Ye Qianyu: Figure Painting in Wartime and Postwar China

Inspired by A Changed World: Fu Luofei’s Realist Painting and Chinese Wartime Art, curated by Professor Cai Tao at Taikang Art Museum, this lecture focuses on several key works by Ye Qianyu featured in the exhibition, including Escape from Hong Kong (1941) and Wartime Chongqing (c. 1940). These paintings mark a pivotal moment in Ye’s artistic development, tracing his transition from cartoonist, illustrator, and innovative visual journalist to a pioneering painter of modern ink art.

Taking these works as its point of departure, the lecture also considers the broader significance of Chinese art in the 1940s. Against the backdrop of war and social upheaval, artists responded to the realities of their time through remarkably diverse artistic practices, exploring new visual languages to express the suffering, displacement, and profound sense of uncertainty brought about by conflict.