The True Taste—Chinese Philosophy in Qi Baishi’s Art
- show time：2020-09-30 to 2020-11-08
- Organizer：Beijing Fine Art Academy
- venue：Beijing Fine Art Academy
The Art Museum of Beijing Fine Art Academy launched “The True Taste —Chinese Philosophy in Qi Baishi’s Art”, to appreciate the ingenuity and the way of speculation of Qi Baishi with the audience. This exhibition was presented in Athens, Greece in 2019, and it told the philosophy and aesthetics of Chinese culture with Qi Baishi’s creations. Under the grand blueprint of the “Belt and Road” initiative, it has witnessed the enthusiasm for cultural exchanges between Greece and China.
Qi Baishi once published a small seal, saying, “There is a true taste in this.” The word “true” actually depicts the most essential connotations of Chinese art and Greek culture in an appropriate way. The Greeks value the “truth”, and the early sages kept asking the truth about everything crossing time and space. Philosophy, mathematics, science, art... came into being and became the origin of European civilization. Chinese people admire “truth” and feel the true meaning of life from their own minds. It is as magnificent as the vast universe and as tiny as flowers, birds, and insects. They are all connected to “I”, and they are touched by “I”.
Qi Baishi’s paintings are full of his comprehension of nature and life. His landscapes are derived from realistic scenery, free from the stylized shackles of the “System of Four Wangs, namely Wang Shimin, Wang Jian, Wang Hui, Wang Yuanqi”, and they convey the Chinese people’s knowledge of homeland, mountains and even the vast universe in a simple way. His flowers, birds, grass and insects originated from his love for life, reflecting the spiritual temperament of Chinese literati and all things in nature: an affinity for the world, and a flower, a tree, a grass and a worm, wandering freely between the macro and the micro to experience the beauty of the world.
“The True Taste—Chinese Philosophy in Qi Baishi’s Art” gathers nearly a hundred works from Qi Baishi’s creations, through the trilogy of “Like or Not Like”, “Meaning Beyond the Image”, and “The Time Between Things and Me”, melodiously and tactfully, he sings the profound connotation of Chinese culture and the speculative way of Chinese philosophy. Viewers are expected to listen to the symphony of art and philosophy and appreciate the subtlety of Chinese painting and the profound aspect of traditional culture.
