March 8th:
For now I’m in Beijing with a couple days of down time until Ellen arrives from Seattle, and Matt and the family return from Cambodia. I found the Hutong House I painted three years ago. Thought I might reprint it, but it has not aged well artistically over these three years:
. (The house next door does have possibilities, though)
How about that scooter – guess they’ve gone upscale,
Meanwhile I’m hanging out with Francesca dal Lago who is also staying in the apartment here. (Matt’s home is always like a United Nations, with interesting people passing through.) Francesca’s credits are a mile long – she’s an expert on Chinese art history, here to film a documentary.
Yesterday we took in a unique exhibition of paintings at the National Art Museum celebrating a Chinese-Russia friendship event of 1953. That was 50 years ago, just four years after the Chinese Revolution.
Francesca, in front of the National Art Museum, one of the ten major buildings built to celebrate the Communist Revolution and the only one not strictly Soviet Realist.
China sent 33 politically correct art students to Russia to study from noted Russian painters and artists for a year. The exhibition collected their studies and finished works made in Russia during that time period. All the exhibition is good, some of it is excellent, and I can learn a lots from both categories. Here are a few works that really intrigued me:
Small (5×6, maybe) but beautiful in its simplicity
Another small delicious work, practically abstract
I like the use of the tree trunks were added last, to frame the focus and provide depth
The thing here is the change in the edges, moving from the ribbon to her feet
Love this bold use of color and brushwork
