For Luo Erchun
Michael Sullivan

It is a pleasure for me to write these few words about the art of Luo Erchun.

The great tradition of Chinese painting is expressed above all in monochrome ink and the calligraphic line. Colour in such paintings is something that is added, if at all, to the drawn or painted line to make the subject look more real.

That is true also, to a great extent, of the tradition of Western painting.
J.W.M Turner (1775-1852) was perhaps, in his later work, the first artist to express feeling and emotion in pure colour. He was followed by the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists, who most consistently used colour as the expressive element in their paintings.

Even among contemporary Chinese artists who have responded to Post-Impressionism the ability to reveal feeling directly through the expressive use of colour is very rare, And that is what singles out Luo Erchun from most of his contemporaries. He has surely read the correspondence of Vincent van Gogh (1853-90). In a letter to his brother Theo of 1888 he said, “I will not draw a picture with charcoal. You must attack the drawing with the colour itself in order to draw well”. He would well have understood what Luo Erchun was doing.

Luo Erchun will not mind my saying that every painting of his is not wholly successful. There are times when his drawing is less than expressive of the form. But in his best work there is a confident energy and directness of approach to his subject that is exhilarating to the viewer. Moreover, when we see these men and women who are his subjects, we know exactly what sort of people they are; their personality and character leap out of the canvas.

Luo Erchun does not seem to belong to any School, or trend, in modern Chinese art. He is always himself. It is a privilege to me to have met him, to own his works, and to see what a unique position he occupies in the world of contemporary Chinese art.

Michael Sullivan
Oxford,
November 21, 2009