REBIRTH OF THE EAST

It's not just about contemporary American art, says our columnist. Western collectors are missing out if they let the new wave of talented Asian artists pass them by. JEAN-DAVID MALAT

To many observers it might seem that European Old Masters and American contemporary art have a stranglehold on today's art market. But now we are seeing the rise of a new phenomenon: the rapid rise of a culture of Far Eastern art.

I am particularly interested by a new generation of painters who have mastered the techniques of classical fine painting while choosing to raise contemporary issues that matter to them as young members of a modern and evolving society. By doing so, they have created a whole new style; very recognisable and typical of the world they come from and for which they speak.

Li Tianbing is a perfect example. After studying the arts in China (both traditional techniques and western realism), he went on to study oil painting at the Ecole Supérieure Nationale des Beaux Arts in Paris, graduating in 2002. His work, often portraits of Chinese individuals, reflects the conflicts affecting China today: Eastern and Western cultures fighting within society, communism versus capitalism, ancient culture and modern consumerism.

Liu Fei has already shown his works around the world, especially in Asia, and he has started to gain recognition thanks to his ultra-realist technique and very distinctive style, which confronts traditional movements within contemporary Chinese art. Indeed, Liu Fei’s style depicts females dressed in traditional students’ uniforms from 1930’s China. Their strong facial expressions, shaved scalps and wide-mouthed laughs make his paintings unique and easily recognisable.

The women’s red lips stand out against the otherwise black-and-white colourings of the painting, making the painted characters look simultaneously welcoming and somehow threatening. In one of his series, ‘Women with Guns’, Liu Fei’s subjects are armed with pistols and pointing them directly at the viewer.

Another portraitist that deserves mention is the magnificent Feng Zheng-Jie, whose paintings depicting celebrities are reminiscent of Andy Warhol’s pop art. Feng’s portraits of women are influenced by advertising imagery; and the exotic bright colours and electrified auras he uses radiate with glamour. His work is often said to be a critique of the capitalist world, notably through the empty eyes of his models, whose faces are neither western nor eastern – as if he had emptied them of any thoughts and cultural identity.

I'm also a great fan of Wang Yehan, notably because he is one of the few abstract artists that we know from the Far East. Born in 1959 in Shanghai, he graduated in 1980 and was awarded a second prize at the First Youth Art Exhibition held by the Shanghai Art Museum in 1985. From the beginning of his career Wang has focused on abstract painting, away from the Chinese pop art that has already been quite popular in the rest of the world for several years. His works have many layers of pigments that intersect each other to create juxtaposed yet structured and energy-filled abstract paintings.

Far Eastern painting, still mostly dominated in the art market by China, is a beautiful demonstration of how artists nurture from classical techniques and the work of their ancestors to create something completely new and – sometimes – critical of the environment they belong to.

The sculptural movement is slightly different but just as exciting. Young sculptors from the Far East are incredibly creative and show amazingly innovative skills in the use of material as much as in the subjects they choose to talk about. Fan Xiaoyan is a female artist which is already quite an achievement in a Chinese art world mainly dominated by men, who has gained great recognition among the second generation of Chinese contemporary artists.

Born in Gaomi, she now lives and works in modern Beijing. In her convincing feminist art, she takes a clear stance that confronts soft and warm nudity with cold, hard steel in order to get her viewers involved on a visual and psychological level. Fang herself describes her art as “the arrival of a new era, a new kind of human-being, a new power, a new sensation… a surrealistic virtual world in which men and women are equal.” She is clearly an artist to watch out for in the coming years and, for early investors in Chinese contemporary sculpture, well worth attention now.

Liu Bolin is another Chinese artist who is already well known in Europe. Mostly famous for taking photographs of himself painted in order to blend in with streetscape, he is also a talented sculptor whose distinctive style has led him to be shown in several major art festivals and foundations.

And then there's Li Lihong, who marries traditional Chinese aesthetics and materials with contemporary iconography. His porcelain sculptures mimic the shapes of recognisable brand logos: McDonald’s “M”, Absolut vodka bottles and Steve Jobs’ Apple. His message is crystal clear: Western business has now become fully integrated into Chinese culture and his art is here to prove it.

Japan has its share of innovative sculptors too. Over the last 50 years, it's recognised that the success of Japanese art in the Western world is partly due to the presence of the Americans in Asia. In 2005 Ando Hiro created an artists’ studio in order to manage the creation and promotion of young neopop artists who would include their own popular culture in their art. There are about 10 artists in his “Crazynoodles” studio today. A polyvalent artist, Hiro recently started working on a series of sculptures inspired by Japanese popular culture. This is how he gave birth to the “Samurai cats”, “Sumo cats” and “Robot cats” sculptures, made in shiny smooth fibreglass and bright colours that take us to the world of Manga while depicting Japan’s ancestral lucky charm: the Maneki-Neko cat. Hiro’s art is often labelled as Japanese Neo Pop Art.

And then there's South Korea, whose arts are becoming increasingly significant, notably thanks to the Government’s policies of bringing the country’s artistic heritage to light and encouraging young artists. Hong Sang-Sik is one of the country’s most interesting sculptors, whose fresh sculptures go beyond the limit of material itself. The subjects treated in his artworks are often lips and eyes, interpreted as objects of desire. But what is really amazing is the material used: drinking straws - a particularly weak structure, available to anyone and completely disposable. Yet Hong makes them into permanent artworks describing the strong feelings of love and desire – proving also the wit and creativity of a whole generation of artists from the Far East.

On purely business terms, nowadays it is mainly art collectors from the Far East that invest in their fellow emerging artists. No fewer than 13 of the top 20 contemporary artists in the world, ranked by value of work sold, in the latest ArtPrice survey, are Asian. Every year tens of thousands of new art collectors emerge in Asia. European and American collectors are missing out if they don't take an interest in their art.

Jean-David Malat is director of the international Opera Gallery group. operagallery.com