Artist's grand views inspire serene nostalgia

Growing up in the north and now living in the south, ink artist Shi Jinwang has been nurtured by the glorious landscapes that vary from region to region across the country. He comes from Weinan in Shaanxi province, and studied in Beijing for many years. He is currently based in Xiamen, Fujian province.

No matter how different the scenery he depicts, Shi says he always tries to present "a spirit of forbearance and perseverance "between the clouds and mist, mountains and waters, and rocks and trees that he is portraying.

"The truth of art lies somewhere else, outside the paintings; it is in the effort made to accumulate knowledge and technical ability over time," Shi says.

Shi's ongoing one-man exhibition, Fujian Mountains and Rivers, at the National Art Museum of China, which runs until Dec 6, will appeal to lovers of Chinese landscape painting. On show are more than 60 paintings in the style, testimony to Shi's endeavors in the realm of ink art that span nearly three decades.

The dynamic, varied natural scenery he has been captivated and inspired by in Fujian is one of the main subjects exhibited. Several long scrolls — measuring from 16 to 40 meters in length — of famous landscapes, including the Wuyi Mountains, Taimu Mountain and Gulangyu Island, are on display, inscribed with poems Shi has composed for each.

"Between the hills and rivers in Fujian sit many villages that have thrived for centuries," Shi says of his journeys to the province's hinterlands. "There I find distinctive, age-old civic buildings, lounge bridges, well-preserved ancestral houses and other objects and customs in a close association with the past."

His paintings integrate this nostalgic, poetic feeling to present a spiritual haven of serenity.

Meanwhile, Shang Hui, the exhibition's curator and a critic with the China Artists Association, says the other paintings on show are half realistic and half imagined, drawn from Shi's impressions of the grand views ranging from the north to south and west to east of the country.

"His vocabulary of art is also built on his long-term studies of the approaches of ancient landscape painters, especially those living in the Song (960-1279) and Yuan (1271-1368) dynasties, the periods when Chinese landscape painting achieved great momentum," Shang says.

He says Shi's work is a blending of the views and atmospheres of these famed natural destinations, such as the Zhongnan Mountains, Huashan Mountain and Taihang Mountains, which have been revisited by generations of Chinese painters; and he is able to infuse tradition and modern aesthetics into his brushwork, lending it depth, grace and refinement.

Shi has taken short-term courses in Chinese painting at the Chinese National Academy of Arts several times, receiving instruction from noted artists, including Long Rui and Zeng Laide. "They pay great attention to learning to become a consummate artist in painting, calligraphy and literature.

"The best lesson I have learned from my teachers is that the essence of art is not the techniques," Shi says, "but the scope of learning and wisdom, and morality and understanding of responsibilities as a person and as an artist."