Liu Guosong (Liu Kuo-sung)

Private Collection, USA

Generally in good condition overall.
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Liu Guosong is considered the most established painter active in Taiwan after 1949 who sought to combine Western modernist elements with traditional Chinese abstraction. In 1956 he established the Fifth Moon Group with his contemporaries in Taiwan who each turned to the ink medium in a campaign to modernise Chinese painting. The term "modern Chinese ink painting" is in fact attributed to the writing and exhibition activities of Liu Guosong in Taiwan during the 1960s. Inspired by Abstract Expressionism, Liu Guosong merged its similarities with the traditional Chinese literati painting ideals that reveal the artistic self through spontaneous action. His mastery of colour and texture set him apart from both tradition and his contemporaries working in ink. His exploration with collage on paper, marble water-ink painting techniques and vibrant colour resulted in an innovative style that truly expressed a contemporary and scholarly spirit different from the Western precedent.

Previously in the estate of a Kansas Art Institute professor, Winter Landscape (Lot 47) is one of various early examples of paintings by Liu Guosong exhibited in the United States. From 1966-1967, Liu Guosong was a John D Rockefeller II Fund grant recipient and travelled extensively throughout America and Europe. One of Liu Guosong's earliest exhibitions include a 1967 solo exhibition at the prestigious Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri, recognized for its extensive collection of Asian art.  In contrast to his widely recognized works of complete abstraction, this is a recognizable landscape created with handmade paper collage, marbled ink on paper, and fibre-plucking techniques that depict fragments of vegetation, rocks and cliff emerging from the snow. In a traditional manner, the perspective of the painting is realized through the bare paper colour in the foreground and background, and interspersed with innovative collage elements to complete the composition. In contrast, the lack of descriptive elements in the painting subverts tradition in favour of expressive descriptions of nature's grandeur and results in Liu Guosong's powerful artistic vision.