Marie's to pay tribute to front-line heroes

As part of the city’s Quality Life Week, a special exhibition, “The Angel and Spring in My Eyes,” is currently showcased at Marie’s Art Museum.

Themed on the fight for life during the coronavirus outbreak, all participating works — a total of 146 paintings created by 110 candidates around the country — are judged by a jury composed of nine members who ultimately selected 45 artworks to display.

“When most of us were instructed to stay home due to lockdown restrictions during the prolonged Spring Festival holidays, we often imagined life afterwards when coronavirus cases leveled off and things returned to normal,” said Gu Tingting, director of the Marie’s Art Museum.

Some wanted to visit their families, dine at restaurants, go to movies or concerts while others simply wanted to appreciate the dazzling spring flowers. All these expectations for the lockdown’s aftermath are well reflected in the painters’ brushstrokes.

There are works featuring people’s leisure time spent boating on a lake, swallows flying among willows and bountiful blooms covering shrubs.

“Those are exactly the scenes when spring arrives in China, showcasing faith in the promise that everything can begin again,” Gu said.

Besides the celebration of spring, “angel” is another subject of the exhibit’s paintings. Many works are dedicated to the “Angel in White,” a term used in China to refer to medical workers who fought on the COVID-19 front line.

One of the exhibition’s highlights is works by a small group of candidates from the Le Pingfang Public Welfare Development Center in Nanjing. Painted by children with Down syndrome and autistic spectrum disorder, the paintings show their gratitude and respect for medical workers who fought the virus in Wuhan.

There are also paintings depicting the thousands of construction workers who worked day and night to build Wuhan’s Huoshenshan and Leishenshan hospitals as quickly as possible.

Conceptualized in February, the exhibition was organized by the Shanghai Morning Post and Marie’s.

Marie’s is a century-old domestic paint brand whose logo — profiles of one black horse head and one white horse head — is deeply rooted in the minds of many generations of Chinese. A household name, Marie’s is closely linked with many firsts in China, including watercolor and oil paint, crayons, acrylic and ink-wash paint.

Exhibition info

Date: Through June 20, 10am-5pm
Venue: Marie’s Art Museum
Address: 158 Chenjiaqiao Road

Ti Gong