One artist's messages between East and West
The solo show is curated by Udo Kittelmann with the support of Fondazione Prada, showing the work of Liu Ye through a selection of 30 paintings realized from 1992 onwards.
Prada is presenting “Storytelling,” a solo show by painter Liu Ye at Prada Rong Zhai in Shanghai through January 20.
The show is curated by Udo Kittelmann with the support of Fondazione Prada, showing the work of Liu Ye through a selection of 30 paintings realized from 1992 onwards.
The artist expresses an intimate and sensual imagination that feeds on heterogeneous sources related to literature, history of art and popular cultural from the West and the East, giving, evoking introspection, purity and suspension.
“Every work is my self-portrait,” Liu said. His paintings are generated by a plurality of creative forces: memory, observation, imagination and artistic education. His work is a means of self-exploration and discovery, in a context in which artistic creation and daily life influence each other.
“Even though I have never become an abstract artist, I am nonetheless interested in stripping down narrative and simplifying.”
Kittelmann said: “I experienced his paintings as sensitive pictorial messages relayed between two worlds that are often viewed as contradictory: Western cultures versus Asian cultures. Liu Ye’s paintings struck me as manifesting a dialectical constellation. His work is not only interwoven with China’s manifold cultural development, it also bears witness to a profound knowledge of the history of European culture and painting.”
