As the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) enters its new century, we study and demonstrate the artistic creation of Pan Shixun, oil painter and one of the first-batch graduates from Studio No.1, in a cautious manner. It is significant in understanding Pan Shixun’s great contribution to China’s realistic oil painting and the characteristics of New China’s art education reflected from his artworks.
Mr. Pan Shixun is an artist educated in New China’s art education system. For 60 years since he graduated from Wu Zuoren Studio (Studio No.1) of Department of Oil Painting and became a teacher at CAFA in 1960, he has always held a firm cultural ideal and academic ambition, absorbing and carrying forward the excellent tradition of oil painting teaching of CAFA. He took a solid step in the direction of realistic art that reflects the times, expresses life and compliments people. He pursues pure quality and broad realm, devoting a lot of excellent works to the painting world, sticking with his original intention that underlines truth and realism. Since the 1960s, Pan Shixun has went to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau more than a dozen times, eating, living and working with local Tibetans. With keen eyes and enthusiasm, he has created a large number of artworks that reflect the unique humanities and natural landscapes of the Tibetan area and the spiritual features of the Tibetan people, with works such as “The Red Sun Has Just Risen”, “We Are Walking on the Highroad" and many other figure and landscape oil paintings. The majestic modeling, the light effect of the plateau, and ethnic features of the colors are all strong and vivid in the works. They not only show his solid art skills learnt from the academy education, but also reflect his creative spirit rooted in life, existence and true emotions.
Behind the creation of works, there is always the artist’s diligence and accumulation. Pan Shixun’s artistic career is a career full of sketching. He used sketching as a way to collect creative materials, as well as a way of recording on the spot and expressing his feelings. Although these sketches are simple, they are vivid and right to the point, with meaningful and profound implications. They are also full of documentary and artistry characters, directness and spirituality - even the sketches are endowed with timeless charm.
This exhibition begins from his sketches extends with his oil paintings. It takes a glimpse of how he studied life through his large volume of sketches, and another glimpse of how he his creative language transformed cleverly. We could get to know how an artist collected vivid creative materials from real life, formed his creative thinking through experiencing the life, and kept emotional elements unparadoxically in realistic art creation.
Mr. Pan Shixun has been teaching for decades and trained a large number of oil painting talents, and has always been concerned about the development of Chinese oil painting. In the early 1980s, he went to France for exchange. In addition to studying the historical changes of European oil painting, he was particularly dedicated to the study of oil painting technique, materials and oil painting’s expressiveness. Pan Shixun can be seen as the first person who introduced the oil painting technique and materials into oil painting education in the new era, publishing the book The Evolution of European Traditional Painting Techniques and articles including Thoughts on Oil Painting Techniques. He also held many lectures to benefit young students, and promoted the study of oil painting language in the art world, leading the creative trend that highlights oil painting itself.
For decades, Pan Shixun did not care about wealth and fame, but only focused on his research, sketching and education. The CAFA Art Museum and Department of Oil Painting worked together and prepared carefully for this exhibition, which not only reflects his art journey that centers around practice, but also highlights his inheritance and promotion of the academic tradition that combines personality and aesthetics. In the present time, the realistic concerns, austere spirits, language quality, and aesthetic imagery - all the important qualities that reflect the spirit of realistic art - are worthy of further development and enrichment. In this sense, it is just as Pan Shixun’s painting depicts: We are walking on the highroad.
Fan Di’an
President of Central Academy of Fine Arts
President of China Artists Association
As the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) enters its new century, we study and demonstrate the artistic creation of Pan Shixun, oil painter and one of the first-batch graduates from Studio No.1, in a cautious manner. It is significant in understanding Pan Shixun’s great contribution to China’s realistic oil painting and the characteristics of New China’s art education reflected from his artworks.
Mr. Pan Shixun is an artist educated in New China’s art education system. For 60 years since he graduated from Wu Zuoren Studio (Studio No.1) of Department of Oil Painting and became a teacher at CAFA in 1960, he has always held a firm cultural ideal and academic ambition, absorbing and carrying forward the excellent tradition of oil painting teaching of CAFA. He took a solid step in the direction of realistic art that reflects the times, expresses life and compliments people. He pursues pure quality and broad realm, devoting a lot of excellent works to the painting world, sticking with his original intention that underlines truth and realism. Since the 1960s, Pan Shixun has went to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau more than a dozen times, eating, living and working with local Tibetans. With keen eyes and enthusiasm, he has created a large number of artworks that reflect the unique humanities and natural landscapes of the Tibetan area and the spiritual features of the Tibetan people, with works such as “The Red Sun Has Just Risen”, “We Are Walking on the Highroad" and many other figure and landscape oil paintings. The majestic modeling, the light effect of the plateau, and ethnic features of the colors are all strong and vivid in the works. They not only show his solid art skills learnt from the academy education, but also reflect his creative spirit rooted in life, existence and true emotions.
Behind the creation of works, there is always the artist’s diligence and accumulation. Pan Shixun’s artistic career is a career full of sketching. He used sketching as a way to collect creative materials, as well as a way of recording on the spot and expressing his feelings. Although these sketches are simple, they are vivid and right to the point, with meaningful and profound implications. They are also full of documentary and artistry characters, directness and spirituality - even the sketches are endowed with timeless charm.
This exhibition begins from his sketches extends with his oil paintings. It takes a glimpse of how he studied life through his large volume of sketches, and another glimpse of how he his creative language transformed cleverly. We could get to know how an artist collected vivid creative materials from real life, formed his creative thinking through experiencing the life, and kept emotional elements unparadoxically in realistic art creation.
Mr. Pan Shixun has been teaching for decades and trained a large number of oil painting talents, and has always been concerned about the development of Chinese oil painting. In the early 1980s, he went to France for exchange. In addition to studying the historical changes of European oil painting, he was particularly dedicated to the study of oil painting technique, materials and oil painting’s expressiveness. Pan Shixun can be seen as the first person who introduced the oil painting technique and materials into oil painting education in the new era, publishing the book The Evolution of European Traditional Painting Techniques and articles including Thoughts on Oil Painting Techniques. He also held many lectures to benefit young students, and promoted the study of oil painting language in the art world, leading the creative trend that highlights oil painting itself.
For decades, Pan Shixun did not care about wealth and fame, but only focused on his research, sketching and education. The CAFA Art Museum and Department of Oil Painting worked together and prepared carefully for this exhibition, which not only reflects his art journey that centers around practice, but also highlights his inheritance and promotion of the academic tradition that combines personality and aesthetics. In the present time, the realistic concerns, austere spirits, language quality, and aesthetic imagery - all the important qualities that reflect the spirit of realistic art - are worthy of further development and enrichment. In this sense, it is just as Pan Shixun’s painting depicts: We are walking on the highroad.
Fan Di’an
President of Central Academy of Fine Arts
President of China Artists Association
