PRINTCatalogue Note:
THE MONUMENTAL BLACK AND WHITE PORTRAIT OF HUMANITY
I'M INTERESTED I N HUMANITY. MY
WORK CAN BE CONSIDERED AS KIND OF
A UNIVERSAL PORTRAIT. WHAT I PAINT
ALWAYS IS, DEEP INSIDE, AN IDEA OF THIS
HUMANITY.
– YAN PEI MING
Yan, whose work is based on a question of passage and identity, painted the first of his black and white portrait in 1988. The present lot epitomizes Yan's monumental bodiless face rendered with fast and sweeping ardent brushstrokes of broad gesture. He utilizes the anonymous face to augment the pictorial quality of the painting. According to the artist, the innermost emotions of one's joy, grief, anger and happiness are discernible from the expressions on one's face, it is thus the frontal face that can best represent humanity. In essence, "what goes into the making of the whole exhibits element of Expressionism and partly heading towards procedures of repetition that are all that Expressionism is not." Hence, "Portrait" is alleviate from burden of the distraction from resemblance arising from the identity of the subject on his canvas, which go far beyond a mere superficial resemblance of the features. The resulting composition enable the pictorial quality of the face to fully unfold. The face in the "Portrait" becomes clearer as the view moves away from the canvas, the pictorial effect in Yan's painting are thus both drawn and blurred simultaneously, these qualities resonates with the notion that Yan's approach is both intuitive and cultivated. The relative anonymity of the "Portrait" focuses less on the subjects resemblance but rather to addresses the humanistic qualities such as the nature of existence and the respective spiritual worlds of his subject.
It is apparent that the occidentalism influence is present in Yan's artistic approach, it nevertheless exhibits qualities of the orientalist as well. In particular, the utilization of the black and white color scheme uphold the expressive desire of the imagination in the Orient. This perhaps is a derivative from his early experiences in Shanghai as a gifted adolescent commissioned to produce propaganda f rescoes of cultural revolution and his subsequent relocation to Paris and teaching position at the Fine Art School of Dijon. Yan utilizes the two colors black and white to avoid detracting from the simplicity of his portraits. As he painted rapidly and with exquisite energy. the slurring of the two colors results in a mono-chromatic scheme of subtle gradations of tones and colors, which remains pertinent in extenuating the lively effect of his brushstrokes in forming the face as the heightened chiaroscuro conveys an impression of intense drama and visual power. As Yan posits, "I've always been very comfortable using black and white. For me it's a very sufficient palette to express what I want to say. And for me it's become a very direct way of painting, using black and white." The present lot conjures up imageries of Chuck Close's black and white portraits and a certain form of Expressionism in de Kooning's work, while at the same time exhibit a certain energy towards the canvas present in Georges Matthieu's artistic approach. The referential brushstroke in Yan's painting thus contrasts greatly with the orthodoxy of contemporary art as Yan paints, erases, covers and reveals the face of his subject matter that becomes illuminated as the viewer steps further back away from the canvas, thereby adding to the enigma of these bodiless face which forces one to explore the possibilities of the painter's intentions. In retrospect, Yan had been chosen by curators as different as Jean Clair for the 1995 Venice Biennale and Harald Szeemann for the Lyon Biennale in 1997. In 2009, Yan became the first living contemporary artist to have his solo exhibition "The Funeral of Mona Lisa" shown at the Louvre.
I'M INTERESTED I N HUMANITY. MY
WORK CAN BE CONSIDERED AS KIND OF
A UNIVERSAL PORTRAIT. WHAT I PAINT
ALWAYS IS, DEEP INSIDE, AN IDEA OF THIS
HUMANITY.
– YAN PEI MING
Yan, whose work is based on a question of passage and identity, painted the first of his black and white portrait in 1988. The present lot epitomizes Yan's monumental bodiless face rendered with fast and sweeping ardent brushstrokes of broad gesture. He utilizes the anonymous face to augment the pictorial quality of the painting. According to the artist, the innermost emotions of one's joy, grief, anger and happiness are discernible from the expressions on one's face, it is thus the frontal face that can best represent humanity. In essence, "what goes into the making of the whole exhibits element of Expressionism and partly heading towards procedures of repetition that are all that Expressionism is not." Hence, "Portrait" is alleviate from burden of the distraction from resemblance arising from the identity of the subject on his canvas, which go far beyond a mere superficial resemblance of the features. The resulting composition enable the pictorial quality of the face to fully unfold. The face in the "Portrait" becomes clearer as the view moves away from the canvas, the pictorial effect in Yan's painting are thus both drawn and blurred simultaneously, these qualities resonates with the notion that Yan's approach is both intuitive and cultivated. The relative anonymity of the "Portrait" focuses less on the subjects resemblance but rather to addresses the humanistic qualities such as the nature of existence and the respective spiritual worlds of his subject.
It is apparent that the occidentalism influence is present in Yan's artistic approach, it nevertheless exhibits qualities of the orientalist as well. In particular, the utilization of the black and white color scheme uphold the expressive desire of the imagination in the Orient. This perhaps is a derivative from his early experiences in Shanghai as a gifted adolescent commissioned to produce propaganda f rescoes of cultural revolution and his subsequent relocation to Paris and teaching position at the Fine Art School of Dijon. Yan utilizes the two colors black and white to avoid detracting from the simplicity of his portraits. As he painted rapidly and with exquisite energy. the slurring of the two colors results in a mono-chromatic scheme of subtle gradations of tones and colors, which remains pertinent in extenuating the lively effect of his brushstrokes in forming the face as the heightened chiaroscuro conveys an impression of intense drama and visual power. As Yan posits, "I've always been very comfortable using black and white. For me it's a very sufficient palette to express what I want to say. And for me it's become a very direct way of painting, using black and white." The present lot conjures up imageries of Chuck Close's black and white portraits and a certain form of Expressionism in de Kooning's work, while at the same time exhibit a certain energy towards the canvas present in Georges Matthieu's artistic approach. The referential brushstroke in Yan's painting thus contrasts greatly with the orthodoxy of contemporary art as Yan paints, erases, covers and reveals the face of his subject matter that becomes illuminated as the viewer steps further back away from the canvas, thereby adding to the enigma of these bodiless face which forces one to explore the possibilities of the painter's intentions. In retrospect, Yan had been chosen by curators as different as Jean Clair for the 1995 Venice Biennale and Harald Szeemann for the Lyon Biennale in 1997. In 2009, Yan became the first living contemporary artist to have his solo exhibition "The Funeral of Mona Lisa" shown at the Louvre.