New Window Decoration
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.This print of a peasant who practiced modern hygiene promotes an educational campaign organized in rural areas by the Communists. The artist incorporated the style and motifs of traditional popular prints, such as paper cuts for window decoration, in his celebration of the new hero. The couplet next to the left and right margins reads:
Hygiene model;
A life as long as South Mountain.
Luo Gongliu was first known as a woodcut artist before he became an oil painter and author of iconic images of the Chinese Communist revolution. In 1938 he went to Yan’an, the Communist power base in northwest China. The experience of making prints and living among rural people in wartime had a profound impact on his art.
Hygiene model;
A life as long as South Mountain.
Luo Gongliu was first known as a woodcut artist before he became an oil painter and author of iconic images of the Chinese Communist revolution. In 1938 he went to Yan’an, the Communist power base in northwest China. The experience of making prints and living among rural people in wartime had a profound impact on his art.
Artwork Details
- Xin chuanghua
- Title: New Window Decoration
- Artist: Luo Gongliu (Chinese, 1916–2004)
- Date: 1944
- Culture: China
- Medium: Woodblock print; oil-based ink on paper
- Dimensions: Image: 5 1/16 x 4 15/16 in. (12.9 x 12.6 cm)
Overall: 22 x 16 in. (55.9 x 40.6 cm) - Classification: Prints
- Credit Line: On loan from the British Museum
- Curatorial Department: Asian Art