Angels and a Thousand Words

Yesterday was the feast of St. Michael and All Angels. I wasn't going to blog about it, but I did take personal note because of all of the saintly feast days, this is the one I take note of. St. Michael is the angel with the sword, you see, and I rather like the idea of well-armed angels. I habitually wear a small pendant of Saint Michael. He is mentioned in The Book of Revelations as leader of the heavenly armies and in Roman Catholicism is designated as the patron saint of police, security forces and ...artists.

Ground Zero (click to enlarge)Late last night I decided it was high time I took a look at the latest issue of The American Enterprise. TAE does such a great job on arts and culture but would not itself be known for its aesthetic qualities, especially the covers. This issue's cover was especially homely but the goodness lay inside. On the Contents page was an arresting picture of an oil painting. It was of a solitary, downcast woman in white so reminiscent of the work of my favorite painter, John Singer Sargent. Closer examination revealed wings- an angel. The caption said only "page 10." Well, really she was on page 11, in an article written in response to Karl Zinmeister's assertion that so little art reflected the events of 9/11. Apparently, he had been set straight and one of the examples sent to refute him was this allegorical painting called "Ground Zero." In his own words, the artist tells the story of the painting:

I went to the studio around 9 a.m. on the morning of September 11. Then news of planes crashing tore me away from my work. Feelings of shock, disbelief, sadness, anger, insecurity, and grief overwhelmed me for many days, I couldn't possibly go back to painting what I had been working on prior to the attack: a series of paintings celebrating the joy and beauty of light and life. My heart was filled with the darkness of despair. I turned to painting angels as a way of comforting myself. I realized the angel should embody strength along with tenderness. She would be standing amidst the ruins, looking down in mourning. One hand holds a sprig of red, white and blue, flowers, their colors symbolizing the courage, justice, and truth that the American flag represents. Her right hand is clutching her dress at some folds that are suggestive of a sword's scabbard. Her gaze is directed toward some long piece of metal in the rubble which perhaps resembles a sword. Could she be contemplating retribution?

The artist , HongNian Zhang, is a contemporary master and a new American citizen. From the Fletcher Gallery website:

Zhang's career began in China folllowing his training at the Central Arts Academy, China's most prestigious art school. He helped create the avante-garde Flashback and Scar movements during the years following the Cultural Revolution. These movements, in opposiiton to China's politicized art climate, evoked a raw, untainted vision of Chinese life.

The artist lives with his family in Woodstock, New York .

John Singer Sargent, for your enjoyment: here, here, and here. 

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[Howarde]

CHINESE ARTISTS PAINTING WESTERN STYLE ART
Over the past fifteen to twenty years I puzzled over the many Chinese artists painting western style art instead of the typical Chinese style, which I assumed was what they would be taught in academies in that country.

Most paintings coming in from Asia were copies, often made directly from catalogs of prints by American artists, or with variations so that they were technically originals. Cheap, but European style, by good copyists sold in department stores and in "starving artists" sales in hotel ballrooms and convention centers.

Then one day I met another of these fine young Chinese artists and he gave me the answer: during the takeover of the USSR by the Communists, the White Russians fled to the east, with many of them settling in China. There were among them many art teachers, who found employment in the colleges in Beijing, and they taught the disciplines of western art.

Meanwhile from the 40s to the 90s, universities in this country virtually dropped courses in drawing and painting in a realistic style. One student told me that after buying all the supplies according to the list furnished by her instructor (who painted abstracts), he entered the classroom the following Monday morning, students at their easels, and said, "Express yourself" and walked out of the room.

But, in the USSR and in China, they taught in the manner of the old Atelier method, with drawing a requisite. Hence, Chinese artists painting things that remind one of John Singer Sargent.

A noted art teacher told me about one of his students in a life-drawing class who refused to draw a model more than once, as if he could learn everything about that model from a single session.

So, in many galleries about the U.S., Chinese artists like Zhang sell everything they paint while American artists may lag far behind. I do not believe that there are many, if at all, art academies in the U.S. that can compare with the quality of those in Russia or China today, although they are offering much better art programs than they did in years past.