Shenzhen Station:

Exhibition period: June 25th to July 25th, 2012

Exhibition location: Central Hall and Hall C on the first floor of Guanshan Yue Art Museum

Organizers: Art Department of the Ministry of Culture, Propaganda Department of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, Propaganda Department of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Shenzhen Bureau of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and China Artists Association

Guidance unit: National Art Museum Professional Committee, National Center for Modern and Contemporary Art Research

Undertaking units: Guan Shanyue Art Museum, Guan Shanyue Art Research Association of the Chinese Artists Association

Co organizers: Guangdong Academy of Painting, Guangdong Artists Association, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts

Guangzhou Station:

Shanyue Danqing - Art Exhibition Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of Guan Shanyue's Birthday

Exhibition period: October 25th to November 10th, 2012

Exhibition location: Art Museum of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts

Organizers: Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China, Propaganda Department of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, Department of Culture of Guangdong Province, China Artists Association, Propaganda Department of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Shenzhen Bureau of Culture, Sports and Tourism

Co organizers: National Art Museum Professional Committee, National Center for Modern and Contemporary Art Research, Guangdong Artists Association, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, Guangdong Academy of Painting

Undertaking units: Shenzhen Guanshanyue Art Museum, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts Art Museum, Lingnan School of Painting Memorial Museum

Special support: Special Fund for the Development of Propaganda and Culture in Guangdong Province and Special Fund for the Development of Propaganda and Culture in Shenzhen City

Shanyue Danqing - Teaching Seminar Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of Guan Shanyue's Birth

Time: October 25th, 2012 at 3:00 PM

Location: Lecture Hall of the Art Museum of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts

Academic hosts: Li Weiming et al

Undertaken by: Lingnan Painting Academy Memorial Hall, Chinese Painting Academy

Beijing Station:

Shanyue Danqing - Art Exhibition Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of Guan Shanyue's Birthday

Exhibition period: November 18th to November 24th, 2012

Exhibition location: China National Art Museum

Organizers: Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China, Propaganda Department of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China

Undertaking institutions: China Artists Association, China National Art Museum, Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, Propaganda Department of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Culture, Sports and Tourism

Executive agency: Guanshan Yue Art Museum

Co organizers: National Art Museum Professional Committee, China Artists Association Theoretical Committee, National Center for Modern and Contemporary Art Research, Guangdong Artists Association, Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, Guangdong Academy of Painting

Special support: Shenzhen Special Fund for the Development of Propaganda and Culture

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Mr. Guan Shanyue, a famous Chinese painter, educator, and master of the Lingnan School of Painting. As an outstanding representative of the Lingnan School of Painting, Guan takes the development and prosperity of Chinese painting as his own responsibility, bringing his personal artistic exploration into the tide of contemporary Chinese art transformation. He continuously explores new spaces for innovative development of Chinese painting in new cultural contexts and historical backgrounds, leaving an immortal monument for the cause of contemporary Chinese art. In 1997, Guan Lao decided to donate 813 of his representative paintings from various periods of his life to Shenzhen. As a result, the city decided to establish a public welfare art museum named after Mr. Guan Shanyue. This created an organic operation model that combines the personal memorial hall of famous artists with the public art museum, effectively promoting the inheritance and development of the cultural cause of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone.

　The "Shanyue Danqing - Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of Guan Shanyue's Birthday" series of activities are jointly organized by the Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China, the Propaganda Department of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, the Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, the China Artists Association, the Propaganda Department of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, and the Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Culture, including exhibitions in Shenzhen, Guangzhou, and Beijing, academic seminars commemorating the 100th anniversary of Guan Shanyue's birth, editing and publishing the "Complete Collection of Guan Shanyue", and the renovation of Guan Shanyue's former residence at Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts. Since its launch, this project has received funding support from the Propaganda Department of the Provincial Party Committee and the Special Fund for the Development of Propaganda and Culture in Shenzhen, and has been included in the "Key Project of the National Center for Modern and Contemporary Art Research" and the "2012 National Art Museum Collection Exhibition Season" activities. The Shenzhen exhibition is the first exhibition of the three exhibitions. On the occasion of the exhibition, it coincides with the 15th anniversary of the opening of the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum. A series of activities were held to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Guan Shan Yue's birth and the 15th anniversary of the establishment of the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum. The opening ceremony and other series of activities were held at the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum at 3:30 pm on June 25th. The Guangzhou exhibition also kicked off on October 25th in Guangzhou. Recently, we are about to welcome the related activities of Beijing Station.

　　In the early 20th century in China, due to external threats, national consciousness dominated the trend of painting. The social reality centered around the Anti Japanese War fundamentally changed the ink painting tradition of literati. Based on the changes generated by the social reality of the Anti Japanese War, ink painting changed the detached self admiration in the ink painting tradition of literati. With a positive attitude towards joining the world that differed from traditional literati, it indicated the political and cultural stance of literati in the changing society. In the history of social change in China, Guangdong holds a very unique position. As the earliest trading port in China, Guangdong was able to lead the way and be exposed to the influence of Western social customs and culture. This not only gave birth to early democratic ideas in China and became the birthplace of the Xinhai Revolution, but also made Guangdong's culture inclusive and integrated with both the East and the West. The emergence of the Lingnan School of Painting is closely related to the social changes in China at the beginning of the 20th century. They hope to promote the reform of Chinese culture through artistic innovation, and thus achieve the revolutionary goal of transforming Chinese society. As a disciple of Mr. Gao Jianfu and an outstanding representative of the second generation painters of the Lingnan School of Painting, Guan Shanyue adheres to the philosophy of his predecessors to "compromise between the East and the West, and integrate ancient and modern". In terms of ideology, she accepts Gao's theory of reflecting real life and serving the public through art, and takes it as her own responsibility to innovate traditional Chinese painting. She integrates her personal artistic exploration into the current trend of contemporary Chinese art transformation. As one of the most academically interpretive Chinese painters of the 20th century, Mr. Guan Shanyue's artistic activities have been involved in major social events in China since the late 1930s, and he has left memorable works in each period, such as "Retreat from the City" (1939); Zhongshan Refugees (1940).

　　In the mid-20th century, after entering New China, Chinese art, especially the language of Chinese painting, experienced a new historical transformation. Literati painters became literary and artistic workers, cultivating emotions with real landscapes and reality under the sunshine of the new era, thus stimulating the passion of painters to express reality. Through the three major themes of production and construction, revolutionary holy sites, and Mao Zedong's poetry, traditional Chinese painting served reality, thus completing its historical transformation. Guan Shanyue advocates the artistic concept of "keeping up with the times" and "revolutionizing the past and opening up the future". At the same time, in the trend of the 1950s that "sketching is the foundation of all plastic arts", she insists that "the line drawing of Chinese painting is also sketching". On the premise of maintaining the basic language of Chinese painting, she continuously explores new spaces for innovative development of Chinese painting in new cultural contexts and historical backgrounds. Representative works such as "The Leap Forward of Mountain Villages" (1958); "Jiangshan So Many Beauties" (1958); Coal Capital (1961); "The Green Great Wall" (1973) and so on.

　　In the late 20th century, since the reform and opening up, Chinese art works have had a rich and special significance in terms of social, political, cultural, and artistic aspects, which is different from ever before. In the 1990s, with the rise of the market economy and further social transformation, art creation began a relatively stable adjustment and return. Various types of paintings studied tradition from different perspectives and levels, seeking "Chinese language". After the reform and opening up, Guan Shanyue, as an outstanding Chinese painter who made many achievements, disregarded his age and continued to hold art exhibitions and create sketches both domestically and internationally. He also made plans to create "group paintings of the motherland". As a friendly ambassador for cultural exchange between China and foreign countries, he visited, gave lectures, held art exhibitions and created sketches in the United States, Japan, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong and other places multiple times. The works demonstrate his vibrant artistic creativity, which is not only reflected in the stylistic power of these masterpieces, but also in his keen sense of natural and formal beauty, as well as his unique grasp of the relationship between social life and artistic creation. Representative works such as "The First Spring of the 1990s" (1990); "Hukou Waterfall Observation" (1994); "Jiangxia Tujuan" (1980) and so on.

　　Art historian Mr. Li Weiming pointed out that Guan Shanyue may be one of the few famous Chinese painters of this century with the most academic and interpretive value. Mainly based on the following reasons: firstly, Guan's artistic activities have been involved in various major social and political movements since the late 1930s, and have all left memorable works; When observing the spiritual life of the Chinese people from the perspective of art history for over half a century, we cannot bypass Guan Shanyue's creations. Secondly, in the historical process of Chinese painting transitioning from "traditional" to "modern", Guan Shanyue demonstrated the possibility of complementary infiltration between traditional brush and ink line styles and the spatial concepts and modeling systems of Western painting through her persistent efforts. Although there is still controversy in the academic community about how to evaluate the positive significance of this possibility; However, it cannot be denied that exploring this possibility in theory and practice is one of the most eye-catching and important topics in the field of Chinese painting in the 20th century. Thirdly, if there has been a value form in Chinese art that can be called "new orthodoxy" since the 1950s, then there is no doubt that Guan Shanyue is one of the most suitable representatives in the field of Chinese painting; The completion of the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum precisely restores the position of "new orthodoxy" in contemporary Chinese social life in a concrete form. Exploring the causes and consequences of this position's establishment will naturally become a necessary path for us to truly enter the core area of 20th century Chinese art history.

 "20th Century Chinese Art Research" is an important academic topic of the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum. Over the years, focusing on the academic positioning of "Guan Shan Yue Art and 20th Century Chinese Art Research", the Guan Shan Yue Art Museum has planned multiple related academic exhibitions and seminar activities. Numerous experts and scholars at home and abroad have participated in the museum's academic activities, forming a certain theoretical accumulation. Therefore, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Guan Shanyue's birth, our museum plans to hold an international academic seminar on "Guan Shanyue and 20th Century Chinese Art", aiming to discuss relevant issues of 20th century Chinese art based on Mr. Guan Shanyue's artistic practice.