LOT DETAILS

Materials:

Oil on canvas

Measurements:

19.69 in. (50.00 cm.) (height) by 15.75 in. (40.00 cm.) (width)

Markings:

Signed in English on bottom right; titled and dated in Chinese,signed in Chinese and English on reverse

Exhibited:

EXHIBITED：20 Jun – 12 Jul 1997，8+8-1：Selected Paintings by 15 Contemporary Artists，Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong Kong1998，8+8-1：Selected Paintings by 15 Contemporary Artists，Connaught Brown Gallery，London24 Nov – 11 Dec 2007，Schoeni Art Gallery’s 15th Anniversary Exhibition.Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong Kong17 - 20 May 2012，Art HK 2012，Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre，Hong KongNov 25 2012 – 3 Feb 2013，Latitude/Attitude—In Celebration of Schoeni Art Gallery’s 20th Anniversary，Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong KongThis work is accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity issued by Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong KongChildren Portraits by Guo JinBorn in Chengdu in the Sichuan Province，and having graduated from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute，Guo Jin is an artist who uses the portraits of children as a motif in his paintings.On canvas，he depicts his innermost imaginations of various children playing in diverse settings，acting as a wistful reminiscence of his innocent and pure childhood，now a distant memory.His works also serve as a means of exploring a passage of or moments frozen in time and the relationship between time and people.His style of painting and his chosen themes are very special，setting him apart from the mainstream artistic movements of Cynical Realism and Political Pop，which spread across China in the 1990s.Instead，he strives to recreate idealized worlds that act as strong reminders of the cruel and tough reality around us，a technique that has allowed him to forge his own unique artistic language.In I want to be the child that has the right to choose No.38，the artist blurred out the background to separate the protagonist from a fixed time and space，as if leading us to a surreal “world of children”.The heavy use of yellow for the background highlights the innocence and purity of this children’s world，and the figure is the result of thick layers of oil-paint undergoing a repeated coloring process.The final effect is a rust-like tone resembling the course of history that has melted itself away long ago，evoking a sense of nostalgia.There is no sense of when here，so everything has become stagnate，as if a complete illusion.In his work，the artist uses the figure as a metaphoric representation of one’s starting point in life.“It is a dimension of infinite imagination.Human beings begin their lives by dreaming themselves a kind of role model in this or that field，but when their dreams encounter and are finally shattered by brutal reality，they hide themselves behind such colorful yet care-free illusions.” The artist’s attempt to recollect the elusiveness of childhood is a survey into the relationship between the inner strivings of the heart and the real world.Would it be too preposterous to say，then，that every grownup living under the stress and strain of a busy career has never uttered：“I want to be a child who has the right to choose!”？

Literature:

LITERATURE：1997，8+8-1：Selected Paintings by 15 Contemporary Artists，Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong Kong，p.582007，Re-Collection，Works by 41 Chinese Contemporary Artists— Schoeni Art Gallery’s 15th Anniversary Exhibition，p.482012，Latitude/Attitude，Schoeni Art Gallery，Hong Kong，p.70