Born in 1921, the Chinese-French painter

Zao Wou-Ki 赵无极

“Although the influence of Paris is undeniable in all my training as an artist, I also wish to say that I have gradually rediscovered China it has affirmed itself as my deeper personality. In my recent paintings, this is expressed in an innate manner.”

“Abstraction in art is no more abstract than isolated words in literature.”

“Everybody is bound by a tradition, I am bound by two.”

“I believe that all painters are realists for themselves. They are abstract for other people.”

A master of post-war art

“Painting is a struggle between the canvas and me; a physical struggle. Especially with large formats, which allow more human gestures, a veritable projection. One must plunge into them completely.”

Zao Wou-Ki

“My painting became unreadable, still-lives and flowers no longer existed. I was tending towards an imaginary, indecipherable writing.”

“ I think I can say that painting with marks is a Chinese invention, but Chinese painters have never taken it seriously, and for a long time I was mistrustful of the facility that came to me from my long apprenticeship in calligraphy. It had remained an exercise in style, a kind of virtuoso demonstration that I mistrusted. But, despite this feeling to which I became increasingly indifferent, I went on. I saw spaces come into being, made or unmade according to my whim, in an invasive impression of lightness: lightness of brush and colour, the lightness of the moment, of time passing. And as I arranged those marks, the living of life became lighter and the pleasure of those gestures prevailed over the traces in my memory.”