Monday, March 25, 2019

Landscapes Without End, Cycle Four: The Met


Xiao Yuncong, Marvelous Verses Without Sounds, Qing Dynasty @ 1660-73 - in Cycle Four of the Met's two-year exhibition of Landscapes Without End. Museum Link
Wang Jian's Landscapes in the Styles of Old Masters (Qing). There are quite a few of these copy album collections in the show, along with
A series of prints from Huangshan, Yellow Mountains.
By Xiao Yuncong.
Then startlingly this print from 1980 by Li Huasheng, who writes of tourism and the workers who serve them.
Xuezhuang, a Qing Dynasty monk, built Cloud Palace in Huangshan and itemized the locations throughout the mountain; see below:

Early Wang Meng! he wants to paint emptiness, but cannot help but connect each element!
Foretelling a natural proclivity to pile it on...in fantastical landscapes that never cease to inspire.
Ni Tsan, his opposite, whose neutral, dry brush epitomizes Francois Jullien's notions of the Bland, the neutral that permits all phenomena to circulate, without flavor or attachment to any one outcome. Ni Tsan foresook his considerable estate during the Mongol invasion and freed himself, as a nomad, for the remainder of his life.
My biggest crush at the moment, competing with Shanghainese painter Cheng Jialing, whose wild lotus works are defined as something "girls will like": Wu Guanzhong's brilliant ink paintings, here shown in Seascape at Beidahe, 1977. 

Hongren, later 1700s
A series of beautiful landscapes by Dai X.



Lu Hui, Waterfalls off a Cold Cliff

Wen Zhemeng~ a favorite.

Luo Ping's effervescent touch! 

Wu Tao

Guo Tan? Not sure I have that right, but what a painting!

Two paintings, one by the uncle, one by the nephew.


The endless improvisations in scroll painting reveal powers of concentration that are formidable. It's really a performance art; teacher I-Hsiung Ju writes well of composing and performing, suggesting each play a vital role in creation. 















Four Accomplishments in Ink + Epic Abstraction

Liu Dan: Taihu Rock of the Liuyuan Garden, 2019, ink on xuan, @ 84 x 54 inches, at  J.J. Lally and Co. for Asia Week. Gallery Link 





Zeng Xiaojun: Poetic Pattern of Song Ware II,  2018,  ink and color on paper, @ 81 x 81 inches.




Xu Lei: Interact Trees, 2018, ink on xuan, @ 25 x 82 inches. The title refers to recprocity, interlocking and naturally defining, according to the catalog. Xu exhibited at Marlborough Gallery in 2018. Gallery Link
Just one photo of a very long scroll, presented half rolled, half out, in a case: Master of the Water, Pine, and Stone Retreat, All Natures Splendours Captured in This Gourd Heaven, 2015, ink on dragon cloud paper, @15 x 283 inches.


Above, Xu Lei. I've followed Ink Studio Beijing for some time,  as they are deeply engaged with ink and how it can be used now, so it was exciting to see an exhibition in New York, on a Sunday no less! How convenient and wonderful. 
Upstairs, some 18th century paintings on silk.


A Buddhist painting from the 17th Century.
And a Statue Robe, from 1864. Don't know what this means precisely, but quick research into robes suggests there were many to suit seasons, rank, and standing.




How I wish I got to see more, and how exciting it was to see this scroll with goats--suggested to a collector as a wonderful holiday gift.  
Shi'Tao, Returning Home, 1695, at the Met.
Welcome to Epic Abstraction: Kazuo Shiraga, Untitled, 1958.Museum Link

Isamo Noguchi's Kouros

Early Rothko!
Early Rothko!
Mark Rothko
Chakia Booker
Inoue Yuichi's Cold Mountain calligraphy, 1966
Judit Reigl's Guano, from 1959-1964

And the wondrous Louise Nevelson installation, called Ms. N's Palace, around 1958! 





Helen Frankenthaler, 1957, Western Dream. 
Alma Thomas, a work so rich the photo cannot do it justice.
Joan Snyder, a beautiful work from the 1980s
The great Joan Mitchell, La Vie en Rose, 1979.
Frank Bowling's Night Journey (1969-ish)