Jiang guo fang painting with diamonds

But I am different. What I am after are the aesthetic elements in the historical subjects, elements with certain symbolic meanings. I reject pragmatism and do not wish my art to have a direct connection to real life. I hope that while appreciating my works, people may understand reality and history, the beautiful and the symbolic, human nature and nature itself in a broader sense.

I draw attention to the national and traditional characters in my art, because the majestic long river of our history carries a vast and rich cultural heritage. Its wonder is closely associated with the regeneration of the Chinese nation. In the free space of imagination, it has lent a unique attraction to my art. This is what I believe in and what I pursue.

Among these women were princesses, empresses, empress dowagers, imperial concubines, honourable imperial concubines, and other concubines, whose charm and beauty form an interesting picture of the palace. Palace women in China made up an important part of China's female culture. Most of the women painted in China were court ladies. By the Ming and Qing dynasties, these kinds of paintings had split into two stylistic categories.

One category covered imperial court paintings, which were solemn in appearance, like the portrait of an empress we often see, or a so-called standard portrait today, with the same clothes and ornaments, composition and background. These works, which do not show the painter's own style and aesthetic taste, can hardly be called artistic creations.

The other category included pictures of palace women painted freely by artists. Their diverse and colourful appeal stands for China's female culture and represents an indelible position and value within the history of art. Creating the series of oil paintings of the Forbidden City was systematic work, requiring artistic breakthroughs. Yet, more importantly, it called for a proper understanding of the Qing dynasty history.

Based on this, art and history can be ingenuously combined to create pictures with distinct features of the time that are also accompanied by a profound connotation. This task is difficult to accomplish. Take historical materials, for example.

Jiang guo fang painting with diamonds

A tremendous amount of historical data, including several million pieces of artefacts, is preserved in the Forbidden City. The First Historical Archives of China also contain more than 10 million documents. One cannot finish reading them, even if one would take 60 years to do so. If the empress had no son, the eldest son born of an imperial concubine became the successor.

If the imperial concubines had no son, a son was to be adopted from among the imperial clan, or the throne was to be succeeded by the emperor's younger brother. Sign in. Lot Essay Jiang Guofang is the only contemporary Chinese painter to choose the mysterious Forbidden City as the subject matter of his work. Beginning in , he has produced more than works with this theme in almost 30 years; paintings that whisper to us the intrigue of Qing Court.

The present lot Palace Entrance, executed in , inaugurated the Forbidden City Series, and 26 years later, he has revisited this same scene anew. Jiang Guo Fang's works have been exhibited internationally in several solo shows from Hong Kong to Rome. He was the first contemporary artist to have a one-man show presented at the Forbidden City, Beijing in The present work was painted in The image of the artist signing the work is in that year.