Author: CHEN YIFEI 陈逸飞

Size: 250×100cm

Signed and dated: Painted in 2000

Estimate:

Final Price: RMB 4,500,000

LITERATURE
2001 Chen Yifei Collection of Paintings / Marlborough Gallery
2006 Studio of Chen Yifei 1946-2005 / P13 / Marlborough Gallery
2007 Chen Yifei: Memorial Exhibition A Tribute to Chen Yifei 1946-2005 / P19 / Marlborough Gallery
signed in Chinese and pinyin
EXHIBITED
2001 Chen Yifei Painting Exhibition, Marlborough Gallery, Lundon
2007 Chen Yifei: Memorial Exhibition A Tribute to Chen Yifei, Marlborough, New York

REAMRK
Marlborough Gallery has issued a certificate of collection for this work.
The widow of Chen Yifei has issued an autographed certificate for this work.

The essence of artists is to discover beauty and convey beauty. The creation only tells people that there are many undiscovered beauty in the world.
——Chen Yifei
After his returning to China in 1990s, Chen Yifei started his painting works on the theme of traditional Chinese ladies, which focused on the beautiful ladies in ancient time or the period of the Republic of China, accompanied by the classic Chinese life elements like Pipa, circular fan, bronze mirror, birdcage and dressing table etc., and thus created a dreamlike historic space on the canvas, telling the passing stories through delicate strokes and elegant colors. Although a traditional theme in Chinese paintings, the paintings of traditional Chinese ladies are added by Chen Yifei with the perspective and light perception of oil painting as well as abundant colors, as he emphasizes not only realistic graphical modeling but also the ex-pression of the spiritual temperament and romantic charm of figures, which thus greatly expands the traditional ways of the representation of tra-ditional Chinese ladies. The Beaming in Thought was made in 2000 under the “Old Dreams in Shanghai” series that are the most famous paintings of Chen Yifei on traditional Chinese ladies. Because of his experience in shooting the film Old Dreams in Shanghai, Chen Yifei began to develop a fancy for the golden years in Shanghai’s old time, and wanted to show the people with the nostalgic Shanghai-style culture. The Old Dreams in Shanghai series describe the luxurious life and noble ambience of Old Shanghai, in which the artist created the images looking more modern than in the previous works, and meticulously used dark but rich colors to render poetic circumstances, which is particularly noticeable in the painting in question.
In this painting, a fashionable lady, who socializes in the main street of downtown Shanghai, is dressed with the well-cut cheongsam, with the trendy curly hair and white leather shoes indicating her taste and wealth. The lady shows some high-profile attitude, with a paper fan on her right hand facing the sun and the left hand dragging a suitcase, so that the two hands are almost in diagonal to each other. She seems to be running in small steps, with mouth opened wide screaming out her inner feeling, which enables the picture to deliver a dramatic momentum. In the arrangement of colors, the whole painting uses the cool colors of yellow and green, letting the cheongsam, the ground and the wall to be dyed with a layer of jade green, while the green color in the background is mixed with some warm yellow rays of light. The green and yellow colors symbolize the new life and the bright future respectively, and seem to indicate in the painting a spring-like passion and a romantic enthusiasm. Through the elaborate depiction of the images and the exquisite configuration of colors, the artist revealed vividly a new-era lady pursuing a promising future. Besides, the exaggerating and distorted ways of modeling and the bold composition is a hint of the change and exploration of the artist’s artistic style, so that the painting can be fairly called a key node and a representative work in the transitional period of his creation.