Artists connected to Shanghai star in Jiushi Art Museum's last show for 2023

"In Shanghai," the last exhibition of 2023 for Jiushi Art Museum opened last week.

The exhibition, running through February 26, 2024, features 60 artworks by 20 artists and designers who have lived or are living in Shanghai for long periods.

Among them are three generations of artists including big names varying from Lin Fengmian (1900-1991), Liu Haisu (1896-1994), Yan Wenliang (1893-1988) to Chen Yifei (1946-2005), Ding Yi, Liu Jianhua, and Yang Fudong.

Since the opening of Shanghai as a port in the middle of the 19th century, the city has relied on the advantage of its geographical location and developed a solid economic foundation with a profound humanistic background.

There emerged a large group of prominent artists who have strongly influenced the history of modern Chinese culture and art.

At this exhibition, visitors might find the various art forms created by the representatives from the three different generation of the artists that have close ties with Shanghai.

Liu Haisu, Yan Wenliang, and Lin Fengmian, the pioneering Chinese artists who devoted themselves to the fusion of East and West, not only carved a special art path, but also had a seminal influence on later generations. Their oriental aesthetics are perfectly merged with the Western painting technique on canvas.

Beginning in the 1980s, Shanghai artists Chen Yifei, and Chen Junde (1936-2019) continued such collision of West-meets-East in their paintings via new subjects and styles.

It is also interesting to find contemporary artworks by Ding Yi, Liu Jianhua, and Yang Fudong, all heavyweight names on today's international contemporary art stage.

"Traces" by Liu Jianhua features a cluster of daunting water drop-shaped forms as if they are flowing down the wall. In fact, Liu, one of the top Chinese ceramists, tries to expand the scope of ceramic, the traditional material, with new possibilities and meanings in art.

The artworks created by the new generation of artists including Liao Yuan, Tang Shu, Shi Zhiying, and Lu Dan can also be seen. Lu Dan's "A Cloud" depicts the shape of a cloud against a dark backdrop. Here, the artist aims to reflect the moving rhythms of the cloud in her painting.

One of the highlights is "Sunrise on the East China Sea" co-created by Fan Dian, chairman of the China Artists' Association, and Liu Shangying, a professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts.

Based on the draft of this oil painting, the finished painting, the largest indoor realistic landscape, is now on permanent display at the Grand Hall.

Date: Through February 26, 2024 (closed on Mondays), 10am-6pm

Venue: Shanghai Jiushi Art Museum

Address: 6/F, 27 Zhongshan Rd E1

Admission: 38 yuan (US$5.32)

中山东一路27号6楼