Hosted by museum of Beijing Fine Art Academy, "Painting under the spirit of diligence, peace and treasuring time, Chinese painting exhibition of Huai Yi, Yao Zhenxi, and Le Xianghai" will be open at 2 P.M. 6th December, 2015. The three artists of this exhibition are all talents brought in by Beijing Fine Art Academy who are diligent in their respective position and at the same time, had admiring achievements in painting.  

      The theme of this exhibition “Painting under the spirit of diligence, peace and treasuring time” fits perfectly with the cooperation of these three artists. The boundary between “professional” and “amateur” of art was vague for ancient Chinese artists, especially the literati painters. The inscription of Qi Baishi’s “Three things to do in the spare time” says”Writing poems in the spare time of sleeping; Painting in the spare time of working; Longevity is just because of escaping from the misadventure”. It is known to all that Qi Baishi has a profound knowledge of poetry and painting, but for him, poetry and painting are just supposed to be done in the spare time after sleeping and working. The inscription is not only a reflection of his peaceful attitude towards poetry, painting and life, but also the deep thoughts he had through his art and life experience.

      Here, “Yu” in his inscription can be perceived as “amateur” and “spare time of life”, besides, it is also the indispensable “practice out of painting”. From this level, Huai Yi, Yao Zhenxi, Le Xianghai have the extremely similar inner awareness and external practice. They are able to have a balance between working and painting without being limited. Though being easily appreciated, their works are other than market production of “image flood”, but the reflection of their life and inner heart. This might be what the ancient saying ”Art comes from Life, but also need an artist's inspiration and creation to make it a piece of art” is about.  

      So when appreciating Huai Yi, Yao Zhenxi and Le Xianghai’s works, we can not limed our sights in the form. We can clearly feel the dynamic combination of objects and life in their works, which is exactly the visual thinking space where the receiver shall “fill in”. This is also one of the common points of the works of the three artists, on one hand, the background of the works are depicted as a non-existing being, but there is no such image in reality without the support of materials, so there must be inescapable conflicts and cross of boundaries in and out the painting. On the other hand, the artist form a statement space in the connection between his own heart and his works, which can be seen in Huai Yi’s “knicknacks from the painting studio”, “Part-time learning ” , Yao Zhenxi’s “Flowers beside the fence on the hillside”, “Flowers in the year of Yimo”, Le Xianghai’s “Imitating Li Tang ‘s ‘flower-picking’”, “horse painting”.

      The three artists have different expressions in their creations though they are colleagues. Huai Yi’s work embodies rich ancient meanings, absorbing essence from the ancient literature works while has totally new thoughts in the images. In comparison to Zhao Mengfu’s advocate for simplicity and tracing the past, Huai Yi is trying to pursue the modern lifestyle through traceable creation. To him, “painting is a decent while insignificant thing in the spare time”. In his creation, this “decent” is transforming to the delicate image, simple coloring, and peaceful composition. It is conceivable that Huai Yi ‘s description of life just conveys the dislocation of reality and his inner heart, which is a reflection of the artist’s aesthetic taste.

      Yao Zhenxi’s creation is about the description of the plants. His passion is like Goethe who is trying to discover the form of the plants----especially the eternal rules of the life. In comparison to his rational and scientific sights, Yao Zhenxi gave up the accurate sketch of the outline, but laid his emphasis on the fusion of the status of the natural plants and human spiritual world through the description of the different shape, type, characteristics of the plants. But his brushwork, coloring and composition are still closely connected to the traditional Chinese painting,  inundated with vibrancy and exuberant.

       Le Xianghai has insightful views about the Chinese painting----he thought that painting should not be treated as a “work”, and we have to feel more from daily life to find inspirations for the creation, as well as cultivating some other “interests”. Le Xianghai’s work also coincides with this idea, with no deliberate expression about style. In other words, he does not have an actual style. For different works, he attaches different brushwork characteristics and style to the figures. So, what important for him is neither the figures in the painting, nor the theme but the brushwork itself.