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The Unique and Ordinary Craftsmanship: Xu Kuang’s Art of Monotype

  • show time：2018-03-17 to 2018-04-01
  • Organizer：China Academy of Fine Arts, Sichuan Literature and Art Association, Sichuan Artists Association and Beijing Academy of Fine Arts，Beijing Fine Art Academy
  • venue：Beijing Fine Art Academy
    Beijing Academy of Fine Arts will be hosting the grand opening of “The Unique and Ordinary Craftsmanship: Xu Kuang’s Art of Monotype” on March 17th, 2017. The exhibition is an initiative jointly sponsored by Chinese Artists Association, China Academy of Fine Arts, Sichuan Literature and Art Association, Sichuan Artists Association and Beijing Academy of Fine Arts. After the first exhibition in 2010 “The Sunshine on the Plateau: Xu Kuang’s art,” this will be the second solo exhibition of Xu Kuang at Beijing Academy of Fine Arts. It presents Xu Kuang’s creation in a comprehensive and systematic way, including his drawings and studies when he was a high school student at The High School attached to Central Academy of Fine Arts from 1954 to 1958, and his awarded artworks when he joined Sichuan Artists Association after graduation. The exhibition also brings together his monotypes and presents them as a special section on the second floor of the exhibition hall, which will allow visitors to have an in-depth perceptual understanding of Xu Kuang’s artistic career and achievements.
 
    Xu Kuang is the pioneering figure in Chinese modern and contemporary printmaking. His realism led the artistic style of woodcut printmaking in New China. However, as a successful artist of printmaking, in his late years, he chose to abandon the previous artistic forms and started to create monotypes. It is noteworthy that Xu Kuang had created over a hundred monotypes after his last exhibition at Beijing Academy of Fine Art in 2010, “The Sunshine on the Plateau: Xu Kuang’s art.” Considering Xu Kuang has already in his seventies of age, his spirit and commitment to art is admirable.
 
    This exhibition presents over forty selective monotypes. Monotype is Xu Kuang’s unique form of artistic creations. Instead of making prints from the carved boards, the carved boards themselves become artworks. While this artistic form keeps the black-white contrast from print, it adds texture to the surface, as it requires the artist to use the carpenter as the pen to work directly on the board.
 
    In this exhibition, most subjects of monotypes were based on Xu Kuang’s early life experience in Tibet. Looking at the artworks, the viewers would sense that Xu was keen on the minorities’ lives. Xu is competent in presenting poetic imageries with well-planned compositions and pictorial space. He captures people’s emotion and carefully depicted figure’s facial expressions. The intensive and precise lines are well balanced with the sketchy and rough lines. Xu’s skillful execution on the surface allows his artworks to engage the viewers.
 
    As a celebration for Xu Kuang’s 80th birthday, the dates of this exhibition were chosen to coincide with Xu Kuang’s birthday. This exhibition will end on April 1st, 2018.

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