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présentation - 展览介绍 :
As a preliminary show of Art Basel Hong Kong, Pace Beijing is presenting the solo exhibition of China’s most influential portrait artist, Mao Yan. This exhibition is also the first exhibition of Mao Yan since his representation by Pace Beijing.
Mao Yan is well known by his portrait art. His artworks reveal the momentary glory of peace and attract audience into his artworks through the very straight expression without any metaphor. Mao Yan insists the spiritual dominance in his paintings and depicts the same object though years, in which he has controlled the arbitrary sorrows and the flow of emotions and showed the tension of strokes in a slow but calming way. Through the unique image he created and the motion he captured, Mao Yan expresses the light atmosphere that is attracted by a certain moment in memory and weakens the characteristics of a certain figure. Therefore he focuses solely on the language of art and shows the theme that is both magnificent and decadent. We could say that the art of Mao Yao has represented the whole face of an era that is remote but real.
In Mao Yan’s portrait, the feature of time on a figure’s appearance has been removed, and only the common spirit of human beings is still maintained. The grey tone shows his experience and observation over the long and dim modern history. Mao Yan chooses an individual as his standpoint and his personal opinion as the foundation, and he dims any relations with his personal symbol and gets rid of subjective emotional judgment to avoid any symbolic or metaphoric meanings.
Mao Yan depicts the same figure over years. Such behavior is based on the opposite of his own spiritual power. Yet in his non‐sketching creation process, he not only removes the steadiness and flatness of photographs, but also revert the reality of the scene and the vividness of the material, which expresses his personal pursuit to the figure. Mao Yan keeps his pursuit to spirit and the vague memory, embeds his personal feelings into the tone of era, and by making use of his talent and feelings, he presents the dim light of human soul and shows a unique figure that is calm and peaceful.
Other than new works from the series of Thomas, which the artist has been continuing since late 1990s, the first‐time large scale painting of female body will be another focus of this solo exhibition. Faerie on the Chair and The Plump Nude show the rare female figure in portrait paintings. In these two paintings, Mao Yan depicts and compares the flirting slim model in the chair and the plump lady who curls up at the exact same place. In addition, Mao Yan will present artworks about animal heads which are unorthodox. For example, Fish Head for Goya is a tribute to the Spanish romantic master Goya, who has a huge influence on Mao Yan.
We can look forward to seeing Mao Yan’s technique on controlling the painting’s atmosphere and the rare talent he possesses again in this solo exhibition at Pace Beijing.
作为香港巴塞尔艺博会之先声，佩斯北京将于五月中旬推出中国最具代表性的肖像艺术家毛焰个展，而此亦将为艺术家毛焰与佩斯画廊签约代理后之首展。
艺术家毛焰以肖像绘画为人所熟知，他的作品通过不含隐喻性的直观表达手法，揭示了剎那的静谧光芒并吸引人沉溺其中。他坚持以精神力量主宰画面，不断地随着时间流逝深入刻画同一本体的形象，并克制了恣意的伤感与情绪的表现欲，平衡出一种缓慢而从容的笔触张力。他透过富于个性的形象塑造与动态捕捉，来传达某种被记忆中的片刻所吸引的浅层氛围，并发展出淡化人物形象特性、从而专注于艺术的自我语言，呈现出既恢弘又靡遗的题材文本。可以说，毛焰的艺术体现了一个时代悠远而真实的整体面貌。
在毛焰的肖像中，外表的时代特征已被消弭，仅剩人类共性的精神浮现其中，而画面的灰调则体现出他对于漫长幽暗近代史的感受与体察。毛焰以自我个体的方式作为立足点，以独立的观点为基础，淡化与个人符号相关的意义，摆脱具有主观性的情感判断，以此避免为作品附加任何的符号意义与隐喻。
毛焰常年对于相同人物题材的重复刻画，是建立于自身的精神力量的对应，而他在利用素材进行非写生创作时中，他不但磨灭了照片的停滞性与平面化，并还原了现场的真实性与素材的生动感，展现出他个人内心对于形象的追求。毛焰单纯地维持着精神上的追求与模糊记忆中的追索，蕴个人感受于时代色彩的基调之中，藉由天赋的才华和感受力，在瞬间中体现出人类魂魄中的幽微光芒，呈现出安静而不张狂的独特形象。
此次毛焰个展中除却艺术家自90年代末起所创作的《托马斯》重要肖像新作外，将首度以大尺幅女人体创作为另一重点展出。其中《椅子上的小魔女》与《微胖的裸女》呈现了其肖像作品中少有的女性形象，通过同样地点与椅上对比描绘出模特儿的撩人神态与修长形影以及胖女人的团缩神情形象。除此之外，毛焰也将展出非传统意涵的动物头像作品，像是《献给戈雅的鱼头》等，以此向对其影响颇深的西班牙浪漫主义艺术大家戈雅致敬。
此次于佩斯北京个展中我们可期待重现的是毛焰令人赞叹的画面氛围掌控力与其独树一格的罕见才华。
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