‘BAMBOO GROVE’, BY WU GUANZHONG (1919-2010), DATED 1987

拍品描述

‘BAMBOO GROVE’, BY WU GUANZHONG (1919-2010), DATED 1987 China. Ink and watercolor on paper. Painted in striking black, the shoots emerge from the ground in a riot of stalks of all sizes, some stout, some slender, contrasting with the tall and orderly bamboo marked in pale gray and green. The artist refined the black sheath by adding subtle touches of reddish-brown, green, and turquoise splashes, encapsulating the bursting vibrancy of his beloved evergreen plant. Inscriptions: Lower left, signed ‘Wu Guanzhong’ and dated ‘87’, followed by the artist's seal ‘Tu’. The reverse inscribed in pencil ‘Guanzhong 1987’ and with another seal, ‘Sun Shide’. Dimensions: Image size 47.2 x 34.5 cm, Sheet size 63.8 x 44.2 cm "Not only is spring bamboo shoot delicious, its form is beautiful. Time after time I carried my box easel on my back to search for the spring bamboo forest …Unfolded before me was a field of black bamboo sprouts, near and far, which appeared to be peeping at me, mocking me. They seemed short, shrunken with age. But I was wrong - they were sheaths left at the roots, which stayed to guard the young bamboo, now emerging a fresh, spring green color, as they stretched rapidly upwards into the sky." – Wu Guanzhong Wu Guanzhong’s fondness for spring shoots stems from his childhood memory of harvesting them. He studied the robust growth of bamboo shoots, patiently waiting in the forest for an entire week just to capture the very moment the plant breaks through the soil. The artist would often help usher in the spring by venturing out in the wilderness in search of signs that the changing seasons will once again breathe new life into the world. Wu Guanzhong (1919-2010) was a Chinese artist known for landscapes that combined traditional Eastern ink wash drawing with Western oil painting. Born in Jiangsu Province, he traveled to Paris to study on a scholarship at the École nationale supérieur des Beaux-Arts in 1947. His time in France inspired him greatly and he left having learned formal ideas studying the works of Henri Matisse, Paul Cézanne, and Vincent van Gogh. He was the first living Chinese artist to be given a solo exhibition at London’s British Museum in 1992. His works are held in the collections of the Spencer Museum of Art in Lawrence, the National Gallery Singapore, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, among others. According to the Artprice.com database, Wu Guanzhong ranked 41st worldwide by public auction turnover in 2025, with annual worldwide auction sales of approximately €31.3 million. More than half of all auction transactions (53.6%) took place in Hong Kong, while works sold in the €100,000–500,000 range accounted for 24.2% of the market. Drawings and watercolors represented the largest segment of his auction output (55.7%), underlining the sustained international demand for his works. Auction result comparison: Type: Closely related Auction: Christie’s Hong Kong, 25 November 2014, lot 1554 Price: HKD 2,680,000 or approx. EUR 385,000 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing Expert remark: Compare the closely related manner of painting, composition, palette, and motif. Note the size (47.5 x 44.5 cm). Auction result comparison: Type: Closely related Auction: Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 7 April 2023, lot 3035 Price: HKD 16,180,000 or approx. EUR 1,915,000 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing Expert remark: Compare the closely related manner of painting, composition, palette, and motif. Note the much larger size (79.7 x 68.5 cm).

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