Zhiwei Tu
Author: Shirl Smithson
Format: Hardcover 200 pages, full color on 175 pages, 15” x 13.5”,
1996.

Shirl Smithson, former President of Oil Painters of America, compiled this coffee-table sized book of works by Zhiwei Tu. The paintings are expertly placed in their artistic and historical context in the introductory foreword by Prof. Chi Ke of the Guangzhou Institute of Fine Arts as presented in our Blog.

Included among the reproductions are details from a number of mural-sized works now in museums and private collections, as well as a compelling collection of figurative images from Chinese legend, contemporary China, and Tibet. The book is a handsome work of art in itself. A beautiful retrospective of this modern master's most dramatic works to date.

Price: $300 plus $15 for Priority Mail shipping, handling, and insurance.

Click here for printable order form.

His story sounds almost too impossible to believe: born to peasant parents in a remote rural village of Guangdong Province, China, in 1951, Zhiwei got his start in oil painting when the Beijing government sent an “official” artist to his village to create a public portrait of Chairman Mao Zedong. Then a teenager, Zhiwei watched the artist work for an entire day, then asked to borrow samples of his paints and returned the next day to set up alongside the professional and prepare his own oil portrait of Mao.

As the story goes, the villagers were so impressed by Tu’s finished work that they chose it over the government artist’s portrait for display. Tu notes; it’s a long time gone now, almost 40 years. But they did choose it, and it was on the second floor of the school building in my village, facing outside, for many years.”

After achieving widespread recognition and acclaim in China, and studying at the Guangzhou Institute of Fine Arts, Zhiwei traveled to the United States in 1987 to study at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. He was named president of OPA in 2004 and still travels back to China every year for exhibits and to collect his preferred painting supplies. Last year he visited when his hometown opened a museum in his honor.

“I like impressionists—the color, the light,” Zhiwei says of his painting style. As to content, he says, “I’m very interested in Chinese history and the old stuff, and more recently the American traditions. American Indians, pioneers and mountain men—the look on their face, their beards, they are stone shaped and so strong.”

This year, two oil painting Masters are receiving due recognition from their home lands. In Spain, a two year long travelling exhibition of the works of Joaquin Sorolla, which includes his epic murals on the 14 regions of Spain, is at El Prado. He is now recognized as a “National Treasure” for his works along with three others…El Greco, Goya and Velazquez.

Zhiwei Tu’s recognition by China is equal in importance. While Sorolla focused on the 14 regions of Spain in his murals, Tu’s interest is in painting at least 14 epic stories of Chinese history and specifically, its people.

Arguably, Tu is the most widely known and exhibited painter in his homeland. The Tu Zhiwei Art Museum, Shaoguan, China, was built for and dedicated to Tu in 2006. Presently, an additional museum is being built in his honor in Weng Yuan, near his home town in southern China. He exhibits also at Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou Institute/Academy of Fine Art, Liu Hai Su Art Museum, Shanghai, the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, Sun Yat –Sen Memorial Museum, Guangzhou, China, Hareyama Arts Center Taiwan, and Imavision Gallery in Taipei, Taiwan.

Tu has lived with his wife Danny, a very accomplished pianist and teacher, for 19 years in the Chicago area. While clearly recognized and a “National Treasure” in China and a Grand Master painter elsewhere, he remains a humble gentleman.