“When the Sages of Antiquity and the First Kings accepted Heaven’s command and received the (divine) tablets they thereby came to hold the magic power in the Tortoise Characters and the proffered treasure of the Dragon Chart….. Then Creation could no longer hide its secrets….. At that time writing and painting were still alike in form and had not yet been differentiated.
Zhang Yanyuan (mid-9th century) “On the Origins of Painting” Taken from “Why Chinese Painting is History by Wen C. Fong (Fong, Wen C. “Why Chinese Painting Is History.” The Art Bulletin, vol. 85, no. 2, 2003, pp. 258–280. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3177344. Accessed 18 Feb. 2021.)
In his paper “Why Chinese Painting is History” Wen C. Fong explains “For the Chinese both the ideographic script and pictorial representation functioned as graphic signs (tuzai) that expressed meaning.” He goes on to say, “Rather than colour or light, the key to Chinese painting lies in its calligraphic line, which bears the presence, or physical ‘trace’ (ji) of its maker.”
Huang Guo Qiang is a Chinese master of line, brush and of colour. Born in 1932, he is of Chinese descent yet hails from the sleepy West Coast Malaysian town of Muar, described in the Encyclopaedia Britannica as “…a town and port on the southwestern coast of Peninsular (West) Malaysia”. Muar is where the Nanyang Chinese artist Liu Kang had sojourned when the Japanese invaded China in 1937, and was to later comment on Malaya’s Japanese occupation (1941 to 1945).
Huang Guo Qiang, like Liu Kang, had studied at the Muar Chung Hwa Secondary School and graduated from there, in 1949. Nineteen-fifty saw Huang Guo Qiang studying in Singapore’s Zhongzheng Middle School (by Singapore’s Zhongzheng lake), and stepping out for further studies in China.
In Huang Guo Qiang’s teens he had studied oil painting and had been influenced by the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters, especially the Dutchman Vincent Van Gogh and the French/Peruvian Paul Gauguin, like many of his South East Asian contemporaries. A ‘Nanyang Style’ (or South China Seas style) of art, based on the fusion of Western (Parisian) and Eastern (Chinese) art styles with the addition of imagery from South east Asia grew as a fresh style of art, specifically in Singapore, and what later became Malaysia and being most active in the 1930s to the 1950s, but still relevant to the art of the region. Theoretically, Huang Guo Qiang could be counted in their number, but practically not.
Unlike the proponents of the Nanyang group of artists, where a distinct stylistic lineage may easily be traced back to European ‘Modernist’ artists, but more especially Gauguin, Huang Guo Qiang fully internalised Western ‘Modernist’ styles, making them his own. Those influences may be seen more clearly in Huang Guo Qiang’s ink, watercolour and oil (coloured) works like “Mom, Mom” and his images taken from the 500 Buddhist caves (Qianfodong, located in the desert, 15 miles south-east of the town of Dunhuang, north western China). In “Lin Dunhuang Mural” his paintings sing not just with the eloquence of his line work, but with his sheer joy of colouration and, perhaps, a hint of magic.
Like those artist exponents of the Nanyang style of painting, Huang Guo Qiang deepened his love of China and traditional Chinese arts and culture in his sojourn at Chinese art school. His love for Western Modernism and for the arts of China melded, integrated within him, enabling him to look afresh at the world and at his creations.
At the age of 21 (1953) Huang Guo Qiang left Malaysia (then called the Federation of Malaya), for China. He relates that…
“The influence of Malaysia's geographical and cultural influences, the formation of my habits and hobbies, until now (I am now more than 80 years old), still remain. The loves of drinking coffee, eating durian and so on are still there. Malaysia is a peninsula with three sides facing the sea. My home was in the Straits of Malacca on the western side of that small country. Every day I could feel the majestic, broad, vast sea, experience ochre skin, warm eyes, equatorial bodies resonant with colour, for these are the characteristics of all living beings under the hot equator, strong, warm, simple, and naturally integrated into my heart, and have, naturally, become the root stone of my art world. This hot flame of the equator ignites the blazing passion of my heart and never goes out.”
Born in the sun-drenched tropics, Huang Guo Qiang absorbed the brightness and colouration of the land of his birth. This can be seen in his many outstanding works of colouration. Even in his works concerning Chinese ethnicities, or depictions of the Dunhuang Buddhist murals, there is colour vibrancy, a warmth of colour in which the viewer bathes. There are intimations of Zhang Daqian’s love of colouration too, as well as his love for the Buddhist mural paintings at Dunhuang. Like great artists before him, Huang Guo Qiang has acknowledged the good and the great of Chinese and Western painting, while developing his unique style of painting, grounded in traditional Chinese mediums as well as Western notions but is, perhaps, better known for his stunning Chinese ink and watercolour works.
Huang Guo Qiang’s coloured Chinese ink paintings have all the exuberance and magical grace of a combination of the two traditional Chinese ink and brush styles – ‘Gong-bi’ (meticulous) and ‘Xie Yi’ (spontaneous freehand style). Coming from a Western art historical perspective, Huang Guo Qiang’s brilliant works have all the sparkle, and strength of line seen in Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec’s Parisian art works and exciting modern coloured Chinese paintings, reminiscent of the grand Chinese artists Zhang Daqian (mentioned above) and Liu Haisu (founder of the Shanghai College of Graphic Art later to become the Shanghai Art School, in 1914), especially in works like Liu Haisu’s ‘Huangshan Landscape’ (1978) and ‘Huang Shan mountain peak’ (1989). Lui Haisu, along with Lin Fengmian and Xu Beihong were instrumental in sharing their knowledge of Parisian artists, the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists, especially Van Gogh and Cezanne.
While Tsinghua University was founded in 1911, and once housed scholars like Fu Lei and Zhu Ziqing on its site in “Qing Hua Yuan (Tsinghua Garden)” which was the royal garden of the Qing Dynasty. China’s Central Academy of Arts & Design (CAAD), the art school Huang Guo Qiang attended, came into being several years later, in 1956. That is where Huang Guo Qiang enrolled to study ink art, book design and decorative art, in 1957. He graduated in 1960.
Beijing’s CAAD is now the Academy of Arts & Design (AADTHU), at Tsinghua University, Haidian District, Beijing. Huang Guo Qiang counts as one of the most honoured alumni. Huang Guo Qiang has served as the deputy director of the Department of Decorative Arts and book art; and has been the director of the foundation department, professor and member of the Academic Committee and title judging committee of the College.
Huang Guo Qiang is a former Director of Education of the Malaysia International Modern Art Group in China, as well as former Dean and Director of the School of Modern Art of Yunnan University, and former Vice President of the Hunan Zhengshan International School of Design and Art. Huang Guo Qiang is a member of the China Artists Association and a Director of the Beijing Art Education Society.
He has taught for more than 50 years, and is both an outstanding artist and a most revered educator. He has edited the book "Traditional Chinese Decorative Art", and has had the "Huang Guoqiang painting collection", and "Huang Guoqiang Painting Collection of Sketchs" published, and wells, "Huang Guoqiang Painting Collection of Soot Ink painting", and the "Huang Guoqiang Painting Collection of Coloured Ink characters".
Huang Guo Qiang has held exhibitions and academic lectures in Australia, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, France, Austria, Germany and Hong Kong, as well as in Harbin, Beijing, Shanghai, Lanzhou, Weihai, Jinan and other places in China. His work "snow lotus" was selected by the Ministry of culture of China to participate in the 33rd International Monte Carlo painting exhibition in Morocco. His biography may be found in the "Chinese Artist Celebrity Dictionary", and in the "World Contemporary Painting and Calligraphy Dictionary". The Japan Xiangyang Society published, "Chinese Painter Named Kam". His works have been collected by a number of national museums, art centres, art academies and private collectors.
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