Zhang Xiaogang

signed in Chinese and dated 2004.12, framed

Private Collection, USA

This work is generally in good condition. There are a few minor creases on the lower right of the canvas near the edge. Please note that it was not examined under ultraviolet light and out of its frame.
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Zhang Xiaogang increasingly looked to the specific familial relationships between parent and child, husband and wife, brother and sister, sister and brother. The colour of these paintings is soft and harmonious. The form is hypnotically uniform, and the dark eyes ruefully haunting. Imbued with a liquid film of moisture, so glassy are these big, round, penetrating eyes that, up close, viewers almost expect to find their reflection there. In what was a subtle shift, the details of clothing, neckerchiefs and collars became secondary to the faces of the individuals who wore them, as their expressions occupied the pictorial space with a compelling intensity. Zhang Xiaogang did not abandon the familiar style of Cultural Revolution dress. That continues to be a necessary element in fixing his issues to a complex and reprehensible period of history, as he attempts to fathom the nature of its impact upon the family circumstances of his childhood.

Excerpt from Karen Smith, Nine Lives: The Birth of Avant-Garde Art in New China