LiFang

(Hardback)

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"The portrait is a process of distillation of the essence of the being whose only purpose is to preserve the aura of the individual."

Born in 1968 in Jiangsu, China, LiFang lives and works in Paris. Her figurative work, on the border of abstraction, deals with all the subjects of our daily universe: antonymous crowds in megalopolises, portraits of her entourage, scenes of idleness at the water's edge, current events (Chinese censorship, migrants)...

Her singular technique proceeds in large strokes: the bodies appear as sculpted blocks, right in the colored material. LiFang works in the same way on facial features, bodies and clothes. This unity of treatment and this refusal to individualize the characters transform the subjects into beings who, having no other consistency than that of the paint, send us back the image of our shared solitudes.

Behind their apparent banality, his paintings express universal feelings: loneliness in crowds, the joy of bodies at rest connected to nature... By revisiting the subjects of classical painting, LiFang invents new codes to propose a contemporary vision of the beauty of the world. Timeless, light and deep, joyful and dramatic, LiFang's work is an open work. It offers the viewer the freedom to realize his or her own imagination while feeling part of the community of the living.

This first monograph invites the reader to explore all aspects of her work. LiFang is represented by several galleries, including Galerie Boulakia, Red Zone Arts, SpArts Paris. The Cernushi Museum acquired three of her works in 2013.

Author Bio

ric Lefebvre is director of the Cernushi Museum.

Mal Bellec is curator at the Cernushi museum.

Jean-Louis Poitevin, art critic.

Selina Ting, founder of Cobo.

Wang Keping, artist.