枯枝杂草 2019

Wang Xinfu created this painting, titled 枯枝杂草 or "Dry Branches and Weeds," with oil paint. The thick application of paint, the all-over composition with no clear focal point, and the muted color palette all suggest the influence of Western abstract expressionism. The art schools of China were opened to Western art from the 1980s. It may well have been through the institutional structures of art education that Wang encountered this style. Yet the painting's subject matter—seemingly ordinary flora—has deep roots in Chinese art history. Artists, poets and scholars have long found spiritual meaning in the natural world. Wang uses a foreign style to engage with a traditional theme. Is it simply decorative or does it comment on the relationship between China and the West? To understand this artwork fully we would need to know more about the artist’s influences and intentions. We must remember that the meaning of art is always contingent on its social and institutional context.