Liu Xiaodong

signed in Chinese and dated 1993

Private Asian Collection
Acquired by the present owner from the above

China, Beijing, The Palace Museum, A Selection of Calligraphy and Paintings from the Collection of Mr and Mrs Ullens de Schooten of Belgium, 2002, pp. 144-145, and 179

Decrop Jean-Marc Ed, Liu Xiaodong, Loft Galerie, Paris, France, 2006, p. 17

This work is generally in good condition. There are two perforations, probably made by two nails to the top edge of the canvas with associated paint loss. Paint cracks to the edges, especially along the right edge. There is a small patch of buckling to the canvas on the left edge. Having examined the work under ultraviolet light, there appears to be no evidence of restoration.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Strokes of Affection
Liu Xiaodong

Featuring his lover Yu Hong, Relaxing in Spring (Lot 779) is one of Liu Xiaodong’s early works which is very secretive and personalis.  The piece was painted in 1993, a year of extraordinary significance for Liu.  In this year, he was to marry Yu Hong in the United States, culminating their nine-year courtship.  For collectors Guy and Myriam Ullens, Relaxing in Spring is their first acquired work by a contemporary Chinese artist.  Thus the painting also bears a special meaning to them.

Amidst the trends led by Political Pop and Cynical Realism in the nineties, Liu Xiaodong has never changed his goal of aiming at the ordinary people in society.  The friends surrounding him are also important subject matters in his works.  Through painting them, Liu seizes the ephemeral light on and silhouettes of physical bodies in the world of mortals, solidifying time with his remarkable brushstrokes.  Chasing after the traces of living on his tableaux, Liu endeavours to present the energy within that solidifies life.  “I particularly hope that my paintings can be more solidified.  What is the basis of solidification?  It is my in-the-moment feeling, which may be solidified after lengthy polishing and refining.”  This energy of life reflects the Zeitgeist.  In Relaxing in Spring, cooling off in the shade on a rattan chair in a vegetable farm, Yu Hong smiles at the artist / viewer.  Liu Xiaodong solidifies this emotionally moving instant.  Bathing in the evening twilight, the painting is full of warm colours, expressing the artist’s tender love for his lover.  Painted before the wedding of Liu Xiaodong and Yu Hong in the States, Relaxing in Spring is a witness of the couple’s pledge of everlasting love.

Born in 1963 in Jincheng, Liu Xiaodong arrived in Beijing as early as 1981 to attend the affiliated high school of the Central Academy of Fine Art. In 1984, along with Yu Hong, he won admission to the Third Studio of the CAFA’s Oil Painting Department. When he graduated 4 years later, he was sent to teach at the affiliated high school. Campuses were infused with idealism in the eighties, when the ‘85 New Wave swept across art schools large and small across the whole country. But for Liu Xiaodong, many trends and behaviours of the New Wave were “excessive and immature.” He was a little uncomfortable in a jingoistic, conceptualist art world. In the eighties, he also tried to use his body as a medium, for example by spreading ink on his body and rolling around in trash. It was only later that he rediscovered the creative drive in painting. “So I just followed a natural path and did what was most familiar and natural.”¹ To be sure, the ‘85 New Wave had made everyone who wanted to paint seem passé and old-guard. “I wanted to do things honestly, but also to paint explosively.”² In 1989, Liu Xiaodong was invited to the controversial landmark exhibition, “Chinese Avant-Garde.”

His submissions Smoker and Resting were impressive first attempts, but these paintings of his friends smoking and resting, with their realist documentary vision, were at odds with the highly conceptualist and aggressively idiosyncratic tone of the exhibition. Following the student political movement of 1989, Liu Xiaodong’s works became more clearly in tune with the times. In 1990, he organised his first solo show, “Liu Xiaodong’s Oil Paintings,” which generated a tremendous response. Although he did not participate in the “New Generation Art” exhibition of 1991, his painting style had already begun to influence painters of the nineties, such that he was in fact the earliest of the “new generation.” At the time, the famous critic Li Xianting, who articulated the influential notion of Cynical Realism, thought that Liu Xiaodong, like other realist artists of his generation, felt helpless and lost in the face of insurmountable powers. “[Your, i.e. Liu Xiaodong’s] concern for individuals was a coming down to earth from the high vantage of the ’85 New Wave, a turning towards the everyday, incidental moments in your life and your surroundings.”³ Liu Xiaodong himself has said, “From then on, I tended to trust only what I could see with my own eyes. Other kinds of history I couldn’t understand and didn’t have time to learn, but I didn’t trust them. This has influenced my painting style. I still like to paint on the spot, to interact with these people in person. I don’t look at anyone else’s photographs, but only my own. I only refer to the world I myself see.”⁴

For his mastery of psychological states and his painting style, Liu Xiaodong is often compared to the British artist Lucien Freud. Both create emotionally compelling scenes with nudes. But the two are also very different in creative approach. Whereas Freud painted hired models hermetically in his studio, Liu Xiaodong wanders out and about. Liu Xiaodong also emphasises the need of a true connection with his subjects and hopes to sublimate their individuality into more general emotional truths. Relaxing in Spring is a prime example.

1 Li Xianting, The meaning of the fragment of life: Interview with Liu Xiaodong
2 Refer to 1
3 Refer to 1
4 Art Bazaar, November 2012, p.95-96