Liu Xiaodong, Heading South to South Africa #12, 2014; Watercolor on Xuan Paper, 50x50cm

“LIU Xiaodong in South Africa” will be opened at ESLITE GALLERY on 14 May, exhibiting his life drawings resulted from his project in South Africa (commissioned by LV) in August 2014. During the one month, LIU Xiaodong visited many places: he sketched the wild lives in Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park and Blyde River Canyon and portrayed the ordinary people in Cape Town and Cape of Good Hope, to name just a few spots. 50 paintings on xuan paper and on photos present the robust people and landscapes in South Africa. They are so powerfully contagious that the viewers can lay aside the differences of ethnicity and culture, observing their lands and lives via the lens of shared humanity.

Liu Xiaodong, Heading South to South Africa #03, 2014; Acrylic on Xuan Paper, 50x50cm

Liu Xiaodong, Heading South to South Africa # 30, 2015; Watercolor on Xuan Paper, 50x50cm

Even though LIU Xiaodong has been one of the most influential figures of Chinese contemporary art, he still enjoys carrying his tools to paint on-site. He has been to China, Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, America, Italy, Cuba, Tibet, Qatar, and South Africa. Keen in observation, LIU explores the mindsets of his target figures and is well versed in representing their diversified postures of existence in society and nature. Life drawing can be viewed as his epistemology. “I feel I know him the moment I paint him,” he said to the documentary photographer the day he sketched a lion. LIU’s works, therefore, not only capture the objective reality and felt emotions but manifest the spirit of anthropological studies and actions.

Liu Xiaodong, Heading South to South Africa # 37, 2015; Watercolor on Xuan Paper, 50x50cm

Liu Xiaodong, Heading South to South Africa # 39, 2015; Watercolor on Xuan Paper, 50x50cm

About the exhibition

Date: 14 May 2016 - 05 Jun 2016

Venue: ESLITE GALLERY

Address: 5F, No. 11 Songgao Road, Taipei 11073 Taiwan

Courtesy of the artist and ESLITE GALLERY.