Lot Essay
With an arsenal of work that poetically portrays birds and flowers, Jiang Hongwei celebrates the tranquility of nature. Inspired by Song dynasty paintings, Jiang depicts the delicate nature of flowers and birds with supreme elegance. He imbues his paintings with a greyish tone, a technique he employs to symbolise the passage of time, in order to maintain a link to the distant past. In his work, time slows down. The artist meticulously applies layers of ink to paper, allows it to dry, and repeats the process allowing layers of colour to accumulate.