Liu Haisu retrospective

By Wu Ziru

Giant Pine by Liu Haisu.

A rare large-scale retrospective of Chinese traditional painting master Liu Haisu (1896-1994) is being held at the Yanhuang Art Museum in Beijing, with 100 pieces of his traditional art as well as modern works on display. The collection provides a unique insight into the master’s life-long exploration.

Many of Liu’s representative works such as Girl in the Fox Coat, Sunset at Notre Dame and Sunflower, rarely publicly exhibited, are on show.

As one of the few significant Chinese artists of the 20th century, Liu made great contributions to Chinese fine art. He was among the first group of artists to travel abroad to study and combined his new skills with traditional landscapes.

Liu was also instrumental in art education. In collaboration with artists Wu Shiguang and Zhang Yuguang, he founded Shanghai Fine Art School of Traditional Chinese Painting, China’s first fine art college.

Liu advocated painting outdoors and encouraged life drawing, both of which had never been experimented with in China’s fine art circle before.

Although widely criticized for his “bizarre” ideas and condemned as a “traitor of art,” Liu’s persistance earned him the recognition as one of the great masters of his time.

The exhibition will run until September 10 and is free.

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