-----By Kathleen Lau

Drop in on any conversation of expats in Shanghai and you will inevitably hear conversations of business and opportunities. Meet anyone new and soon there is an exchange of business cards or a date for coffee to discuss potential "cooperation." Among friends, there is a common lament that most conversations are about business.

To head off any similar comments of this column, I have decided to devote this issue to art. While my topic might change - being who I am - I can't help analysing the difference between Chinese and Western art cultures, even though I have no expertise in this area. What I do have is a passion for discovering the difference in cultures and the evolution of a perspective. So I will apply my own brand of art analysis to the contemporary Chinese art that I have seen.

The qualification of art "that I have seen" is important as I have not seen that much. I'm sure there is an explosion of art - and I'm talking about paintings in particular - going on in the fine arts academies all over China. Alas, I have little time (because I'm doing business) to ferret them out, so I am reduced to getting my art education by going to Moganshan Lu; and looking at the art that is created for its very Western buyers.

The current investment-crazed art scene where everyone wants to invest in who might be the Chinese Picasso of the 21st century, leaves little room to appreciate what is not judged as good art by foreign curators.

Most of the Chinese artists creating art today are in their 20s and 30s. Western style painting came late to their art exposure and education. They did not grow up surrounded by Western art, or go on school fieldtrips to local museums in their townships. Ten years ago, I interviewed a Chinese artist known for his colorful abstract work. I asked him when was the first time he first saw Western art. He said it was in college. Today, he's probably in his late 30s. Chinese fine art academies are still heavily focused on teaching traditional Chinese art. So how does someone from this background create those vibrant, emotional, and passionate pieces that we see displayed in so many Shanghai galleries? By copying. Like any fans of a new culture, you experiment by copying what you like. Helped by the cheap canvas and paints available on the local market, you can practice and practice until you arrive at your own style. But the need to sell and become the next darling of the expat set adds tremendous pressure on such developing talent.

And there lies a world of Chinese art culture lost in translation to its Western fans. Look at any art piece on Moganshan Lu and you will see an artist struggling to break with the culture of Chinese paintings, not to incorporate it. The result is art that carries the traces of Western masters and styles, but none of the Chinese's. Perhaps with experience and self-confidence a new crop of artists will rise who can create in the art world the fusion cuisine of the culinary world.

The things I look for in contemporary art are the elements in which Chinese art excels: focus, color, perspective, and brush work.



Focus Traditional Chinese paintings are done on scrolls. There is no focus. The artist uses imagery to illustrate a story to make a point. It has its roots in appreciating man's role in nature. And so man is always small, the landscapes are the grand canvases. The artist's message is capture in poems, art illustrates the words. Eventually, the message becomes so important, calligraphy becomes as important as the painting itself. The artist is no longer visible, only his message is important: his calligraphy his art.

Western art comes from religious icons and the vanity of the rich. Early art depicted Jesus and the saints and later, the rich commissioned portraits. There is always a focus and man is the point. Other artists revolutionised it by painting fruits and flowers but the focus has always been up close and centre. Once the artist move away from religion and paid portraits, the point becomes the painting itself. The artist playing with lights and shadows, vague impressions where the subject ceases to be important. In the end, there is only the artist and no message. His emotions expressed in colors and forms are the point.

Colour

Traditional Chinese paints in ink, creating a world of depth and texture with blacks and whites. They can create a world in multiple variations of shadows and light long before the computer gave us 250+ million colour choices. I have seen a Chinese artist create a black and white abstract piece that is so full of texture, perspective and structure that it's like looking at a Delacroix. The foreign language to the Chinese artist is colour: their moods, their symbolism, and how they co-exist has yet to be discovered.

Western artists live intimately with colour. They blend, play and transform colour at will. But take color them and they'll give you Black on Black (Museum of Modern Art, New York) and White on White (Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco). Really, at a distance, these paintings are a black square and a white square. Or we have the checkerboard, as in tablecloth. Or, ид la Jackson Pollack, a field of chaos where blacks and whites are forever at odds.



Perspective

Look at a Chinese traditional landscape; you can see hundreds of miles from mountain to mountain. Nothing is out of perspective. It's like standing on an Arizona desert highway and seeing the mesa 100 miles away, you can feel the distance and the expanse of nature.

Not so with Western art. The next time you go to a museum, look at the paintings that show any scene more than a mile away. Then pick out the distortions. If there's distance in the painting, chances are it's in the primitive style where distortion and flattening are accepted. Another Western phenomenon, abstract art, is two-dimensional.



Brush work

Traditional Chinese paintings use round brushes. Years of practicing Chinese characters have created supple wrists that can swirl a brush better than any graffiti artist. A simple flick of the brush can evoke levels of complexities, texture and perspectives. The brush work becomes the craft of the art.

Western pallets are stiff or artists use flat brushes which require no swirling or any twist of the wrist. Simple elbow motions can suffice. Here the brush work is in using different colors to illustrate depth, the brush is only the vehicle in color delivery.

Such are my comparisons between art cultures, not an educated art commentary. I adore Western art and in particular abstract art. However, I am reminded that traditional Chinese techniques can add much richness to what we are seeing in Shanghai today. There is where the Chinese artist already has a history and affinity. There is where the strength of his art can rest and from there be transformed. I look forward to the day when Chinese artists can translate their history into their present, and into their art.

?copyright 2007 by Kathleen Lau. No part of this may be reprinted - in any language or format: printed, electronic or otherwise - without expressed written permission from the author.