Zeng Fanzhi moved from Wuhan to Beijing in the early 1990s and began work on his iconic Mask Series. The work Mask Series No.16, created in 1994, is the earliest of Zeng’s mask series. The figures in the painting are seated before a plain coloured background, yawning, scratching their ears, and crossing their legs, conveying a certain cynical attitude. Regarding expression, the strong lines and hard expressions worn by the subjects of the painting retain the forceful brushwork of the artist’s earlier work, as seen in such works as Xiehe Hospital, executed with a certain casual ruggedness. The composition generated by the two seated figures in Mask Series No.16 is uncommon within the series as a whole, with the metaphoric and symbolic expressionism used by the artist rendering the emotions conveyed absurd and subtle.

In numerous cultures, masks have performed key symbolic roles in classic works throughout the history of art. In the context of contemporary symbology, masks often carry connotations of social alienation, loneliness and anxiety. The sluggish, grotesque figures of Zeng Fanzhi’s Mask Series reflect the influence of Western art on artists, functioning both as a localised exploration of contemporary Chinese painting and as an expression of the psychological conflict brought upon the individual by the social change of a given time frame.

(Edited by Lijie Wang & Miao Zijin, 2019)