Li Ning

Artist Statement

Those selected drawings of mine are regarding the subjects of power, dictatorship, and civilization.

Deeply under the influence of old masters such as Titian and Botticelli, I realized that figurative forms could carry religious, psychological, allegorical, and metaphysical meanings.

I believe that a painter should carefully observe the subject he/she depicts to create a strong impression in mind, and also looks beyond it. Beyond it means, a painter ought to discover his/her subject’s potential to transcend its physical form. The core is the combination between physical observation and spiritual imagination, as a painter should neither limited by his/her subject nor fall into total ignorance of his/her subject’s natural character. This requires a painter always be sincere with his/her subject, or he/she might fall into the danger of creating works full of false feelings.

Furthermore, by observing, we can find similarities between different objects. Therefore, sometimes the most irrelevant tiny objects can play important characters in an epic painting. For example, regarding my own experiences, on a heap of stones and woods, altars and columns can be seen. On pots of houseplants, gardens and jungles can be seen. We can create figures according to our own forms with deformation to some extent. As long as any imaginary creatures still resemble the basic human form, we can use ourselves or anyone as models to create their movements, then fusing features from other creatures and distorting the whole proportion to make them look ridiculous or terrifying. So, I believe imagination works best when we are able to observe and connect different objects, and it can help us create any forms we want convincingly. Meanwhile, we should endow our imagination with clearly oriented meanings, fitting all the forms for purposes rather than create a Frankenstein.

“The muse of art is a cool lover. Only by enthusiastic hands holding the sword of calm, one could possibly touch her heart.”

Country China