Saturday mornings at the academy
During my studies at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, Saturday mornings often brought an opportunity to watch established painters at work. The academy invited artists to demonstrate composition, brushwork and the use of ink. One of those visits led to a student prank that became rather more complicated than I had intended.
Twice, the academy took up my suggestion to invite a painter from outside Beijing: one from Xi’an, the other from Shanghai. I appreciated the effort, since most guests came from the capital and these invitations involved travel, accommodation and meals.
The Xi’an painter Wang Ziwu
I had discovered Wang Ziwu (王子武) in a regional art magazine and shared my enthusiasm with my Chinese colleagues. He was not widely known in Beijing at the time, but the academy responded quickly and invited him.
Some visiting painters seemed to flourish as the crowd around them grew. Wang Ziwu was shy. Perhaps demonstrating his work before an audience at the academy put him under pressure. He began a portrait and abandoned it, then painted a colleague with only moderate success. Finally, to the amusement of some of the students, he painted me. It was a very good portrait.
By then he knew that I had suggested inviting him. He asked me and my Australian colleague, Claire R., to visit him at his hostel the following day. There, we could watch him paint in a quieter setting. He made two pictures and gave them to us: a magpie on a willow branch in late autumn for me, and a hen with five chicks for Claire.
On the way home, Claire asked me to take her painting back to the studio and put it in her desk drawer, as she was going somewhere else. Still full of the impressions of that morning, I began copying her picture. The result was quite passable, and even the inscription looked convincing. Unable to resist a joke, I put my copy in her drawer and kept the original in mine.
The prank takes an unexpected turn
On Monday morning, Claire proudly showed her gift to our Chinese colleagues. There was admiration, animated discussion and much congratulation. Then our professor arrived. The others immediately showed him the painting, and he praised it highly.
My harmless joke was taking an awkward turn. Hoping to untangle the situation without embarrassment, I brought out the original and said, “Actually, he made two of the same.”
Claire understood at once, and some of the others began to realize what had happened. Professor Y., however, pointed to my copy and said, “But this is the better one.”
I think—and hope—that nobody ever explained the matter to him in greater detail.
I took this photograph of Wang Ziwu in 1983, when I had the opportunity to watch him painting.
About Wang Ziwu 王子武
Born in Chang’an, Shaanxi, in 1936, Wang Ziwu graduated from the Chinese Painting Department of the Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts in 1963. He was a representative of the Chang’an school of painting.[1]
My memory of him begins with the portraits and the small paintings he made for us. The quieter visit to his hostel gave us something the formal demonstration could not: time to watch him work at close quarters.
Footnotes
[1] Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts: Wang Ziwu — alumni biography (Chinese). Source for his birthplace, birth year, graduation and association with the Chang’an school. ↩
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