Wang Chuan, outstanding artist of contemporary Chinese ink, has been experimenting with ink, merges calligraphic forms with abstract shapes since late 1980s. He plays one of the important roles to the contribution and the development of Chinese ink art after the Cultural Revolution. By combining classical Chinese styles with inspiration from the West, Wang shows how Chinese ink on rice paper can become a wonderfully creative, modern art.
Born 1953 in Chengdu, Sichuan, Wang Chuan began painting during the Cultural Revolution while working building Railway tracks in 1960s. He graduated from Sichuan Art Academy in Chongqing in 1982, studied traditional Chinese painting. Like many of his contemporaries, he also did oil paintings until 1984 when he found his attraction to ink as a medium of expression. He moved to Shenzhen in the late 1980s, and lived in Guangzhou in 1990s. In 1997, Wang went to New York but unfortunately diagnosed with gastric cancer, and then he was back to Chengdu for an operation and chemotherapy in 1998. In spite of adverse conditions, Wang continued to express his emotions through his paintings, experimenting with ink’s many possibilities; gradually the calligraphic characteristics dissolved leaving only the abstract shapes. He explored the relationship of abstract forms and space ever since then. He has had around 60 solo and group exhibitions around the world since 1980s, such as USA, Germany, Italy, Spain, Singapore, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong. Selected museum collections: Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, USA; Ferrara Art Museum, Italy; Norway National Art Museum, Norway; Guangdong Art Museum, Guangzhou, China; Hong Kong Museum of Art. He currently lives in Beijing.
