On 30 June 2006, the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute announced the best graduation works among that year’s class, with only two students in that year won First Prize: one from the Printmaking Department and one from the Chinese Painting Department. Hao Liang’s painting Skimming represented the latter. This large four-panel work, measuring about 2 x 4 m, was the largest he had made at the time. Hao Liang, then in his early twenties, enjoyed winning prizes, but he had not imagined that he would make a name for himself in the next decade for his seamless blend of the traditional meticulous (gongbi) technique of Chinese realism and the idealised aesthetics and visual rhythms of Renaissance frescoes. He gained a reputation at the 7th International Ink Art Biennial in Shenzhen (2010), and later, as a recognised pioneer in the field, he took part in ‘Shuimo: Meet Revolution, The New Silk Road’ at Beijing Minsheng Art Museum (2015). He cemented his international reputation after participating in the main exhibition of the 57th Venice Biennale (2017). Two years later, he was named one of the ‘Top 10 Contemporary Artists Under 45’, and he became a leader of New Ink and the cohort of Chinese contemporary artists born in the 1980s. When he painted Skimming, Hao Liang had not yet experienced his many successes nor had he developed the finely dressed skeletal figures, spindly plants, alienating organ-like landscapes, and magical, miraculous animals that would become his trademarks. This work presents the painter’s earliest intentions and heralded his future fusion of traditional Chinese ink painting with the lineage of contemporary art.

Classical allusions lie at the core of Hao Liang’s work to date. From the titles, figures, and imagery he employs, as in Poison Buddha, The Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, and Treatise on Bamboo Skeleton Painting, viewers can deduce which ancient sage’s classic work referenced, reflecting his immersion in historical subjects, ancient texts, and classic art. As Hao describes it, he takes an ancient artist’s approach to creating contemporary art; he uses ancient techniques but responds to the contemporary moment. When asked if Skimming had an ancient source, he said that his university years were the only inspiration. He wanted to paint the students he would see daily at the academy. Aside from the woman in pink, who was a student in the Fashion Department, the other models were his classmates from the Chinese Painting Department. A self portrait of Hao Liang stands in the far left of the composition, pulling a funny face and perfectly articulating the ease and bewilderment of a university student.

Skimming is Hao Liang’s largest piece from his student years. Though his trademark skeletal figures do not make an appearance, his remarkable skill in gongbi painting is already evident. The texture on the denim skirt of the young woman leaning over in the foreground is clearly painted and every eyelash and strand of hair are carefully differentiated, showcasing Hao’s mastery of this ink painting technique. He has always worked slowly and deliberately, nurturing and representing his creative ideas with a stalwart painstaking spirit. He remarked that making one painting per year is considered good progress; the present work took him a long time. At first glance, this painting seems to realistically depict an everyday scene, but from the details buried in the painting, the viewer gains a clue to a theme that will permeate his later work: developing his own style from explorations of antiquity.

Philip Tinari, director of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, said that, if you want to understand Hao Liang’s work, you don’t need to be familiar with Chinese art history, but if you happen to look at his paintings very closely, you will discover citations and intertextualities. In this way, Hao builds context for what the viewer sees. Skimming is an exercise that Hao painted at the beginning of his career. Through his distinctive ink painting methods, he activates associations with classic works of art. Take the artist’s self-portrait as an example: the mischievous face he makes is reminiscent of Youth Making a Face, a well-known painting by Baroque Flemish painter Adriaen Brouwer. The dazed young man on the right side of the composition looks upward and leans back. One of the paper airplanes brushing past him looks like an arrow about to pierce him through the heart, a reference to the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian often depicted in Western art. The paper airplanes flying across the painting from left to right guide the viewer’s eye and create dynamism and continuous narrative in this otherwise still scene, an effect reminiscent of Renaissance religious frescos containing multiple parts of the same story. This compositional method had a significant influence on his later The Tale of Cloud, The Scroll of Ten Thousand Rocks, and The Flourishing and Withering in Four Seasons. On the paper airplanes and the figures’ clothing, Hao used a particular technique that allowed him to peel off the paint in certain places to simulate the weathered, fragmentary appearance of the Dunhuang wall paintings. Set off by the hazy composition and dim colour palette, the painting presents the desolation of passing time.

‘I was still really young,’ said Hao Liang of those paper airplanes. ‘I thought that the dynamism of light paper airplanes cutting through space invisibly linked the figures’ different lives, personalities, predicaments, and expressions. It was an immature but romantic idea.' Hao Liang noted that the people in the painting are no longer in art the art field. While he is still in contact with one of them, he has lost touch with the rest. Hao, a devout Buddhist, reflects on and appreciates the students in the painting as individuals, representing a sutra that he had long contemplated: ‘One is born alone, and one dies alone. One comes alone, and one goes alone. One bears both joy and pain alone; no one to bear them on your behalf.’ He expresses his subconscious feelings through the craggy, withered tree standing alone in the background. In Hao’s later Standing Alone in the Cold Woods, The Hunter and the Transformations of Hell, and An Anecdote from the Grove, this strange, lonely tree would reappear, the bare branches accenting the skeletons, pilgrims, and monks, and embodying the artist’s exploration of the cycle of life and death on earth. In an interview last year introducing his new work Ode to Dead Trees, Hao cited the poem of the same title by Northern Zhou poet Yu Xin to describe his tree imagery. People are metaphors for trees and trees are metaphors for people; the flourishing and withering of a tree can be used to reflect the ups and downs of human life. Only the trunk remains of the lonely, withered tree in Skimming, but Hao’s interest in Existentialism and the voids in Chinese aesthetics had taken root and sprouted.

Hao Liang explained, ‘I see painting as writing. At every stage, my interest in painting has changed. I collect and organise my ideas and present them as they are.’ Skimming is an early blueprint for his artistic career. The work brings together the influences of Chinese traditional techniques, the tests of Western classical painting, the profundity of classical Chinese literature, and meditations on transience from Buddhism. He collects ideas and allegories from all times and places, then keeps certain small moments, like little paper airplanes, that can activate traditional cultural symbols and their associated worldviews.

2006年的6月30日，四川美術學院發報了當屆本專科畢業生優秀畢業作品的評選結果。應屆學生爭相角逐的一等獎殊榮僅兩名，分別來自版畫系和國畫系，而郝量的畢業作《掠過》正以後者代表的身份，登在獎項名單榜首。這幅約兩米乘以四米的宏大四聯拼，是當時藝術家筆下尺幅最大的作品。才二十出頭的郝量獲獎甚是歡喜，卻又何曾預料在未來十數載，他將憑藉無縫揉合中國古典寫實的傳統工筆與西方文藝復興濕壁畫視覺效果及韻味別具的骨骼人體美學，在第七屆深圳水墨雙年展聲名大噪（2010年）。隨後他更以先驅、承拓者身份參與北京民生現代美術館的「水墨：世界變革與藝術新路」大型水墨藝術展（2015年），接著獲邀參與第五十七屆威尼斯雙年展的主題展且揚名國際（2017年），並在兩年後躋身「45歲以下當代藝術家首10人」，成為當代中國80後藝術家及「新水墨」的領軍人。駐足於《掠過》跟前，郝量的種種成就仍未破繭，觀者亦不見其標誌性的華服骨骼人體、骨節花草竹枝、異化器官山水、幽邃奇珍異獸。本作所呈，乃畫者一顆赤子般的初心，以及成就其往後對傳統中國古典水墨的闡釋與當代藝術脈搏接軌的一面前瞻旗幟。

宏觀郝量迄今的作品，「引經據典」四字可謂貫穿其創作核心。觀者可通過郝量作品的標題、描繪的人物、運用的圖像，例如《毒浮屠》、《竹林七賢》、《竹骨譜》等，推敲藝術家取材自哪位古人哪本典籍，強調其對歷史題材、古文及古藝的沉浸與精究。套用郝量自己的形容，他在用古人的心創作當代的藝術。應他取法古人以回應當下，問起《掠過》有否古源可溯，郝量意外地坦率表示，此源僅是自己的青蔥大學歲月，希望捕捉當時學院裡經常見面的同學的生活模樣。除了穿粉色衣服的服裝系女生，其他模特兒均是郝量國畫系上的同學，而郝量本人則站在構圖的最左方，滑稽地裝著鬼臉，大學生的淳樸爛漫不言而喻。

《掠過》作為郝量學生時期最大尺幅的作品，縱使未見他筆下獨樹一幟的皮殼骨骼形象，其超群的工筆造詣已顯露無遺。從在前景叉腰的女生身穿的丹寧布料紋路，以至人物的每根髮絲睫毛，都勾勒分明，一絲不苟，凸顯著郝量對水墨技法的精金百煉。郝量一直秉承慢工出細活，恪守紮實畫工以滋養並體現創作的理念，認為一年能畫成一張就著實很好了，而以《掠過》的尺幅而言，也需時甚長。本作乍眼看似刻畫入微的日常紀事，卻可從固中細節梳理出畫中埋下，那日後貫穿郝量創作模式的苗頭：考掘遠古，從中演變自我。

尤倫斯當代藝術中心館長田霏宇曾說，要解讀郝量的作品，不需要熟悉中國藝術史，但要自發去做一點認真研讀，繼而梳理出各種引用和互文性，如此一來便能為所見的內容搭建一個語境。《掠過》正是初出茅廬的郝量繪製的一道練習題。他以其獨有的水墨演繹方式，激發觀者對藝術經典名作的聯想。以畫中的藝術家作例，其搗鬼形象令人想起巴洛克時期的佛蘭芒畫家亞德里安・布勞威爾與其名作《齜牙咧嘴的年輕人》。構圖最右方的男生一臉納悶，昂首抬眼，身軀後仰，掠過胸前的紙飛機像箭頭直擊心房，宛若西方藝術史中聖塞巴斯蒂安的殉道寫照。貫穿畫作的紙飛機從左至右引領觀者目光，在單一場景裡營造動態和連續性敘事，呈現出文藝復興時期宗教壁畫的一圖多重敘述的效果，此構圖手法對郝量後期的《雲記》、《萬萬石卷》、《四季榮枯》等大型作品影響尤甚。郝量更特意在紙飛機跟人物的衣服上使用「脫粉法」，以致顏料局部剝落，意圖凝造敦煌壁畫風化的殘缺感，並在黯雅的構圖用色襯托下，微顯時光飛逝的蒼涼。

論及紙飛機時，郝量笑嘆當時年少，感覺紙飛機那輕輕劃過空間的動態，像把各人各異的生活、性格、自處、表現都在無形中連串起來似的，意境稚嫩，卻與大學生的青春浪漫格外相符。郝量憶述，畫中之人都已經離開藝術圈，而當中只有一位還有聯繫，其他都已經失聯。篤信佛學的郝量少時對畫中同學作為個體的反思和感悟，彷彿暗示他早已開始琢磨佛經那句「獨生獨死。獨去獨來。苦樂自當。無有代者。」，並潛意識地寄情於獨自佇立在後的嶙峋枯樹。這棵奇兀的孤樹在郝量後期的《寒林獨立》、《獵人與地獄變》、《林間記》等傑作中反復出現，以禿枝折繞的驅態映襯不疾不徐的骨偶香客僧士，體現畫家對凡塵生滅輪迴的探究。郝量在去年一則介紹新作《枯樹賦》的訪問中，引用北周詩人庾信的同名原詩就樹這個圖像加以詳述，以人喻樹，以樹喻人，借樹木榮枯，描人之少壯殘歿。故此，《掠過》中的寂寥枯樹衰僅其軀，而郝量對「存在主義」和中國美學中的「虛空」學理的興趣及追求正紮根萌芽。

郝量解釋：「我視繪畫為寫作。隨著每個階段對繪畫一體興趣的變化，我把我的想法收集起來，組織起來，如實地反映出來。」因此，《掠過》堪稱郝量藝術生涯的雛形藍圖。它彙集了藝術家受中國傳統技法的浸淫、西洋古典主義畫派的洗禮、古籍之博大精深、佛學的凡相虛妄觀自在，並從中過濾出古今中外的通融思維，寓言式的陳述媒介，繼而集腋成裘，儲備能激活傳統文化符號及其相應認知觀的一隻隻紙飛機。