‘She pushes herself relentlessly, and paints prolifically. To visit her studio is to be awed by her output, and by her technical skill and conceptual depth. Her work reveals her deep knowledge of both Chinese and Western art history, and of contemporary art. ’
—Dr Luise Guest
I am really delighted and honoured to be invited by Yeqin and Aileen to curate this exhibition of work by Gao Ping, and I’m particularly delighted that the artist was able to travel from Beijing and to be here in Sydney for the opening.
Firstly though, before I speak about her work, I want to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the unceded lands on which we gather today, the Gadigal people of the Eora nation, and pay my respects to their elders, past and present, to their emerging leaders, and to any First Nations people who are here with us tonight.
I must explain that the title of this exhibition, ‘Between the Shadow and the Soul’, is taken from a line in a poem by twentieth century Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. It came to me after I had been immersed in the artist’s work for some time, preparing this exhibition, and thinking about how Gao Ping creates a sense of mystery in her work, drawing on the traditions of Chinese ink painting, in which ink in all its nuances of deepest sooty black to ghostly washes of palest transparency is believed to render additional colour unnecessary – in fact, black ink is understood to contain within it all other colours.
Gao Ping admires the great 17th century ink painter Ba Da Shanren, who famously said there were ‘more tears than ink’ in his paintings. As we look around this room, at the larger works in particular, we can see that sense of melancholy and mystery, ‘the shadow and the soul’, if you like, that is then punctuated by the quirky humour apparent in many of her smaller works. The darkest shadows are illuminated by her clever use of surprising colours like the viridian green or rose madder that lies underneath diluted washes of black and grey or is the predominant palette in other works, and the creamy yellow that appears in many of the small paintings. Yet overall it is still the sense of shadow that is the dominant impression. It can be melancholy, I think, but not depressing. We could think of some lines from German poet Rilke:
‘But the darkness embraces everything:
shapes and shadows, creatures and me,
people, nations — just as they are.’
In contemporary painting, internationally, there has been interest for some time in darkness, both literal and metaphorical. Last year at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, for example, an exhibition called Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility presented works that feature partially obscured or hidden figures. As the museum text said: ‘In this art context, the common phrase going dark is understood as a tactic whereby artists visually conceal the body to explore a key tension in contemporary society: the desire to be seen and the desire to be hidden from sight.’
The work behind me, for example, which really repays a close look, is titled ‘Intimacy’. Yet, like many of her works it is very ambiguous – as I looked at it during the install of the exhibition, I thought it could just as well be titled ‘Disconnection’, or ‘Invisibility’ and it seems to me to express the complexity and contradictions inherent in relationships. Similarly, so many of the figures in Gao Ping’s paintings appear isolated, even when they are in a group. The figures against the wall of Beijing’s Ditan Park (‘The Temple of Earth’) seem to each be in their own little world. Which, when I think about it, might very well express what so many of us feel in 2025, when connections across political, generational and cultural divides are so fraught with difficulty. But there is also a sense that Gao Ping sees humanity in all its absurdity, and there is a tenderness in her figures – so often posed quite awkwardly and apparently unaware of being observed, or confidently showing off a furry jacket, or stripy stockings like the detail at the right of the first painting in this room. I love that figure, whoever she is, she’s feisty!
When you look at the smaller paintings in this room and in the second room, we see the work of an artist who is such an astute observer of life. Under Gao Ping’s penetrating gaze human foibles, desires and dreams are revealed – we see bodies in various states of undress and repose, everyday objects such as discarded toys, teapots on tables, shoes and furniture, corners of rooms and remnants of meals. And we also see her love of the landscapes of northern China, the grey hills, distant mountains and leafless wintry trees. I particularly love the two small paintings inside the window, which recall for me my own winter train journeys from Beijing to Xi’an or Chengdu, with bare trees that reveal the bird’s nests from the previous spring and summer flashing past the carriage windows. And the dominant greys, of course, also remind us of the grey walls of Beijing’s traditional hutong neighbourhoods, with their doorways into courtyards that reveal glimpses of the lives within them.
Having visited Gao Ping’s studio (or successive studios – as we all know, artists’ studios in Beijing are even more precarious pieces of real estate than they are here!) over the years, I’m also aware of her extraordinary work ethic. She pushes herself relentlessly, and paints prolifically. To visit her studio is to be awed by her output, and by her technical skill and conceptual depth. Her work reveals her deep knowledge of both Chinese and Western art history, and of contemporary art.
In conclusion, I’m delighted that so many of you have come out tonight for the opening of this exhibition – a significant addition to Vermilion’s well-established tradition of supporting the work of women artists, and especially significant just after International Women’s Day and at a time when women’s rights are under attack in many parts of the world.
I say this also because I think that Gao Ping’s work reveals a particular sensibility that is shared by many of the Chinese women artists I have researched and written about over the last fifteen years – it is very strong, and undeniably powerful (reminding me that, as she told me many years ago in Beijing, some women artists need to be warriors. When I asked her what kind she herself was, she said “Sometimes the warrior kind”!) Yet there is great subtlety, tenderness and nuance in these works as well. I believe it is that combination of strength and subtlety that allows Gao Ping to express deep psychological insights into her own feelings about life but also revealing aspects of our common humanity.
Dr Luise Guest
