Fu Baoshi's "Winding Dragon, Squatting Tiger"

Nature in all her splendor and glory is represented in a vivid exhibition of 20th-century Chinese ink-wash artists at the Shanghai Art Museum, writes Wang Jie.

History has it that in ancient China, the emperors never executed a criminal in spring, but left the execution until autumn. That demonstrates how the ancient Chinese believed in the rules of nature, and the rules are widely displayed in traditional landscape paintings as well.

An exhibition featuring 200 ink-wash landscape paintings of the 20th century, some on loan from overseas collectors, is now running at the Shanghai Art Museum.

"Landscape paintings have been a permanent subject in traditional China art," says Lu Fusheng, president of the Shanghai Fine Art Publishing House. "But what lies in front of the viewers are not simply rivers, mountains or rocks, in fact they reflect the deep respect that the ancient Chinese had for nature."

The pictures are imbued with the artists' admiration for and even their feeling of awe towards nature.

"This is a retrospective show, and also a collision between tradition and revolution, mixing and rebelling," says Zhang Qing, deputy director of the Shanghai Art Museum.

Nearly all the big names of the 20th century are on the list, such as Zhang Daqian (1899-1983), Fu Baoshi (1904-65), Li Keran (1907-89) and Huang Binhong (1865-1955). Instead of blindly inheriting the skills of the ancestors, these masters injected their own interpretations and creativity into these old subjects.

The highlight of the exhibition goes to a big scroll created by Fu. The 6-square-meter ink-wash painting disappeared from the public attention after it was auctioned for 10 million yuan (US$1.25 million) in the early 1990s. According to Lu, the piece was actually painted while Fu was drunk, which might well explain the wild and uncontrolled brushstrokes seen in this huge piece.

Along with the heavyweight exhibition, a series of seminars will be held to discuss the future of this ancient art genre.

"One of the purposes of this exhibition is to remind people of nature," says Lu, "because we have destroyed so much of it, especially in the past decades."

Ancient Chinese believe that nature will avenge any act that is committed against its rules.

"Now we are too bold in the face of nature," adds Zhang. "Some scenes depicted on the rice paper at this show no longer exist, they are just a beautiful memory from the artists' mind."

Date/Time: through June 25, 9am-5pm
Location: No. 325 Nanjing Xilu
Ticket: RMB 20
Tel: 021-63272829