Sun Xiaolan
I has always been
fond of daydreaming since childhood, and I especially love painting. When I was
little, I always stared at the landscape paintings hanging at home for a long
time, and even imagined myself being in these paintings. In junior high school,
I tried to replicate some classical landscape paintings and flower-and-bird
paintings in ancient times with Chinese painting pigments. Then, I hung up my
paintings on the wall, which were often praised by my family and neighbors.
Therefore, an indissoluble bond was formed between me and the paintings.
Maybe because I
like sunshine very much, which brings warmth and endless vitality to the world,
I was particularly interested in paintings with impressionism style when I was
studying oil painting. At first, I liked the painting styles of Renoir and Monet;
and later, I admired the painting styles of Sonora and other painters. Both the
bright colors and the lively sunlight belong to the elements loved by
impressionism painting masters. After learning the styles of painting masters,
I began to draw the beautiful scenery around which is familiar to me. For
example, in the painting, Nanshan Road of Hangzhou in Autumn, I would like to
display the bright and beautiful scenery of the autumn sunlight shining through
the sycamore trees. In the painting, Lin 'an Qingshan Lake in Hangzhou, I also
would like to show the warm sunshine scattering on the surface of the lake,
then showing different colors; the red metasequoia trees in the distance start
to glow because of the sunshine, and the ships near the shore become mottled
halos as the sunshine passes through the trees. It’s sunshine that makes the
world full of life and rich in beautiful colors.
I've painted a lot
of still life paintings and landscape paintings, and I've studied the styles of
several other painters. I particularly appreciate the texture of Fechin’s
paintings, and I like the movement in Vincent van Gogh's paintings. For me,
what remains unchanged is that I like to paint the sunshine, different colors
and different atmospheres brought by different lights. In 2015, I saw many
paintings with various schools and styles from ancient to modern times in the
Musee d'Orsay in Paris, France, and in the end, I was deeply moved by Bonnard's
paintings. As it happens, Bonnard's paintings were shown in a special exhibition
at the Musee d'Orsay. I got to see a lot of his original artworks, and I was
attracted by his magical colors. From his paintings, I realized the pleasure of
subjective expression of colors in paintings, and the visual musicality
generated by the combination of colors with points, lines and planes.
Recently, I have
created numerous landscape paintings with different materials, including oil
paint, acrylic pigment, ink, watercolor and so on. However, what I mainly want
to express is the interesting scenes brought by subjective colors, especially
in the tea mountain series and impression of the West Lake series. In the tea
and mountain painting series, I tried to render the atmosphere of different
seasons with different colors, and I also tried to draw tea plants in the tea
garden as individual trees and rows of trees, so that they could be arranged in
an interesting way, which seemed to contain musical rhythm, even making trees
in the tea garden starting to dance with the rhythm. In the impression of the West
Lake painting series, I express viewers’ different feelings of the West Lake in
different periods of time with bold colors through the pink series, blue
series, golden series, etc. How to endow painting with more subjective emotions
and rhythms is my new exploration in painting.
Whether a painting
embodies diverse colors or just one simple color, these colors not only
represent the painter’s most direct painting language and the emotional world
inside, but also reflect the painter’s own aesthetics and spirits. Because of
the application of the subjective colors, oil paintings and photographs have
the essential distinction, which is no longer a mere color reproduction. The
application of subjective colors with personal emotions can unleash emotions to
the greatest extent and provide more freedom to the painting language.
Although the
formation and collocation of colors are scientific, it is subjective in use. I
hope to construct the space in the picture, create the emotional atmosphere
relying on the subjective expression of colors, as well as express the spirit
by colors. This is the artistic direction I would like to dig into at present.
I love the world
of light, so I hope all my paintings are the beautiful worlds with light. I
also like music very much, and I will always immerse myself with music when I’m
painting. I think music has a lot in common with painting, and I sincerely hope
that my artworks can spread the happiness, comfort, positivity and kindness.
With the rapid
development of technology and the accelerated pace of life, everything is
becoming convenient and fast. Have you ever stopped to enjoy the scenery around
you? Have you ever been waiting for a long time? When urban civilization
advances, citizens enjoy fashion and technology, but sometimes, they may miss
the feeling of embracing the nature.
Human beings are
inseparable from nature. No matter how much progress is made in science and
technology or how developed human society is, as a member of all things on
earth, human beings are closely related to nature and tend to embrace the
nature. Therefore, every time when I face the real natural scenery, I’m always
moved by this real and beautiful world. I hope I can express my feelings for
nature through paintings, and I also hope my painting can bring viewers into
the original beautiful world. In the pursuit of the rapid economic and
technological development, I really hope we could stick to the philosophy that
human and nature should live and develop in harmony.
I love painting,
for it can capture my affection to the world. For this reason, I would like to
be a painter for the rest of my life, to depict the world I love and to
continue the innocent dreams in the world of painting. As life goes on, my
passion for painting will never fade away.
Finally, I am
eternally grateful to my teachers and friends who have guided me and taught me
on the road of painting, and I also thank my family for their immense support.
Thank you very much! I will continue to pursue my dream of painting.