Hao Shiming works with lines, the purest element in traditional ink painting and the most crucial element in his artistic philosophy, to reconstruct and transform it. In his landscape
paintings lines are neither straight nor intended to render perspective, but rather interweaved and undulated, expressing a powerful leaping rhythm. Thanks to the training he received from the painting department at the Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts, the artist is highly skilled in traditional Chinese painting techniques such as ‘Gongbi’, a method that involves drawing fine lines with small brushes. He has expanded on these traditions to develop his own style, relieving his works of unnecessary embellishments and moving away from figuration towards abstraction. Systematically doubling his strokes and filling the frame with numerous layers of characters, his series Cursive Script in Tang Dynasty Style is deeply minimalistic, his approach is influenced by philosophic reflection on ephemerality and renewal. In another series, threads of calligraphic traditions and symbols taken from Chinese historic literature are subject to the same methodology: they are fragmented and then reconstructed – the basis and foundation for his artistic method. In his Da Guan Inscriptions, he examined historical inscriptions, copying them from source using ink and paper, in an attempt to recreate both the spirit and the knowledge of the meaning of the scriptures. Hao Shiming is a member of the ‘New Ink’ movement which emphasises the use of such traditional materials to create new forms of painting that embrace traditional calligraphy with contemporary painting methods.
Hao Shiming, born in 1977 in Heze China, graduated from the Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts in 2000 before completing a master’s degree at Beijing Normal University in 2014. He currently works at Hubei Provincial Academy of Fine Arts and divides his time between Wuhan and Beijing. His works have been exhibited at the National Museum of China, the Shanghai Museum, Today Art Museum, Hubei Museum, Shanghai Duolun Museum and the Wuhan Museum as well as Art Basel Hong Kong and Ink Asia.