Almighty painter

Chapter 790 Love and Art Exhibition
Love is the most eternal theme in art.

Times are changing, and so are the themes that painters are accustomed to expressing.

Today's painters do not depict lightning in the sky and smoke in the jungle with fear, as they did ten thousand years ago. They do not depict ghosts and gods with awe, as they did three thousand years ago. They do not depict history and life with respect, as they did a thousand years ago.

Unlike hundreds of years ago, balls and poems were not described with debauchery and vanity mixed with confusion and pain.

But to this day.

Artists from all over the world, like their predecessors ten thousand years ago, three thousand years ago, one thousand years ago or several hundred years ago, try to express the love in their hearts with fear, awe, respect, debauchery, vanity mixed with confusion and pain, using all the words they can think of in their minds.

That's the strange thing.

When he was studying, Gu Weijing discovered that artists whose mission is to express love are often very good at making love, or at least "love", a mess.

Van Gogh loved someone so much that he cut off his own ear and gave it to the person.

Although this is a testament to Van Gogh's passionate emotions or even his crazy life, from the woman's perspective, Gu Weijing felt that this kind of relationship might be uncomfortable or even terrifying.

Is this really love?

Picasso loved others endlessly. He always seemed to be on the road of spurning his previous lover and falling in love with the next one. He couldn't count how many people he fell in love with in his lifetime, how many relationships he messed up, and how many people he hurt.

Is this really love?
For both parties in a relationship, does passion bring more happiness, or does passion bring more pain?
It's really dark humor.

During the art history class at Fitz International School, Gu Weijing stared at the portraits of famous artists in the book. The more he stared, the more he felt an indescribable feeling -

People who have expressed and painted love all their lives should be the apostles of love in the world, but they often cannot handle their own emotions well.

This is like a fighting coach who makes a living by teaching others fighting courses, has many books, and is proficient in various fighting techniques and strange weapons. He has a large number of admirers all over the world, and the fighting teaching materials he compiled are regarded as the bible by people in the industry.

until one day.

The fighting coach is ready to show off his skills himself.

He rubbed his fists, raised his arms high, accepted the cheers and shouts of the audience around him, and smeared olive oil on his muscles, exuding the oily sheen of a Greek hero. Then the gong sounded, and he was hit cleanly on the chin by life. Without any hesitation, he fell straight to the ground and lay dead.

The expressions on the faces of the audience around must have been strange at that time.

A little surprised, a little funny...

There is also a hint of sadness.

Through this tragic farce, they perfectly demonstrated the complexity of the word "love" and the danger of the word "love".

When he was a student, Gu Weijing often used the experiences of his predecessors to warn himself.

He respected Van Gogh and his courage to walk into the thorns of life. He was willing to embrace Van Gogh, but he would rather not do the kind of madness that would lead to cutting off one's ears and giving them to prostitutes.

He envied Picasso and his achievement in creating an artistic era. To put it bluntly, he was also quite envious of Picasso's fortune worth hundreds of millions of francs and his large estate in southern France in the last century, and his unprecedented success and fame.

There are few painters who do not envy Picasso, and there are few painters who do not want to be Picasso.

Gu Weijing is no exception.

But he did not envy Picasso's coldness as he watched his pregnant wife and lover fighting in front of him and laughed, nor did he envy Picasso's turbulent emotional life like an angry bull.

Their lives may have their own splendor, but Gu Weijing has always felt that he should just be a spectator outside the octagonal cage.

He didn't want to walk into the thorns of love.

He only yearns for worldly, ordinary, and plain happiness.

But he always missed out on ordinary happiness. When Gu Weijing hung up the phone, he realized that whether he was willing or not.

At this moment.

He was already surrounded by tangled thorns.

"Your nephew is finished!" When Mr. Sloth learned about the predicament that Gu Weijing was facing, he could hear the prophetic tone of certainty.

At this moment, thinking back to what Mr. Sloth said to me, it has a different meaning -

“Love is uncontrollable. People can control their feelings and their behavior, but they cannot control the development and outcome of love.”

It can make people rush towards a broken suspension bridge without blinking, or stride into an unknown wilderness.

Gu Weijing zipped up his pocket.

He walked slowly into the main exhibition hall of the art exhibition, followed the crowd and paced, head slightly tilted, his face deep and thoughtful, which was not in line with that of a young man. From time to time, he paused in front of one or two booths.

……

Every holiday, international schools have summer camps and winter camps for study tours and exhibitions around the world.

Gu Weijing's family was not wealthy.

Old Man Gu was not the kind of parent who would desperately send his children to expensive private schools and then turn a blind eye to them, leaving them to fend for themselves in school. However, Gu Weijing himself understood the significance of expenses starting from several thousand dollars to his family, so he never asked for money.

Before today, Gu Weijing's experience with large-scale art exhibitions was limited to textbooks and the photos in the PPT presentations of his classmates sharing their holiday life after school started.

The first major art exhibition he actually visited in person in his life was the one he attended himself.

His experience was very novel.

Gu Weijing possesses the dual identities of a tourist and an exhibiting artist, and he also possesses the dual perspectives of a tourist and an exhibiting artist.

The competition at this year's Biennale is indeed more intense than in previous years.

When Gu Weijing checked the electronic albums of previous years, he judged that the technical level of the first level of Lv.4 profession combined with good painting emotion had touched the threshold of the master exhibition.

If an oil painting has both level 5 in oil painting technique and sketching technique, it has basically reached the general level of artists in such international exhibitions.

This was also Gu Weijing's initial goal.

now.

Before coming to the Biennale, his painting ability was much higher than he initially thought.

After arriving at the Esplanade, Gu Weijing discovered that the competition in this Biennale was much more intense than he had expected.

There are no more works by heavyweight painters like Wu Guanzhong in the entire exhibition area. The names on the plaques next to most of the works are names that Gu Weijing had never known before, but this does not mean that these works are not excellent.

Singapore is the richest city-state in Southeast Asia.

As the old saying goes, antiques are valuable in prosperous times, and gold is valuable in troubled times.

The level of artistic expression of painting art has never been linked to the wealth of the creator.

However, the prosperity of the art market has always been strongly tied to the wealth of the overall social environment.

The works at art exhibitions do not have as strong commodity attributes as those at art fairs, but it is also difficult for them to completely get rid of their commodity attributes.

Many biennial organizing committees have art sales departments.

If you want to sell good works at a good price, no matter how much you talk, exaggerate, and talk until your lips are worn out, in the end, consumers must have money in their pockets.

Therefore, it is an indisputable fact that the richer a place is, the more it can attract artists and the more intense the market competition is.

The artistic heart of Europe would be Paris, where all the daughters of the nobility would gather every social season. Picasso was Spanish, Van Gogh was Dutch, Paul Cézanne's ancestors came from Italy, and he himself was born in Provence.

At some point in their lives, they all converge in Paris. Today, the artistic heart of America is New York, an economic center where the rich gather, and it continuously draws creators from around the world.

There are many famous African artists from Kenya in New York.

Kenya's art industry is very strong, with many modern art industrial parks.

Note that the proposition that the best African artists will eventually go to New York is definitely not true. There are many outstanding black artists who simply disdain the American way of hyping up art, hate the hustle and bustle of New York, and even hate the prosperity of New York, and are only willing to pursue inner peace and abundance.

on the other hand.

Artists who can "roll out" those art and creative parks in Kenya, be picked by scouts and agents, and be brought to American galleries for development are often indeed better than others, or at least more in line with American artistic aesthetics.

Singapore is like Shanghai, Shenzhen, Tokyo, Seoul and other international metropolises in Asia. It is like a siphon straw, strongly attracting excellent works of outstanding painters from all around to be concentrated here and meet with tourists and collectors from all over the world.

As far as Gu Wei can see, almost every piece of work has reached the technical level of Lv.5.

There are also works whose technical level has reached Lv.6 and whose brushwork skills are only a step away from reaching the realm of a master. However, he has not yet arrived at the main exhibition area on the second floor where there are more specially invited painters.

The competition here is not about the best local creators.

Rather, only the best local creators may be qualified to compete in such an international exhibition.

The Singapore Biennale is different from a pure art exhibition. In addition to paintings, it also features a variety of paper-cuts, sculptures, plastic arts, and digital artworks.

Gu Weijing even saw a huge watch in the photo-taking area on the first floor. It was from an independent watchmaking company whose name Gu Weijing didn't even recognize. It seemed to be one of the sponsors of the Biennale. It placed a large watch with a dial diameter of one person's height in the exhibition area. It was said to be a large-scale model replica of their newly launched complex function doll watch with a scale of 1:60.

It is both a promotional advertisement and an exhibit for this year's "Human Noise" Biennale.

Gu Weijing only learned from the explanation board next to it that the so-called animal puppets are a special process of mechanical watchmaking. The watchmaking company incorporates hummingbirds, butterflies, snakes and even miniature illustrations of "The Wizard of Oz" into the dial of the watch. At a special time point, or when the owner of the watch turns the mechanism, the hummingbird will flap its wings, the butterfly will spread its wings, the snake will spit out its tongue, and the fairy will dance... In short, it is very magical.

The watch on the stand has various human silhouettes embossed on its dial.

The male and female protagonists face each other, as if they are walking in opposite directions among the crowd, and at a certain time, they will approach each other under the power of the clockwork, and their intertwined silhouettes will turn into a kiss. Then they will intertwine with each other and separate again until the next specific time point arrives.

The design is indeed very clever.

According to the exhibit introduction on the publicity board, the inspiration for this watch comes from the ancient Eastern myth of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl.

The legend of Niulang and Zhinu meeting on Que Bridge every Chinese Valentine's Day has been modified by this watchmaking company whose name is a long string of English letters into a legend in which at a specific time, their bodies kiss passionately. In a sense... this is another kind of "East-West fusion" with local characteristics.

The Hermès Gallery also has top luxury goods companies as long-term sponsors, and Gu Weijing believes that he knows something about the world.

He knew that such watches would usually be expensive.

But the country bumpkin Gu Weijing was still shocked by the reservation price of the watch on the promotional board: $530, a full 000.00 Singapore dollars.

At first he thought he had accidentally added an extra zero and that the watch alone could be exchanged for a local bachelor apartment.

Apart from the oil painting on canvas "Water Village People" donated by Wu Guanzhong to the National Gallery Singapore, this watch, which is worth nearly US$40, may be the most valuable exhibit in the entire Esplanade, including future gold medal works.

Fortunately, the exhibits provided by such sponsors usually belong to the "non-competitive unit" and should not compete with any art awards won by the painters in the exhibition.

Even the meaning of painting itself cannot be fully encompassed by such narrow terms as technique and brushstroke.

Gu Weijing saw many interesting avant-garde art works in the exhibition. Some of them he didn’t quite understand, some he could see something in, and some he didn’t quite understand, but he could see that the creators seemed to want to convey some kind of power.

The work that impressed Gu Weijing the most on the entire first floor was not the watch worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, but a poster.

Dimensions of 3m by 5m.

It is the largest work in the entire main exhibition area on the first floor, and it is about the albatross that died from swallowing plastic bottle caps.

The mother seabird in the picture is feeding the little albatross gull. What she regurgitates from her mouth is not the fish she has caught, but domestic garbage drifting on the sea. Plastic bottle caps are falling out of the mother gull's rotting body one by one.

Its form is similar to oil painting.

The reason why it is said to be similar is that its category introduction was classified as oil painting on paper by the organizing committee, but Gu Weijing could see at a glance that it was actually painted with oil pastels.

If there is a chain of contempt in oil painting techniques.

So it's probably that traditional oil paints are slightly better than oil paints with chemical driers, and both are slightly better than acrylic paints.

The quality of works drawn with acrylic paints is obviously higher than that of works drawn with oil pastels.

Works drawn with oil pastels are to oil paintings what works drawn with water-soluble colored pencils are to watercolors.

It's not unacceptable, it just has limitations.

It is difficult for watercolor paintings drawn with colored pencils to fully and perfectly reflect the characteristics of watercolor... According to Professor Wattl, it is difficult to "let gravity work its magic between the brewing of colors."

However, it is difficult to fully demonstrate the softness and delicacy of the brush when working with oil pastels.

It flakes easily, has poor color characteristics, weak texture, and is difficult to mix colors. However, its greatest feature is that it is easy to get started and very convenient to paint.

Not absolutely.

Oil pastels are usually used by two types of artists. One type is those who work in a genre that is not known for its painting details, or those who are new to painting and do not care much about the shortcomings of these tools. The other type is art masters who have mastered or even perfected their painting techniques. They stand at the pinnacle of art, a bit like martial arts masters who can use flying flowers and fallen leaves as swords, so they also do not care much about these details.

There are works of art that make the most of oil pastels, but this one is not one of them.

Its technical level is not high, the oil painting technique is Lv.4 professional level one, and the sketch line level is even only Lv.3, which is a semi-professional painting level.

If nothing unexpected happens, this should be the work with the lowest painting technique in the main exhibition area of ​​the entire Biennale.

Gu Weijing looked at the explanation board next to it and found out that the artist of this painting was only 14 years old, a junior high school student in Malaysia. This painting was not exhibited through normal exhibition channels, but through a cooperative project - the other party was the winner of a children's art competition in Kuala Lumpur, and thus won a booth in the non-competition unit of the Esplanade.

As striking as the other person’s 14-year-old age is that the emotional level of this painting titled “Seagull Eating Plastic” has reached the level of “feelings in the heart (perfection)”.

Only by attending such an international biennale could Gu Weijing deeply realize how big the world is and how many geniuses there are.

Being able to draw such works at the age of 14, the paintings contain such emotional depth.

Truly remarkable.

Environmental-themed works are the hottest art category and are also one of the easiest to draw.

There are many works related to environmental protection in the entire exhibition area, but few of them can reach the level of heart-touching. There are even fewer works that can reach the level of "heart-touching (perfection)", with no more than three or four works in total.

There are even fewer works than those whose technical level can reach the perfect level of Lv.6 professional painters.

It is true that young people are to be feared, and he is a true genius.

However, after looking around for a long time, Gu Weijing found that there was only one artist in the exhibition area who could reach the level of "working hard" - Sakai Takakura.

Even here.

Ms. Sakai is undoubtedly still a genius among geniuses.

After looking at all the exhibition areas on the first floor, Gu Weijing returned to the check-in area and to the big watch.

Gu Weijing stood in the distance and watched quietly.

He stopped looking at his watch.

He is looking at people.

(End of this chapter)