Organizer: Portraits of Heart Touching Moments

Contemporary Impressionist Painter: Tongxiu Liang
 
Impressionism has once rewritten the history of Western Art. Yet in a time dominated by commercial art and aesthetic pragmatism, the mention of Impressionism would be like revisiting a forgotten page of history. Is it an outdated proposition? Or does it open a revealing window that introduces fresh air? 

For many years, painter Tongxiu Liang and her fellow artists in Paris (who form the Union of French Contemporary Impressionist Artists, Union des Association D'Artistes Peintres Du Impressionistes Contemporain), have tirelessly pursued the ideas of Cezanne and Impressionism in their various forms of painting, with which they pour in contemporary thinking and emotion, and retrospect on the value of painting. It has been a trudging in the thorns, but eventually, their efforts are recognized and praised in the homeland of Impressionism. Today when we look at Tongxiu's paintings, they well communicate to us that the ideas of Impressionism are still powerful enough to confront the contemporary world, and the open country blazed by Impressionist predecessors but skimmed by the world, is far from fully cultivated. The flowers will bloom again, and the sun will be rising.

Through her arduous creation and deliberation, Tongxiu has come to realize that what Impressionism has changed in Art history is not the technique or form, but the principle for the value judgment of a painting: Neither the three-dimensional "sense of reality" nor the skills of presenting the virtual and the real could serve as a sole criterion. Impressionism is more than the visual interpretation and application of color and light theories. It provides multiple perspectives for painting, and helps realize arts of endless possibilities.
In her artistic life, Tongxiu has always been observing the world with curious and loving eyes, seizing moments that touch our heart.

She devotes all her energy into the exploration of the color patterns that can express those touching moments, with the most powerful and vivid painting manifestation. In her works, the expressiveness of color is unique and strong. She stresses the spectrum of the main color theme as well as the contrast between the corresponding color gamuts, and eliminates the obscurity brought by the perspective of chromatic light in early Impressionist paintings. In this way, she creates a unique penetrating power of color, and the bright and harmonious properties of light. In Tongxiu's paintings, colors are given a superior value, which in turns brings us a pure spiritual enjoyment.
   
Physical form on the other hand, is not an independent element in Tongxiu's paintings.  It is a kind of color configuration, but somewhat different from techniques that deal with light and shade, perspective, and emptiness-fullness in the traditional plastic arts. She composes rich and substantiated physical senses with specific brushwork style and different contrasting effects of each color spot in the general color tone.  
Since she got rid of the shackles of the so-called grand narrativeness of painting, literariness is no longer the guiding element of composition. Tongxiu liberally seeks contrast and correspondence between color gamut and physical form, so as to obtain a dynamic balance.  
Inspiration from Impressionism is clearly seen in Tongxiu's paintings, especially in the form of color. As a modern artist, she has unfolded and reshaped Impressionism in the contemporary context, yet she does not insist on a genre or certain school of art. While portraying the heart-touching moments in life, what Tongxiu constantly contemplates and pursues is the ultimate spiritual value of painting.

(SOURCE: " Union of Contemporary Impressionist Artists ", Yi)