Artwork Description

Title: Lyric Landscape Series
Artist: Ding Fang (Chinese, b. 1956)
Date: 2002
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 61 x 73 cm (24 x 28.7 in)

Artwork Identification
This vibrant painting from Ding Fang’s Lyric Landscape Series demonstrates the artist’s unique integration of expressive abstraction with landscape forms. Characterized by energetic brushwork and luminous color layers, the composition suggests a mountainous terrain viewed through an emotional and symbolic lens, where nature becomes both subject and metaphor.

Artistic Style and Influences
Ding Fang’s work bridges the traditions of Chinese aesthetics with contemporary modes of oil painting. Originally trained in classical Chinese figure painting, Ding’s transition into expressive landscapes showcases a painterly language rooted in spiritual inquiry, materiality, and gestural abstraction. The thick impastos and vigorous strokes suggest affinities with Post-Impressionism and Abstract Expressionism, while remaining deeply informed by Chinese literati painting traditions.

Historical Context
Emerging from the post-Cultural Revolution generation of artists, Ding Fang studied at the Nanjing Arts Institute and became an influential figure in the 1980s avant-garde art movement in Jiangsu. As a co-founder of the Red Brigade Group, Ding challenged prevailing academic norms through his experimental techniques and poetic landscapes. His work embodies a turn toward inner reflection and a search for transcendent meaning in natural forms during a transformative era in Chinese art.

Provenance
Provenance documentation can be provided upon contact.

Condition and Conservation
The artwork is in very good condition. The canvas is taut, and the surface is stable with no visible signs of damage or restoration. The pigment retains its saturation and expressive layering.

Artistic Significance
Lyric Landscape Series represents Ding Fang’s meditative approach to landscape as a spiritual and philosophical journey. The emotional resonance of the scene, conveyed through bold brushwork and harmonic color fields, affirms his place as a leading voice in contemporary Chinese painting. This work reflects Ding’s mature style, which fuses East and West, tradition and experimentation, in a deeply personal visual language.