Opening：2017.06.24  15:00

[Regarding art], both the form of expression and contemporaneity are important. What happens presently exits in the moment. … I do not hope to miss many beautiful things simply because the pace of life is too fast. I only want to keep that sense of balance, purity, nobleness, and mysteriousness in my life, and try my best to document it. I feel that I must create a dialogue with this world of nothingness.

— CHEN Cheng-Wei

CHEN Cheng-Wei was born in Zhejiang Province, China in 1984. A representative young painter of Chinese contemporary oil painting as well as a member of the Portrait Society of America, Chen now lives and works in Beijing. Following the example of Western classical oil painters, such as the Dutch oil master Rembrandt, Chen places an emphasis on the use of light. Through classical oil techniques and his personal sensibility and perception of our time, he precisely and dramatically interprets modern people’s emotions and situations through a lens that integrates reality and illusion, offering his audience an aesthetic experience and a kind of nostalgic beauty. In Being and Nothingness, a new solo exhibition at Chini Gallery, the artist elaborates on the elusiveness and subtleness of romantic love through his recent paintings. On view in the exhibition, a painting sharing the exhibition title is a visual depiction of the artist’s view on relationship, which portrays love’s elusive existence posited between reality and fantasy. The exhibition also showcases Chen’s famous The Republic of China series, including works like Orchid in Dream and Pointing to the Belief that demonstrate the artist’s excellent manipulation of light, physical forms, and gestures to visualize dramatic tension and a sense of mystery. Other works like Heavenly Will and Matchmaker reveal how the artist uses visual scenes to poetically express his true feelings about relationship and marriage. Chen’s outstanding artistry shows his precisely balanced integration of realism and the classical style. He expands the expression and form of traditional realistic oil painting in an innovative way while employing traditional and historic elements as metaphors to voice his reflections on love and life. The reality in life can sometimes fill one with a sense of nothingness. However, the illusory realm depicted in art affords us a momentary haven, where all expectations and fineness, be it in love or in life, never cease to exist.