Zeng Fanzhi

signed in Pinyin and dated 1999

Shanghart Gallery, Shanghai
Acquired by the present owner from the above

This work is in good condition overall. There are no apparent condition issues with this work.
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Zeng Fanzhi redefines our very understanding of 'portraiture.' Rather than a representation of a face, a true likeness, Zeng offers a mere mask. A mask, seemingly meant to disguise or to conceal, transforms into the face that everyone sees, suggesting not anonymity, but instead the disturbing notion that perhaps this mask is the face, or that underneath there is something darker, less accepted, traumatized. The juxtaposition of what exists on the surface with what lies beneath spans far beyond simple notions of inner versus outer; it addresses something far deeper and more complex that the physical barrier between the viewer and the mysterious figures in these painting. 

Zeng's Mask Series have become iconic depictions of the many transformations that occurred in China in the 1990s: most notably, urbanization and the rise of commercialism and a 'socialist market economy.' The tension which arises from gazing at these masked figures resides in an almost resistance of history in order to come to terms with the present. The existence of living contradictions in contemporary China—a socialist, collective identity at odds with the newly formed individual identity —foster a strange and turbulent atmosphere, rooted in tradition, yet determined to evolve. During the Mao years, young people moved to the countryside to learn from the peasants, but with the end of the Cultural Revolution, China's cities became over populated with these same peasants looking for jobs and opportunities. Though Mao had championed the farmers and peasants as the beacon of Chinese communism, by the late 1980s and early 1990s, these peasants had become displaced and in their place, arose the young urbanite, secularized, fashionable, and savvy. The concept of self, of creating an identity in a rapidly growing urban landscape, ruled by the omnipresence of mass media and digital electronics, becomes urgent. This, undoubtedly, challenges Maoist philosophy of the social self, a piece and part of the collective, working of the collective good. The figures in Zeng's Mask Series grapple with the dilemma of self-expression, and while their clothes and their mannerisms may put them apart, they are inherently a representation of every Chinese person, living in post-cultural revolution and post-Deng era China. 

At a time when many Chinese artists drew on their political past as artistic ammunition, Zeng chose to examine the realm of the psychological past, the memories, many of which are manifested in the minute details of his Mask paintings: the red scarves and fake Maoist script. Pushing beyond the utilitarian aspect of the Socialist Realist style, Zeng accentuates the flesh of his figures and enlarges their hands to create a truly expressive and visceral experience, yet with such subtlety and restraint. Zeng's work, Mask Series (Lot 777), encapsulates, most elegantly, the experience of searching for an identity: for this young man, it is looking in a reflection of himself, and seeing only a mask. The viewer is neither sure if the figure is looking at his reflection in a mirror or a self-portrait, nor can the viewer see the 'real' face of the figure, only the reflection.  His hand, gently touching his face, surrenders a shred of his own emotion, while the stoic, detached expression on his mask is unchanged. This play on reality and identity makes this work extremely disconcerting, but poignant and tender by the same chord, embodying a natural and unavoidable aspect of the human condition: the self.