The new display in the Later China Gallery (gallery 38) in the Ashmolean Museum commemorates the life of Fang Zhaoling (1914-2006) who is an important 20th century artist and calligrapher.
LI2153.21 Fang Zhaoling, After visiting the Lake District, 1972, ink and colour on paper, 68.58 x 88.9 cm © Fang Zhaoling Foundation
Born in Wuxi in Jiangsu province, Fang Zhaoling was educated privately at home and later attended school in Shanghai and university in the UK, at Manchester. In 1948, she moved to Hong Kong with her husband and resumed the painting studies of her youth. She studied with the well-known artists Qian Songyan, Zhao Shao’ang and Zhang Daqian. In the 1950s she studied at Oxford, and she spent much of the following decade in London. Throughout her career she exhibited widely. She experimented with abstract styles but always remained true to the traditions of Chinese ink paintings, which she often made contemporary through her choices of humanitarian and environmental subjects.
The four paintings in this display are on loan from the Fang Zhaoling Foundation, all are published in the catalogue Fang Zhaoling (1914-2006) that accompanied a retrospective centenary exhibition (October 2014 to February 2015) in the Museum, Khoan and Michael Sullivan Gallery. The works will be on display until September 2016.
Yan Liu, Christensen Fellow in Chinese Painting.
Click HERE to purchase the Fang Zhaoling catalogue from the Ashmolean shop.