2018 - Sanyu │ In a Reverie of Black, White, and Pink

Lin & Lin Gallery is pleased to announce its solo exhibition Sanyu—In a Reverie of Black, White, and Pink offering the public a glimpse of the elegant times in which Sanyu lived and worked. In 1991, Mr Lin Tianmin brought the first group of Sanyu's oil paintings to Taiwan, and in 1992, introduced them for the first time at a Sotheby's auction in Taiwan. In the same year, the Dimensions Art Center held its first exhibition of Sanyu's oil paintings, which attracted the enthusiastic attention of many collectors who started following his work. To date, Lin has organized a total of six solo exhibitions of Sanyu's work, and participated in large-scale exhibitions at Taipei's National Museum of History, and the Guimet Musée National des Arts Asiatiques in France. Lin Tianmin's son, David Lin, organized this exhibition for Lin & Lin Gallery to extend his father's thirty-year conviction in promoting and researching the development of Sanyu's work. With historical texts as a foundation and Sanyu's aesthetic spirit as a core value, David Lin and the Gallery invite viewers to return to the stunning beginnings of Sanyu's poignant life and work.

Sanyu was born to a merchant family in 1895 in Sichuan Province, China. As a youth, he attended the Shanghai School of Fine Arts and then in 1919, went to Japan to further his studies. In 1920, Sanyu was encouraged to Paris by The Diligent Work-Frugal Study Movement along with Lin Fengmian, Wu Da-Yu, Xu Beihong, and Pang Xunqin, who were among the first generation of Chinese artists to live in France. Sanyu observed the artistic atmosphere of Paris and compared aesthetic concepts of the time to blend modern western aesthetics with that of his own cultural background rather than just follow the academic doctrine of western schools. He also lived and competed with artists who had come from all over the world to be in Paris. He only once returned to China for a short visit, but then decided to rejoin the Parisian art world. In 1991, Lin Tianmin first saw the work of Sanyu, who embodied both tradition and worldliness, and admired his fusion of pure aesthetic and zeitgeist.

The exhibition includes the Lotus and White Crane, YAGEO Foundation Collection, which has never before been exhibited at a private gallery, and at nearly 300 cm, is the largest work that Sanyu had created. Also on exhibition are numerous large-scale paintings of female nudes, potted flowers, and other subject matter representative of his oeuvre. Black, white, and pink were chosen for the exhibition theme, as they represent Sanyu's eastern literati spirit and his celebrated artistic origins. He deliberately reduced his palette to three colors, and in 1946 used concepts from Simplicism or Essentialism to describe his own style, saying, "I pursue simplicity in my forms to the point of their essence. […] Only the power of this precision can create more to an infinite degree." The exhibition venue has been reconfigured to look like an exhibition of the Paris School, and the work of other artists who came from around the world to Paris are presented to give visitors a greater sense of Sanyu's life in the so called Années folles of the 1920s in Paris. In this way, the Gallery wishes to bring visitors to Sanyu's creative period, and have them experience the unique literati aesthetic of his work in a context of modern art's expressive techniques.

Sanyu's legendary Parisian life had its setbacks, but his artwork has elevated our culture and visual aesthetics, thus rendering us witnesses to his lofty and rightful position in the art world. We therefore call on more people to rigorously build a foundation of research, and look forward to thanking others for earnestly safeguarding the reputation of Sanyu's work. As an extension to the exhibition, Lin & Lin Gallery is publishing a professional volume that is much more than a catalog. It comprises 131 plates depicting Sanyu's oil paintings, as well as historical photographs and texts. Writings include a 1945 article in which Sanyu offers his interpretation of Picasso's work, others about Sanyu by the artists Shiy De-Jinn, Pang Xunqin, Chu Teh-Chun, and Wu Guanzhong, as well as writing and research by Lin Tianmin, who first brought Sanyu's works to Taiwan in the early 1990s, and an abridged version of Chiang Hsun's lecture on the occasion of the 1997 Sanyu Symposium held by Sotheby's. With this book, the Gallery hopes to form a more three-dimensional and vivid representation of Sanyu as he finally finds his rightful place in the history of art. And for this reason, we implore everyone to cherish our pure intentions, and passion and devotion to his art.