Qi Baishi has become a legend in the history of world culture. He is an artist with the most outstanding Chinese art spirit and charisma since the 20th century. His art is under the space and time background which has a junction between ancient and modern. Qi Baishi’s art roots in his nation, whereas it belongs to the whole world.
The whole life of Qi Baishi was full of hardship and adversities. When he was young, Qi Baishi made his living by painting and worked hard on art. He even stopped selling his painting and refused to take the enemy’s supply while Beijing was occupied. After the People’s Republic of China was founded, he donated his works to the people and stuck to his way of loneliness in his whole life. His diligence and simplicity make him a master of art and life.
Born in January of 1864, Qi Baishi learned wood work in his early days in Hunan province while spending his spare time on painting and poetry. He became a student of Hu Qinyuan and Chen Shaofan at the age of 27 and started painting. During his middle age, Qi Baishi traveled around for a long time which greatly broadened his horizon. After the journey, he lived in obscurity and devoted himself to art. These activities laid solid foundation for Qi Baishi’s knowledge and skill. From then on, Qi Baishi had formed his own style in portraits, landscape and flower-bird painting.
Because of gangster upheaval in his hometown, Qi Baishi had removed to Beijing where he luckily met Chen Shizeng who influenced a lot in his art style. During this period, Qi Baishi became well-known in Beijing. His art works were popular with the public and he was invited to teach in academies. Qi Baishi held exhibitions around the country and met cultural celebrities. His figure painting always implies feelings through humor. His landscape painting contains significance under simple brushworks. His flower-bird painting appeals to both refined and popular tastes. These features expressed simple and honest of Qi Baishi’s personality.
While Qi Baishi was in his old years, the People’s Republic of China was founded. Faced with brand new social environment, Qi Baishi could not help painting to express his excitement. During the last 8 years of his life, Qi Baishi has built a fantastic unique art world: he paid attention to agriculture tools, fruits, vegetables, flowers and birds. The figures were much plainer than the past. Qi Baishi has promoted traditional Chinese painting into modern times.
Qi Baishi is a master of different fields. He persisted in cutting seals and called himself “rich man of 300 stamps”. Qi Baishi broke the traditional disciplines from Ming and Qing dynasty, formed a rough, elegant and unconventional style.
As a cultural celebrity of modern history, he has made gigantic achievements. Besides the big amount of artworks, he left abundant documents as well. These are precious information to research Qi Baishi. After his death, Qi Baishi’s family donated his legacy to Beijing Fine Art Academy, which contains important poets, diaries and drafts.
The artworks left by Qi Baishi have been deeply imprinted on our hearts. His works often take us by surprise, with an endless aftertaste. His artistic spirit influences modern and contemporary art circles. Nowadays, to pursue and understand Qi Baishi is forever a process of excavating treasure for us. More importantly, we can understand ourselves in this process.