Zhang Shangfeng’s paintings capture enigmatic, severe and often indolent investigations of everyday male figures; his dusky imagery is evidently personalized, always depicting a representation of a single man on his canvases. Zhang’s technique is concentrated on the pure demonstration of his character’s reality and rather on reproducing his distinctive world. These scenes interestingly look like they emerge from a broader landscape from which smaller and minimized captures are finally depicted as cropped parts taken from a bigger image. His works reflect a sort of firm or even solid painting style approaching a sophisticated simplicity rendered in darker tonalities which predominately embody his work.
Words: Yannis Kostarias
Grasping a mouse with one hand, standing still while observing his own glasses with both hands and fixing a hunting bow are some small characteristic details in his visualizations; ambiguity significantly exists and accumulate a strong asset in Zhang’s figurative works which is further painterly employed stating his visualizations more attractive. On the top of that, Zhang’s male figures’ body language incites a remarkable paradox; their apathetic expressions contradict with a significant body movement that would justify a sort of action and liveliness. Even though the painter depicts complete and clear figurative portraiture without obscuring other facial or body parts, he remarkably puts an emphasis on the hands. Zhang seems to capture the particularities in hand gestures or movements which render a further enigmatic approach to his work. In addition, his male figures give off a unique connection with these sorts of movements which are successfullydelivered within the unconcerned and shy realm of a delicate interplay in his soft light and dark mood paintings.
Having said that an allusive concentration on hands and more broadly in hand movement and gestures on canvas strikingly not only take over his figurative formal compositions illustrating a significant perspective on his imagery but also provide an interesting contradiction with his characters’ cold movements and eventually creates a well balanced body language in his artistic compositions. All his characters do not look lost or emotionally alienated but significantly worried in his portraits. Each single painting incites a catchy, uncommon or unexpected hand position whichundertakes the artist’s visual language emphasizing another type of expression enhancing the artist’s visual aesthetics and dynamics as well. Paintings such as ‘All my life I’ve wanted to believe in something’ (2024) or ‘I admire you even envy’ (2024) also reflect some important colour values depicted on canvases showcasing a palette of dark tone and hues. Their tonality interaction aesthetically matches up with his appealing figurative arrangements which further explore the artist’s perception about light and space. In his fully detailed and labour-oriented compositions, skillfullydecorated background images accompany the artist’s one male- centred protagonist in his uncannily cold body postures.
Can you tell us about the process of making your work?
It will start with a image, derived from photographs and films, but will be followed by a drawing. Collages and adjustments are made to several such paintings or sketches, and once the rhythm of the whole picture is found there is no hesitation to paint on the canvas, but the whole process can vary quite a lot.
How would you define your work in a few words (ideally in 3 words)?
Monotonous, modernity, clumsy.
Could you share with us some insights on your painting ‘I admire you even envy’? Is there any particular story behind this new painting?
Of course, the portraits in the paintings, the narratives are all completely fictionalised. When I stopped painting to do some reminiscing, it happened to be spending some time in the UK in 2022, the year of the worldwide outbreak, which gave me the time and space to be able to look back on my own life, where the ever-progressing social consensus was constantly being shattered and replaced by an anxiety of impending decline. I live in the north of China, like the film ‘Tiexi District’ directed by Wang Bing, a site of culture and early industrialisation, where even the prettiest colours seem like grey, and where the wave keeps sweeping everyone deeper and deeper, and there is no escape. ‘The main figure on the painting is smoking, I started smoking recently also from some pressure I guess. It’s like everyone wants to use the act of smoking to escape from some real problems. Smoking is an interesting action, it’s a kind of pause, it makes you need it, it gives people a feeling of escape, but in fact there is no escape.
You are currently presenting your new group exhibition, “Homo Viator” in London; what sort of new artworks do you showcase at this exhibition?
There are two works, one large and one small both from the last two months, and there is some new experimentation in the painting, with the figure in a full-body pose, paving the way for a larger work to come.
Looking at your paintings, ordinary men dominate your imagery in which they tend to have quite calm, frozen or even slightly apathetic facial expressions. Why do you choose this kind of depictions?
Yes, my paintings are mainly about men, I prefer to observe all kinds of men around me, of which I am a part, and at the same time I can easily bring in my own life experience when I paint men. But there is also a reason that I don’t know much about women. In fact, people face many different problems, regardless of their gender, they are all about the people themselves, and there is no difference. Sometimes people only need a little pretence to travel between two very different worlds, the real and the ideal life, that’s why I don’t choose a real face but a ordinary one for the construction of the painting, and never have to face the ultimate question, how should he live, what kind of person is he, because it is a kind of meaninglessness of the moment that makes up a ‘meaningful’ life. ‘The idea of a meaninglessness life in the present brings great comfort.
Based on recent paintings of yours, it seems that there is a fascination on hands movement and gestures on your canvases which characterise your visual compositions; do these sorts of motifs have a deeper meaning or interest to you as a painter?
You mentioned the importance I place on hand and body posture, yes this has always been the part of my work that I have put the most thought into, I feel that posture is a kind of connection to the outside world, a kind of conditioned reflex to communicate with the outside world in the most direct and honest way. It’s like the best way to understand someone is through their body language, it gives you a lot of information.
Where do you draw inspiration in order to build up your distinctive portraiture on canvas? Are they related to personal memories or are they closer to your imagination as an artist?
I see a lot of films, all kinds of films, especially old films, in which I get the most intuitive material. Learning from works by important artists in the history of art, often just a part of the work（Of course I’ll choose what I think is important, is also one of my ways of working, to detach myself from my own perspective, and concentrate on experiencing the works that I think are important.
Can you mention any artists you, lately or generally, take inspiration from?
Picasso, Balthus, Diego Rivera, Philip Guston, Lenz Geerk.
What about the place where you work? What’s your studio space look like?
Xi’an, China, the studio is very small about 30 square metres but enough for now, it’s an old house simply painted and personally I feel it fits for now.
Which are your plans for the near future?
I’ll be working on large-scale works for a while after that, and there’s a group show in Korea this year, and preparations for an exhibition in Los Angeles, and I’ll have a solo show in Beijing next year, and I should bring 16 works there, so there’s still a lot of work to be done.
All images courtesy of the artist & Willow Art Space