Veteran sculptor shows common and important figures

It is not uncommon for artists today to spend time on socializing or profit from commissions.

But Beijing-born sculptor Tian Shixin, 76, seems to be an exception to the global trend.

For most of the time, he “hides” in his studio, according to Li Xiangming, a fellow artist and friend.

“He thinks of the less fortunate people he has met and depicts their lives in his works. He also portrays men of virtue in Chinese history — he voices justice, progress and freedom.”

Tian says he seldom attends social events, because he finds such occasions boring. “I’m in my 70s. I don’t have much time left. I treasure every minute spent on sculpture.”

But for the recent opening of his ongoing exhibition in Beijing, Tian stepped out of his studio in the capital’s northern suburbs. The show, Works of Craftsmanship, has dozens of sculptures and paintings by him that cover his career spanning decades. The show is being held at the art museum of the Central Academy of Fine Arts where he once taught.

The display brings to light Tian’s comfort level working with different materials — wood, metal, raw lacquer and clay.

Li says Tian avoids repeating approaches, and reflects his understanding of beauty and cultural traditions in his sculptures.

Although Tian has been an established sculptor for long, it was not until the late 1970s that he started to invest more time in it. After graduating from art college in 1964, Tian, who majored in oil painting, began teaching at a primary school in southwestern Guizhou province. He lived there for 25 years before returning to Beijing to teach at the fine arts academy.

“There were a lot of wood blocks in Guizhou. So naturally, it made me want to carve and sculpt,” he says, adding that the diversity of ethnic culture in the province also inspired him to pursue the art.

The current exhibition shows some sculptures of people from Guizhou’s ethnic groups that Tian produced while living there.

It was also in Guizhou where Tian became interested in the age-old lacquer art of China, and then integrated it into his work.

“I first learned lacquer when I about raw arrived in Guizhou. Villagers there carried with them cigarette cases that were made of cowhide and coated with a layer of lacquer,” he says.

Later when he visited the Mawangdui Tombs of the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 24) in Central China’s Hunan province, he saw among the unearthed artifacts several bronze and lacquer pieces.

“The bronze objects suffered severe corrosion on the surface, while the lacquer ones still had smooth, colorful appearances and the patterns Works of Craftsmanship, could be clearly seen.

“It occurred to me that the long tradition of applying raw lacquer could be enlivened in the creation of modern sculptures.”

But the craft of applying untreated lacquer has withered over time and such wares are not valued in market.

“The technique is unique to our cultural traditions. I’m optimistic about its prospects,” he says. “I’ve invested resources on making sculptures with raw lacquer. But more needs to be done.”

Historic figures constitute another part of Tian’s output. He has made the sculptures of five prominent Chinese emperors, and other people of political, social and cultural distinction from imperial China, such as Sima Qian, a historian from the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220). The exhibits are part of his ongoing show.

Tian’s interest in history goes back to his youth. When rendering a representation of past figures, he seeks to convey a mixture of feelings — the figures he profiles exhibit a disposition toward “romantic melancholy”. For instance, his work Lu Xun depicts a thin cheek of the renowned 20thcentury literati, suggesting his concern then for the nation and its people.

“I feel I am being pushed by a strong spiritual power, a desire to reflect the meaning of life and existence,” Tian says.

His studio has been recreated at the exhibition, where Tian demonstrates how his representative work Tan Sitong, on the late Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) reformist, came into being in the 1990s.

“He defines the heroic, epic and tragic sides of Tan’s life with an Eastern approach of ease and simplicity,” Chen Wenling, a Beijing-based sculptor, says of the work.

Tian says a sculptor’s studio can be cluttered with things but he doesn’t care. “I enjoy the process to enliven a certain space by filling it with a work of distinctive quality and volume.

“I feel that we artists are no different from artisans when we work out something.”

Tian He, his daughter who is also a sculptor, says, “The most important quality in this art that my father has taught me is honesty.”

paintings. features sculptures and

PHOTOS PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY Tian Shixin (right) works in his studio in Beijing. His ongoing solo show in Beijing,