Features 2025.12.09
By Yin Dan
Zhang Zhaoying's artistic development coincides with an era of self-reflection in Chinese image-based painting. Yet, he does not deliberately avoid imagery in his own work, nor does he resort to a "scissors-and-paste" style of appropriation. Instead, he translates images, presenting them through a personalized grammatical system. For artists of his generation, their attitude towards imagery no longer carries the excessive excitement and "exploitation" that characterized older artists in the 1990s. In the internet age, images have long become an unremarkable part of daily life. Permeating various physical, electronic, and online spaces, they have acquired the capacity for self-reference and inter-reference, much like words. For Zhang Zhaoying, he adeptly draws material from a vast array of images, repurposing them to craft scenes of nostalgic absurdist theater.
Life Soap Opera NO.47, 30×40cm, oil on canvas, 2021-2022
Life Soap Opera NO.50, 30×40cm, oil on canvas, 2021-2022
Zhang has been one of the more active young artists from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in recent years, prolific and versatile in his output. I would like to briefly outline the characteristics of his work from the following aspects:
1. Color Sensibility in Zhang Zhaoying's Paintings: Those familiar with his work can likely sense that a nostalgic warm grey serves as his most frequent color palette. However, it is not the "soy sauce" tonalities of European academic painting, but rather a visual quality reminiscent of color film gradually fading with the passage of time. Sensibility is corporeal, and sensibility also creates distinctions among groups, which is an important reason he has attracted many young "fans." In the recent Letters series, the brightness, purity, and contrast of colors have noticeably increased, yet this warm grey undertone persists, creating a sense of dialogue with the future.
Letter — Realm of Light, 60×40cm, oil on canvas, 2019-2020
"The absurd" constitutes a consistent aesthetic mode throughout Zhang Zhaoying's paintings. To many, the absurd may seem merely about creating surprise or showcasing humor, but it actually conceals a pain that strikes directly at the soul. It presents an indescribable "state of pathos" within "incomprehensible" imagery, leaving viewers to interpret that irrational reality. The method of the "absurd" presents the ineffable contradictions between individuals and the world/society, embodying clear criticality and a forward-looking perspective.
Letter — The Secret of the Fish, 100×70cm, oil on canvas, 2019-2020
Zhang Zhaoying's recent Letters series derives its name from correspondence between himself and a photographer. Of course, these are not literal letters, but rather an exchange of images between the photographer and the painter. According to his account, the photographer would send him fragments of photographic works, upon which he would base his oil paintings, later "replying" with the painted images. The name itself is but a lure, an introduction. What I wish to emphasize remains the potent sense of the absurd in these paintings, which perhaps reflect contemporary individuals' contemplation of the future. Much like Zhang's frequent use of mask-like blurring treatments, their eyes are obscured by futuristic colors resembling LCD screens, making it impossible to guess their thoughts. Does this not recall the image of the tramps Vladimir and Estragon waiting beneath the tree for Godot? For whom are they waiting? What are they thinking? Who is Godot? No one knows.
