Page 49 - 臺中市第二十六屆大墩美展專輯

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Ink Wash Painting
Juror's Statement, Ink Wash Painting Category LI Chen-Ming

The works submitted to the Ink Wash Painting Category of the Da Dun Fine Arts Exhibition seem to have progressed in the same direction as those
submitted to the Eastern Gouache Painting Category in recent years. This mutual exploration makes it di cult to draw a clear line to distinguish them. In the
realm of contemporary art, the increasingly blurred distinction between ink wash painting and Eastern gouache painting, both Asian art traditions, means
more freedom is allowed in the creative process thanks to their increasingly mixed elements. Artists derive intrinsic meanings and interpretations for each of
the ideas conceived in the initial creative stage, taking novel approaches and seeking their personal voice to explore contemporary possibilities for ink wash
painting and broaden its expressive methods. Such e orts are actually experimenting and testing by artists, who attempt to shape distinctive features of their
style through personal experiences and an uncon ned, well-rounded perspective. It is perfectly understandable why they gravitate towards Eastern gouache
painting, since this art form has long been popular, particularly among artists in central Taiwan. However, given that artworks are meant to achieve the
purpose of highlighting their own uniqueness, it is worth considering whether a division should still exist between ink wash and Eastern gouache painting.
This year, 185 works were entered into the Calligraphy Category of Da Dun Fine Arts Exhibition, six of which came from overseas. Following the preliminary
review, 29 works were shortlisted and 26 were accepted for the nal review as three works were returned due to failure to meet the size speci cations. After
several rounds of voting and assessment in the preliminary and nal reviews, ve judges nally selected 26 winners, namely the top three winners, two Award
of Merit recipients, and 19 shortlisted works.
The winner of First Prize is YAO Jie's Blue Time, in which the artist uses gloomy imagery and a hazy gray palette to express complex feelings, such as
uncertainty and resignation intermixed with resignation and calmness, in face of the issues of life and death and one's own existence. It is the exquisite
depiction combined with the subtle, rich layers that make this gong-bi, or meticulous, painting on silk successfully catch viewers' attention and let their
imagination run wild, despite its small size. The Second Prize winner is Essence by LIN You-Rong. The painting employs a gray, black, and blue palette with color
blocks made through multiple washes to bring out a delicately outlined gure loosely clad in a silk robe. The imagery of Essence conveys the artist's attempt
to portray people's uid state of mind in everyday life and the constant shift between what seems permanent and impermanent. It is hoped that soft strength
will help people create beautiful moments in their day-to-day. The Third Prize winner is Upset by CHOU Ming-Han. In this painting, the artist pieces the image
of bodies in motion through gradation from light to dark ink. The frames repeat and overlap until forming a long, horizontal work, bringing to mind crowded
thoughts, disorder, and anxiety, while the ocher red background intensi es the already restless atmosphere.
The four Award of Merit recipients are also one-of-a-kind. In HUANG Pao-Hsien's The spread of memory, two di erent spaces are arranged side by side. The
intertwining light and shadow together with the rhythmic representation of objects give viewers more room for imagination. The artist's memory translates
into a novel visual language and creates a suggestive form of expression. HUANG Shin-Chih's By the River in the Morning portrays morning light on a river with
the simplest depictive technique, heedless of the trend to combine multiple techniques in contemporary ink wash painting. This conveys the purest aspect of
nature to viewers. KANG Xing-Long's The Winard of Egret is essentially composed of lines. The clumps of reeds by the water are depicted with neat, intertwining
lines, bringing out an aesthetic appeal of order in disorder. The little egrets standing on and ying over the reeds add some liveliness to the tranquility of the
image. ZHANG Deng-Ke's Nature Gazing illustrates a bent space time continuum in a plain gray palette. Themed on a small spot in the city, the artist draws
viewers' attention to the coexistence and equilibrium between nature and the busy city.
Congratulations to winners and, for non-winners, keep up the good work!

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