An artistic exile : a life of Feng Zikai (1898-1975)

This engrossing book, a brilliant blend of biography and criticism, tells the story of Feng Zikai (1898-1975), one of the most gifted and important artists to emerge from the politically tumultuous decades of the 1920s and 1930s. Barmé provides a closely woven parallel history, that of the life of writer-artist Feng, who was also an essayist and a translator, and that of China's turbulent twentieth century. He investigates Feng Zikai's aesthetic vision, its development, and how it relates to traditional and contemporary Chinese cultural values and debates. Although Feng was known for his so-called casual drawings, he was reluctant to classify his art. According to Barmé, much of his writing and painting was rooted in a philosophy of self-expression. Difficult to position in relation to existing Chinese political and social nomenclature, Feng remains, to a large extent, an enigma. He was sympathetic to the average person and the impoverished peasant, yet he was a romantic, and often identified with the increasingly politicized intelligentsia. A devout Buddhist, he was a close observer of nature and children, and while his art appeared gentle, it often carried a strong message. Much has been written about Feng Zikai, a figure who has become popular among elite and mass audiences in the Chinese world once more, but no other work has examined his place among May Fourth writers and intellectuals nor his position within the context of China's artistic, religious, and literary tradition. An Artistic Exile moves straight to the heart of debates surrounding modernization, religion, science, the essence of a tradition in an age of colonial modernity, and the ethos of political and social thought in twentieth-century China. "This book, a blend of biography of criticism, tells the story of Feng Zikai (1898-1975), one of the most gifted and important artists to emerge from the politically tumultuous decades of the 1920s and 1930s. Barme provides a closely woven parallel history, that of the life of writer-artist Feng, who was also an essayist and a translator, and that of China's turbulent twentieth century. He investigates Feng Zikai's aesthetic vision, its development, and how it relates to traditional and contemporary Chinese cultural values and debates.". "Although Feng was known for his so-called casual drawings, he was reluctant to classify his art. According to Barme, much of his writing and painting was rooted in a philosophy of self-expression. Difficult to classify in relation to existing Chinese political and social nomenclature, Feng remains, to a large extent, an enigma. He was sympathetic to the average man and the impoverished peasant, yet he was a romantic, and often identified with the increasingly politicized intelligentsia. A devout Buddhist, he was a close observer of nature and children, and while his art appeared gentle, it often carried a strong message."--BOOK JACKET. Frontmatter Acknowledgments (page ix) Introduction (page 1) 1. Taking Nature as Master (page 13) 2. Journey to the East (page 47) 3. The Artist and His Epithet (page 72) 4. New Paintings for Old Poems (page 98) 5. The Cult of the Child (page 128) 6. Protecting Life and Preserving the Self (page 157) 7. Marketplace and Mountains (page 191) 8. A Chinese Perspective (page 236) 9. The Artist Liberated (page 270) 10. Belated Blossoming (page 313) Epilogue: The Art of Exile (page 347) Notes (page 375) Bibliography (page 433) Index (page 461) A blend of biography and criticism, this work tells the story of Feng Zikai (1898-1975), one of the most gifted and important artists to emerge from the politically tumultuous decades of the 1920s and 1930s. Barme provides a closely woven parallel history of Feng and China's turbulent 20th century. When the invading Japanese army launched an air-raid campaign in late 1937, bombing the towns and villages in the region in Zhejiang Province known as "the land of fish and rice," Feng Zikai and his family were forced to flee for their lives.