A few years ago I wrote an essay on the works of my good friend, Li Gang, during the period of his artistic transformation. At the time, Li was at the peak of his creativity, as he completed many series of new works with great momentum. I left for Beijing later on. One day, Li suddenly resigned from his steady job and “wandered” off to Beijing like I had done. Our “wandering” to Beijing shared a similar motif: we received steady paychecks from “official” institutions, and devoted our spare time to artistic experiment. In this regard, Li showed a remarkable vigor. Here are some of my thoughts on Li from the essay I wrote a few years ago:

　　“It had only been a few days since I last saw him. Li Gang had finished a whole basket of paintings, and he acted like a craftsman who crawled over patchworks and created many new series of works. I admire Li’s capacity for doing everything with tremendous gusto and spreading his energy over multiple pursuits. In Die suan pieng, we have this idiom, “spreading salt,” which has the connotations of “large” and “coarse,” meaning that someone has the courage to strive, though his efforts may be unrefined at times. Despite such occasional coarseness, Li was meant to do great things.

　　The art of painting lies between vastness and fineness, between coarseness and subtlety. Vastness and coarseness are a kind of mindset and philosophy, while fineness and subtlety are another kind of feeling and experience. Looking at his latest series, I feel that Li has arrived at new kind of reflection through his quest for a uniquely personal feeling. I have always wondered: What kind of reflection and feeling are they?

　　Li worked in printmaking in the past, and he had a special touch for wood and grain while working on the material. He switched to Chinese ink painting at a later time. Through the use of brush and ink, he sought the dialogue with ancient souls, and its connection with contemporary language. However, I have always felt that he has not found his place in “Chinese painting” and “ink,” and he continues to practice the craft of “brush” and “ink.” In recent years, thanks to his various artistic and professional pursuits and his outgoing personality, Li acquired many “eccentric” friends. He has participated in and organized a number of experimental and contemporary art activities, while he gradually came to an “alternative” mode of thinking and feeling. As a result, he put the “brush,” “paint,” and “writing” aside, and turned to folding papers seeped in ink and their patchwork.

　　On Li’s recent “experiments,” I see three layers of relation and meaning as the entry points to our discussion. The first is “process.” Titled “Series,” his new batch of works explore the experience and joy of the process of creation. The artist does not care for the depiction or expression of anything in particular. Nor does he care about the beginning or the end. He often begins his “process” in the quiet moments of his busy life: folding papers, sprinkling water, seeping the papers in ink, spreading them on a flat surface, tearing them apart and creasing the stripes for patchwork, etc. Step by step, the process unfolds and becomes his experience, while his experience also runs through the process. In this sense, his experience can be extended to a broader aesthetics and cultural meaning of water, ink and paper as a medium. The unison of ink and xuan paper embodies an experiential joy and understanding of the nature of Oriental culture.

　　The second is “graphics.” In the recognition of aesthetics and cultural meaning of Chinese ink painting, we are conditioned to derive our understanding from typical images and formulas such as “mountain and water,” “flowers and birds,” “characters,” and “brush and ink.” This has created the misconception that we can only draw reciprocal meanings of traditional culture and Oriental culture from such graphics, and led us to search for breakthrough from within these frameworks. Li’s breakthrough takes on a rather large scale; it may even be a revolution, a quest for a new kind of graphics. Li attempts to break away from the traditional and classical “S” shaped structures, the relation between sparseness and thickness in brush and think, and the principles of resemblance and difference. In their place, Li creates abstract and square compartments, symmetrical lines that come close to perfect balance in the thickness of ink, patchworks that have been jumbled and rearranged, and the contrast and dialogue between different materials. These touches constitute his understanding and expression of ink art in the contemporary realm, as well as his personalized graphics of ink.

　　The third is “feeling” and “exerience.” The crux of Chinese painting and ink lies in the cultural expression and experiential depth of the art form. Its forms and graphics may be manifold, leading us to a higher plane of cultural experience; or they convey the artist’s personal experience of culture, which gives birth to the meaning of artistic creation. Li has attempted to his feeling and experience of ink as an artistic expression and cultural language with calm. In the depth of these ink compartments, a distinct aesthetics and comprehension are revealed through the varying shades of ink on paper. This needs to be discerned and felt from the heart. Li must pursue this experience as an artist; we, as the audience, must also do the same.

　　Li’s “experiment” evolves along this “process.” The birth of his graphics, the expression of feelings, the experience of culture and the use of ink as a medium are transformed into cultural meaning, through the artist’s language and its growth.

　　In “spreading salt,” Li has both coarse and fine touches. However, his “experiment” is only the beginning of a “process,” which leans toward coarseness and even ferocity at times. I hope that he will calm down and experience life, society and culture, and transform such personal experience into an expression of ink that is completely his own.”

　　The title and emphasis of the essay was “Experience is a Cultural Attitude,” and “experience” has always been the starting point of his artistic creation. At this stage, Li has elevated this “experience” of artistic creation into “cultivation” in his everyday life. It is exalted into a way of living, a means of cultivation toward a higher realm in life. Be it ink, traces of life, emotional states and higher realms in life, they may all become a new stage in Li’s development, an expression of his “cultivation” through the journey of life and existence.

　　I look forward to seeing greater depths of Li Gang’s experience and cultivation.

　　Qinluyun, Beijing

　　10 May 2012