M HKA Ensembles

° 1965

Born in CN.

The painting style of the Chinese artist Zhang Enli (b. 1965) can be seen as the visual outcome of the two extreme settings in which his life took place: his adolescence in the remote countryside of northern China, and his existence in the hectic metropolis of Shanghai. Enli paints neither the quiet unspoiltness of yesteryear nor the hectic temporality of today. He paints life around him in its most essential objectivity: without any commentary, but with an exceptional attention to nuance and depth.

After leaving the North, the artist is confronted with a new reality that he imperturbably disregards. In the anonymity of his painting studio, he begins to reproduce all the day-to-day images and objects that surround him on canvas. His images cannot be placed or located somewhere directly, but are rather empty spaces, random objects lying around or discarded utensils such as buckets, plastic bags and dented cardboard boxes. What is remarkable in his oeuvre is the mastery of the craft with which he represents the naked reality of these objects, without any hint of criticism, irony or other connotation. He strips reality to its barest simplicity.

Text: Hans Willemse
Translations: Michael Meert