- Wade-Giles romanization:
- HsĂŒ Pei-hung
- Born:
- July 19, 1895, Yixing, Jiangsu province, China
- Died:
- September 26, 1953, Beijing (aged 58)
Xu Beihong
-
Who was Xu Beihong?
Xu Beihong (1895â1953) was a highly influential Chinese artist and art educator who advocated for reforming Chinese art by integrating Western techniques.
He received early art instruction from his father, a portrait painter, and became a professional painter and art teacher in his teens. Meeting Kang Youwei, a reform advocate, influenced him to believe Chinese art needed to learn from the West.
After studying in Paris and Berlin, Xu gained fame with a Shanghai exhibition in 1926. He excelled in history paintings, portraits, and animal depictions, using both Western and traditional Chinese methods. His horse paintings were particularly celebrated.
Returning to China in 1927, he taught Western academic methods, emphasizing naturalistic study and drawing. Despite his reform efforts, his opposition to modernists like Picasso led to later criticism.
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What kind of art is Xu Beihong known for?
Xu Beihong, a Chinese artist and art educator, advocated for reforming Chinese art by incorporating Western techniques. He is known for history paintings, portraits, and animals like horses and cats, using both Western media and traditional Chinese ink-and-wash. His horse illustrations received acclaim and boosted his international reputation. Xu was a dedicated realist, but his history paintings also contain elements of French Neoclassicism, like heroism and didactic intentions.
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Why are Xu Beihongâs paintings of horses famous?
Xu Beihong (1895-1953) was a Chinese painter and art educator who advocated for Chinese art reform by incorporating Western art techniques. He is renowned for his history paintings, portraits, and depictions of animals, especially horses.
Xu's paintings of horses are celebrated for their rigorous and stylish illustrations, which gained acclaim from Chinese critics and connoisseurs and contributed to his international reputation. His art aimed to revitalize figure painting to reflect human activities, convinced that Western realism could revive Chinese painting.
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How did Xu Beihong mix Chinese and Western art styles?
Xu Beihong, an influential Chinese artist and art educator, advocated reforming Chinese art by integrating Western techniques. He believed Chinese painting had declined and needed to adopt elements of Western painting, particularly the realist approach, to revitalize it.
Xu received formal training in Western art in Paris at the AcadĂ©mie Julian and the Ăcole Nationale SupĂ©rieure des Beaux-Arts. He insisted that students carefully study subjects in the natural world and focus on drawing as the foundation of painting, following the practices of Western academies. Though he supported realism, his history paintings also contained elements of French Neoclassicism.
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What role did Xu Beihong play in modern Chinese art education?
Xu Beihong was an influential artist and art educator who advocated reforming Chinese art by integrating Western techniques. He believed Chinese painting was declining and needed modernization, urging artists to preserve traditional methods, revive moribund ones, and incorporate Western elements.
After studying in Europe, Xu returned to China and taught using Western academic methods, emphasizing the study of nature and drawing as the foundation of all painting. He became president of the Beiping Art College in 1946 and chairman of the All-China Federation of Artists after the 1949 Communist Revolution. Despite his reform efforts, later generations criticized Xu for hindering the development of Chinese art due to his opposition to Modernist artists.
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How did Xu Beihongâs work influence later generations of Chinese artists?
Xu Beihong, an influential Chinese artist and art educator, advocated reforming Chinese art by integrating Western techniques. He urged artists to preserve useful traditional methods, revive those that were failing, and incorporate suitable elements of Western painting.
After the Communist Revolution of 1949, Xu became the head of the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. His monumental figure paintings served as a foundation for Socialist Realist painters. Although he was against modernism, later generations accused Xu of hindering the progress of Chinese art.
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Xu Beihong (born July 19, 1895, Yixing, Jiangsu province, Chinaâdied September 26, 1953, Beijing) was an influential Chinese artist and art educator who, in the first half of the 20th century, argued for the reformation of Chinese art through the incorporation of lessons from the West.
Xu was first taught art in his childhood by his father, Xu Dazhang, a locally known portrait painter. Xu became an itinerant professional painter in his early teens and an art teacher before reaching age 20. He first visited Shanghai in 1912, and over the next few years he studied Western-style painting and the French language. Perhaps the most pivotal moment of his early career occurred when he met Kang Youwei, the leading exponent of reforms in Chinese art, who deeply impressed the young man with his arguments that Chinese art would perish unless it learned from Western art.
In 1918 Xu traveled to Beiping (now Beijing), where he was appointed a teacher at the Beiping Universityâs Art Research Association. In the same year he presented a paper, âMethods to Reform Chinese Painting,â in which he clearly expressed his view that Chinese painting had declined to a critical point. In order to modernize it, Xu urged artists to âpreserve those traditional methods which are good, revive those which are moribund, and amalgamate those elements of Western painting which can be adopted.â Throughout his career, Xu was thoroughly convinced that only the realist approach from recent Western painting could revive Chinese painting. He also supported the revitalization of figure painting in Chinese painting, which âshould reflect the activities of humankind.â
With the help of a government scholarship, Xu left China for France to further his studies in 1919. During the next eight years he received a solid academic training in Paris at the AcadĂ©mie Julian and the Ăcole Nationale SupĂ©rieure des Beaux-Arts. Xu also studied under Arthur Kampf, President of the Berlin Academy of Art, while living in the German capital from 1921 to 1923.
In February 1926 Xu held a large-scale, one-person exhibition in Shanghai that firmly established his fame as a modern Chinese master. He was best known for his history paintings, portraits, and pictures of horses, cats, and other animals, and he was competent both in Western media and in the traditional Chinese ink-and-wash method. Although he proclaimed himself a dedicated realist, a close investigation of his history paintings reveals that they contain elevating heroism and didactic intentions, key characteristics of realismâs antithesis at the time, French Neoclassicism. His rigorous and stylish illustrations of horses were especially highly acclaimed by Chinese critics and connoisseurs and helped gain him an international reputation.
Xu returned to China permanently in 1927 and continued to teach. As a teacher, he strictly followed the instructions of the Western academies: he insisted that art students study their subjects carefully in the natural world and that their lessons always start from drawing, the basis and foundation of all painting. During the 1930s he widely exhibited his paintings in China and Europe. He took up the post of president of the Beiping Art College in 1946, and, after the Communist Revolution of 1949, he served as chairman of the All-China Federation of Artists and as president of the Central Academy of Fine Arts.
Although his years as a student in Europe coincided with the rise of avant-gardism, Xu was openly and strongly opposed to paintings by Modernist artists such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, whom he denounced as formalist and proof of the decadence of Western capitalism. As a result of this stance, and in spite of his work for reform, later generations accused Xu of setting back the development of Chinese art.
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