Chen Zhiguang, who has created “animal politics”   with stainless-steel ants, is regarded as a “magical”   figure in the art world. His works of the recent one year have largely shaken off the traits of politics and ideology, to represent new images. At the end of 2008, I visited Chen Zhiguang’s large but simple studio in Zhangzhou, where I had a chance to witness his newly created scrolls. The flower-and-bird scrolls made of stainless steel mix the beauty of sculpture and nature and bring audience completely different feelings, compared with his ant series. He started his new series almost from scratching, which shares nothing in common, but basic material, with his ant series. The unusual feelings make it difficult for us to perceive his real intention.
　　Chen Zhiguang combines traditional Chinese flower-and-bird painting and stainless-steel high relief, to represent traditional Chinese aesthetics in three dimensions. Scholar painting is the most important carrier of traditional Chinese beauty, and scroll and volume are the most important forms of traditional scholar painting. His real intention is to connect modern art and traditional aesthetics. To imitate traditional ink-and-wash painting in the form of three-dimensional sculpture there is a highly conceptualized methodology. Roy Lichtenstein, a prominent American pop artist, also transformed his flat artworks into sculptures, but it was simply transformation from two-dimension to three-dimension. Chen Zhiguang’s scrolls and volumes seem to have the traits of pop art too. However they are actually more closely related to Marcel Duchamp, the ancestor of pop art. Marcel Duchamp introduced the concept of “readymade” to the art world and successfully converted anti-art to art . The concept of “readymade” is one that influenced the art of entire 20th century and has become an important mark of modern art. Chen Zhiguang never thought about anti-art, but he expands the concept of “readymade” to “readymade artwork” and copies flat ink-and-wash painting to a three-dimensional space. This way, a modern art concept and a traditional art form are combined to catalyze new miracles.
　　It is not appropriate to simply regard Chen Zhiguang’s works as “readymades” or define them as modern art. In the past few years, the term modern art is even used to indicate the imitation of western art’s concept, style and ideology. Having witnessed the vicissitude of the art market and the global economic crisis, we come to realize that Mannerism  in modern art has become the biggest bottleneck of modern Chinese art’s development. Chen Zhiguang’s works are so unique that some critics believe that there is no way to categorize his works in modern art.  This not only suggests the individuality of the artist, but also entails that nobody can simply label his artworks in any way. The creation of art is a complex process. Even minimal art is more than a label, and encompasses complex motivation of creation and rich history of culture.
　　We cannot simply label Chen Zhiguang’s newly created scrolls and volumes as modern art, because it would make our understanding of his works too narrow and incomplete. His scrolls and volumes compose a huge and complex system, whose spiritual aspect conveys more meaning than images themselves. Some people believe that ink is the carrier of traditional Chinese painting’s spirit. Actually as important as ink is, it cannot fully convey the spiritual connotation of traditional Chinese painting. It seems that he has sensed this. Therefore, ink does not seem to be what he cares most about when he transforms flower-and-bird paintings. What he cares about most is space. The space here means both flat space in traditional Chinese painting and three-dimensional space in sculpture. Chen Zhiguang’s works are amazing mixtures of the two kinds of spaces. In this mixture, real space and painting are fully blended to bring to the audience an unparalleled visual enjoyment.
　　The description of space in Chen Zhiguang’s new works is closely related to aesthetics. Zong Baihua, the most influential Chinese aesthetician, was the first one to borrow the western concept “space consciousness” to Chinese painting theory. In his opinion, the space consciousness represented in Chinese paintings is unlike those represented in Greek sculptures, Egyptian pyramids or western oil paintings. It is Chinese people’s perception of the universe. The Book of Changes says “anything that goes away comes back; this is the rule of the universe”. This represents the very space consciousness of Chinese people.  The Book of Changes also says “the constant change of Yin and Yang is the ultimate power of nature”.  To a certain extent, Chen Zhiguang’s works use western “space consciousness” to represent Chinese people’s perception of the universe, and this largely coincides with Zong Baihua’s theory.
　　Maybe Chen Zhiguang has learned a lot from Zong Baihua, because his works heavily involve another very important aspect of aesthetics, color. Zong Baihua once said “the ultimate flamboyance is simplicity” . Two kinds of beauty existed in Chinese history, i.e. the beauty of flamboyance and the beauty of simplicity. The Book of Changes mentions the two kinds of beauties by saying “beauty becomes noble when it is simple”. Xun Shuang also said “the ultimate ornament is no ornament”. Maybe colorless is the highest level of color. I do not know whether Chen Zhiguang has read The Book of Changes, but I do recognize the ultimate beauty of his stainless-steel artworks.
　　Chen Zhiguang’s works also reflects another aesthetic concept in The Book of Changes, i.e. attachment. Zong Baihua said “attached things, such as decorations, are beautiful”. Chen Zhiguang’s works attach flower-and-bird painting to stainless steel, and forge the mixed beauty of sculpture and ink-and-wash painting. The beauty of attachment implicitly entails that people are simultaneously separated and connected to nature. The artists’ works represent the concept of separation through the style of flower-and-bird and the concept of connection through the light reflected from the surface of stainless steel. Chen Zhiguang’s works also display other aesthetic factors, such as balance, symmetry and contrast from The Book of Changes.
　　The aesthetic factors from The Book of Changes are vividly displayed in the Six Dynasties, Sui Dynasty and Tang Dynasty, when different peoples were mixed and open to new ideas. Today, China is witnessing prosperity never seen in the last millennium. Maybe some of us have not yet recognized that his works are reflecting this very prosperity, because he does not depict it in an explicit way. Some of the art critics have abandoned aesthetics, Chen Zhiguang’s works, however, should be analyzed from the aspect of aesthetics, instead of anything else. His new works enlighten us with the idea that contemporary art should be far more than a symbol and label and become precious heritage we pass on to our children. It is only by embracing aesthetics once again, that we can preserve the real meaning of art and make it eternal.
May 20th, 2009
In China Central Academy of Fine Arts
Introduction of the author: Yu Ding, PhD in art history, vice-president of Humanity College, China Central Academy of Fine Arts. His major works include Chinese Oil Painting and Respect for Art, Visual Arts Administration in and Management in China and the United States.