Chu Teh-Chun (Zhu Dequn)

Galerie Patrice Trigano, Paris
Private Asian Collection

Chu Teh-Chun and His Universe, Alisan Fine Arts Ltd., Hong Kong, 2004, p. 14

This work is in excellent condition. There is one fluorescent spot along the top edge, presumably inherent to the artist's working method.
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A dazzle of color in a dreamlike realm

Chu Teh-Chun, Demeure des songes

“When it comes to the Eastern things stored in his memory, Chu Teh-Chun neither renounces, nor disdains them. Rather, the artist places them onto the canvas, with perfect measure, avoiding the trap of piecing together bits of the East and bits of the West like patchwork, but finds a harmonious yet different path. Viewers are able to experience the profound elements of Chinese culture that flow from Chu’s paintings, which reveal themselves naturally and fuse seamlessly with Western abstractionism. This, in fact, is the very reason that his paintings have achieved such wide resonance among art aficionados. After a half-century of abstract painting, Chu’s artistry has achieved a state of organic ease and freedom, a state that completely transcends the self.”
French art critic Gilbert Erouart

From the 1980s to the late 1990s, Chu traveled frequently between Europe and Asia, quietly influencing his works. In 1983, after having left China for nearly three decades, Chu returned to he soil of his motherland. Aside from engaging in artistic conversations, he took the time to the places he had yearned for since he was a child and a student, making his way to the city of Huangzhou, Shanxi’s Yungang Grottoes, the Dunhuang caves, Huangshan, Beijing, and Shanghai. And amid the famous landscapes of his travels, the mountains and the lakes, he became deeply inspired. It was an inspiration that came from nature and it enveloped him, transforming itself into color and brushstroke, bewitching him, and infusing the artist’s paintings from the late 80s to the 90s with the aestheticism and mood of Chinese landscapes. The charm of the freehand brushstrokes and the praise for the heavens and earth silently revealed themselves. At the same time, his abstractionism attained a state of complete freedom and ease of expression, the artist exhibiting effortless fluidity and maturity.

Eastern Muses, A Free and Uninhibited Brush

During this period, Chu’s works were widely embraced by both the Eastern and Western art worlds. In 1993, renowned French art critic Pierre Cabanne compiled together a volume of his artwork, which was published in Paris. French galleries Galerie Régis Dorval and Galerie Protée separately held solo exhibitions for the artist. In 1997, the French Foreign Ministry sponsored a “Far East” traveling exhibition, with debuts at the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, the Hong Kong Museum of Art, and the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, establishing Chu’s prestige internationally. Galerie Patrice Trigano then embarked on a partnership with Chu, and in the 1990s, hosted a series of solo exhibitions for the artist and managed the artist’s international publicity. The painting up for auction is Demeure des songes (Lot 1018), completed in 1998, initially part of Galerie Patrice Trigano’s collection and one of the representative works from this period in the artist’s career.

Poetry and Painting Become One, Effortless Freedom

For this painting, Chu specifically chose a portrait canvas, diluting and mixing shades of sapphire, indigo, and sea blue, and, saturating his brush with color, sweeping freely across the work’s background and horizon line. Brushstrokes are applied, layer upon layer, resembling the wondrous vigor of calligraphy brushwork, flowing quickly and naturally. The vitality of the brush is, as Chinese painter and poet Shi Tao once wrote, “like a hero wielding a sword, exhibiting all types of movement: crouching and leaping, galloping or walking.” Guided by the energy of movement, the artist’s brush captures the majesty and infinitely-varying splendor of nature, vitality bubbling up to the surface of the painting. In the lower-middle position of the canvas, resplendent colors of vermilion, gold, and jade green are huddled like hidden jewels, piercing the darkness as their mysterious luster glitters and leaps, casting a spell over the viewer and luring him or her into the painting. The image of the painting evokes poet Bai Juyi’s “Jin zhong yu zhi, mengyou xianyou si” (Night Duty at the Palace and a Dream of the Celestial Temple), in which the poet writes: “Idle time in the west chamber/thick groves of pine and bamboo lie quiet and still./ The moon appears, a light breeze blows/ redolent of an evening in the mountains./And thus a dream emerges/a guest to the Celestial Temple./ Hearing the palace clepsydra/it sounds like a dripping mountain spring.” Chu’s extensive artistic career has led to the profound accumulation of technique and the sprit of enchantment, which together construct the sublime and strange scene in this painting, beckoning to the viewer as he or she becomes the sleepwalker at the Celestial Temple, stepping into a Shangri-la dream world. This painting is nothing short of a marvel, astounding and singular.