LIU WEI (b. 1972)
LIU WEI (b. 1972)
LIU WEI (b. 1972)
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LIU WEI (b. 1972)
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Please note that this lot is subject to an import … Read more
LIU WEI (b. 1972)

Outdoor No. 4

Details
LIU WEI (b. 1972)
Outdoor No. 4
signed in Chinese, signed and dated 'Wei 2018' (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
86 5/8 x 102 3/8 in. (220 x 260 cm.)
Painted in 2018.
Provenance
White Cube, London
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2018
Literature
"Liu Wei in the Studio," White Cube, 2018 (studio view illustrated).
Special notice
Please note that this lot is subject to an import tariff. The amount of the import tariff due is a percentage of the final hammer price plus buyer's premium. The buyer should contact Post Sale Services prior to the sale to determine the estimated amount of the import tariff. If the buyer instructs Christie's to arrange shipping of the lot to a foreign address the buyer will not be required to pay the import tariff, but the shipment may be delayed while awaiting approval to export from the local government. If the buyer instructs Christie's to arrange shipping of the lot to a domestic address, if the buyer collects the property in person, or if the buyer arranges their own shipping (whether domestically or internationally), the buyer will be required to pay the import tariff. For the purpose of calculating sales tax, if applicable, the import tariff will be added to the final hammer price plus buyer's premium and sales tax will be collected as per The Buyer's Premium and Taxes section of the Conditions of Sale.
Sale room notice
This work is signed in Chinese, signed and dated 'Wei 2018' (on the reverse).

Brought to you by

Isabella Lauria
Isabella Lauria Vice President, Senior Specialist, Head of 21st Century Evening Sale

Lot Essay

The colorful, amorphous forms that constitute Liu Wei’s Outdoor No. 4 demonstrates the artist’s unique approach to contemporary abstract painting. Belonging to a generation of Chinese who grew up in a rapidly urbanizing China, his work explores the rigidly controlled social and political contradictions of modern Chinese society.

Drawing on the tradition of shan sui—a style of Chinese painting that depicts scenery or natural landscapes—Liu Wei infuses his canvases with a seismic level of energy with his bold use of color. Set against the dark hues, his golden yellows, regal purple and deep azure blues pop off the surface of the canvas. The artist points out that all artistic creation is a continuum, and that in works such as the present example he is continuing with previous themes, but expressing them in new ways. He is at pains to point out that he cannot depict things as they are, and that his work is a way of developing his own understand by combining reality and knowledge.

Born in 1972, Liu Wei graduated from the National Academy of Fine Arts in Hangzhou in 1996 and began his career as part of a subversive art movement known as Post-Sense Sensibility who created extreme experiences for their audiences. Working in many different types of media including video, drawing, sculpture as well as painting, his work is included in many institutional collections including the Samsung Museum of Art in Seoul, the Rubell Family Collection in Miami, and the Astrup Fernley Museet in Oslo; in 2019, his work was also selected for inclusion in the 58th Venice Biennale.

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