship》.  It is the first time F2 Gallery has exhibited works by a contemporary Chinese ink and wash artist.  We expect the exhibition to spur on further development of the art form, to spark off academic debates, and to engage a wider audience in general.

Wang’s works are unfettered by the constraints of tradition linked to the art form and address contemporary existential conditions and various social issues.  Wang takes an extremely rational attitude toward reality and its representations.  One cannot help but feel the deep structure of artist’s feelings and thought emerge on the surface of the works that appear to be aloof and rational at the first sight.  ‘As an artist, Wang Fei senses the connections and ruptures that appear in reality and in the cultural environment around him.  He tries to articulate their impacts on him’, said art critic, Jia Fangzhou.