1 minute read
HONGNIAN ZHANG
from A SENSE OF PLACE | Artists from the Woodstock Masters Series | Kleinert/James Center for the Arts
WEBSITE: HONGNIANZHANG.COM
INSTAGRAM: ZHANGHONGNIAN
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Biography
Hongnian Zhang will be interviewed by James Cox on Zoom. A brief Q&A with the audience will conclude the approximately 50-minute talk. The event will continue the Woodstock Masters series of artist interviews that, along with author talks and panel discussions, fall under the collective title Byrdcliffe Forum.
Hongnian Zhang is a Chinese American realism painter, whose works are beloved in both America and China.
His formal artistic training was at China’s highly selective Central Art Academy. Immediately afterwards, he was sent to the countryside to endure four years of hard labor as “Reeducation” during the Cultural Revolution.
His art career began when he returned to Beijing in 1974 and was selected to join the Beijing Fine Art Academy. He soon became a rising star with paintings that caught the public’s attention and heart. He was a leader of the “Scar Art” movement. Three of his works were acquired by China’s National Art Museum for their permanent collection.
He moved to America in 1985. In 1986 he was in the first show introducing Chinese oil painting to the West. “Realism from China” at Grand Central Art Galleries in New York City attracted national attention.
Over the years his subject matter has expanded to include contemporary life in America, and large-scale history paintings. Several of his Chinese history paintings have been featured in National Geographic Magazine. He recently painted the mural “The Travels of Marco Polo” for China’s National Museum in Beijing.
Zhang and his wife, the artist Lois Woolley, co-wrote The Yin Yang of Painting, which presents his methods and philosophy of painting.
