A painter cares about the advice of his peers, and he gets mixed up in it which is never really understood by other people. Painting is develops for the decades, so that when you paint, people can immediately and basically tell where you come from, who you study with, what you think about. Therefore I will not go into details.

I call the exhibition “Old Painting Exhibition” for I feel that it is an “old” style when looking at the works, which is self-deprecating, instead they are really old things, they were finished from 2010 through to 2012, so that they are new ones although it is not their exhibition. They did not seem fashionable. It is certain that neither old ones nor fashionable ones are praised or despised. In my opinion, no matter what type the painting is, I sincerely admire good painting. Artists must be far away from the vulgar and inelegant styles and habits, hypocrisy is the natural enemy of the arts, there are not any bad paintings except for slick paintings. If playing cards by the book, the card player will fail in his game. Whoever has the confidence to express himself is a true artist, it is certain that by “entirely bringing himself out” it is dangerous, because he should have something to offer before it comes out, if it is bad, it fails no matter what it is.

Painting is both mental and physical work, it derives from both inspiration and hard work, if the so-called Muse, a tacky woman contemptuously talks to me: “Come on”, I believe I will shyly step forward, feeling as if I was shabbily treated.

Xia Yu

December 25, 2013

About the exhibition

Duration: December 29, 2013 – January 10, 2014

Venue: the Teaching Exhibition Hall of Chinese Academy of Oil Painting

Courtesy of the artist, translated by Chen Peihua and edited by Sue/CAFA ART INFO.