In Feng Zhengjie’s memoirs, he gave a personal account of his simple life of childhood in the countryside. There was a cousin who used to play with him:

　　His biggest hobby was buying lots of various propaganda posters as well as Chinese new year and folk paintings. He pasted all of those paintings on his walls, feeling like to paste them layers on layers. I loved to go to his home to see those beautiful paintings. Tracing down the origin of my creation style, I believe those paintings made a huge impact. (Memoirs, 2009, Feng Zhengjie)

　　Based on the common knowledge of psychology, from Feng’s memoirs of 1968 to 1988, we can learn why, after so many years, he choose to use the images from folk paintings, advertisement pictures, and bright colors of Red and Green in his works. In fact, those resources have already become part of the artist’s taste gene.

　　Before entering Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts in 1988, Feng had received his education of fine arts at a middle vocational school (Anyue Normal School). He gained more time to study fine arts in his sophomore year at the vocational school. Still, He admitted, “In spite of enjoying casual drawing and engraving, I knew nothing about ‘drawing’ or ‘color’.” The modern Chinese fine arts in 1984, however, had already witnessed “the Age of the Wounded”. After the Star Art Exhibition being held in Beijing, in the wake of Liberation of Thoughts, the tide of modernism was about to sweep over all fields of art. For readers who resided in big cities, it was not very difficult to find Western writings and art books. However, against this background, we can not see any achievability that Feng, as just an ordinary student in an outlying middle school, may have had an opportunity to enter the region of modern art. In fact, at the time Feng didn’t dream about being an artist at all. Before he took the admission exam for the vocational school, all he could imagine was just “entering the normal school in order to gain a stable teaching job in addition to one share of food quota. After that I do not need study any more, just looking for a wife to make a family. That was the biggest ambition I had then.”(Art is a Way for Me to Reflect the Reality——An Interview with Feng Zhengjie, 2001, Liu Chun). In his recent recount, he said the same. During the later study period, Feng gradually realized the possibility of fine arts. Eventually, he found that he would not be confined to a teaching position in a small town. In 1985, Feng went to Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts to attend an art training class. He gathered a harvest of experience in the academy that had gotten baptized by “the Age of the Wounded”. The paintings of Luo Zhongli, Cheng Conglin，Gao Xiaohua, Zhang Xiaogang, Ye Yongqing, and Liu Hong left profound impression on him. He decided to pursue art further, and if possible, he would apply for Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts. He began to subscribe to New Arts and Fine Arts in China. New Arts was the journal of China Academy of Fine Arts in Zhejiang, in which you can read the translation and recommendations of Western Art, while Fine Arts in China, published by Fine Arts Institute of Chinese National Academy of Arts, provided abundant information about what happened to new art in various cities in China. Those magazines were two of a few mediums that the youth who were interested in art could reach at that time. Feng confessed later: “I can not fully understand most of them then, and some of them are totally beyond my understanding. But nonetheless those messages have gradually entered into my brain without my awareness.” For a student who lived and studied in Anyue, a small town located in the east of Sichuan, those messages had already provided greater access to understanding art.

　　In 1986, while “the new tide of 85” was going on vigorously in different cities, Feng was no more than a none-teaching instructor in Anyue Normal School, although he held a temporary art teacher position at the same time. In 1987, however, in order to prepare for the admission exam of Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, Feng started to take some class; in September of 1988, he had become a student of the famous academy.

　　Just as the artists who were born in 1950s did, Feng began to read books of Western art, aesthetics, and philosophy in chunks. In his memoirs, he mentioned the names of Li Zehou, He Xin, and Liu Zaifu; Li Zehou’s writings (especially The Experience of Aesthetics ) enlightened the younger generation on the subjects of aesthetics and intellectual ideas, and Liu Zaifu’s radical comparison between Chinese and Western thoughts had a rather important impact, among others. Indeed, the years around 1988 were characterized by mess and diverse possibilities, and the economic changes had already created social turbulence. Many intellectuals started to worry about the condition of political structure. In this atmosphere, doubtlessly, the political documentary Heshang played a role in exposing that tension and served to increase the tempest. Feng, only 20 years old at the time, must have been agitated by reading the booklet of Heshang. A stable and mature thought, however, can not come into being from mere reading; though it was obvious that reading was an important factor in shaping his ideas. Within the realm of fine arts, the avant-garde critics and artists had held The Mt.Huang Conference in Mt.Huang in 1988, the message of which was conveyed to the younger students through university lectures by the teachers such as Zhang Xiaogang, Ye Yongqing, Wang Yi, and Wang Lin, and Feng is one of those students. In fact, what kind of revelation those avant-garde activities had given to the students was less important compared to a breath of fresh air from the domain of fine arts that implied the possibilities of openness and rebellion. The introduction of thoughts and styles of modern art, along with those fights happening during the conference, was considered the continuation of the 85 movement, and became resources to enliven people’s imagination. This was enough for students who had an inner impulse.

　　Feng is inherently sensitive to art, and he always follows his inner will to search for his own expression. Before entering Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, Feng had showed his interest in Paul Cézanne; after that, he insisted his instinctive choice. He had already known many academic stereotypes even before he applied for the academy. However, he thought there should be more potentialities in art. Therefore, as he entered the academy, he “preferred following his own heart to make his own way.” His qualities are flexible and they decide that he can absorb new elements at any moment. Feng had a more direct understanding of transformation and potentialities of art, when he saw Tea House Series, by Shen Xiaotong, and Bald Kid, by Xin Haizhou, in the 1988 southwestern Modern Art Exhibition. Both of the artists were students as him in the same department of printmaking at Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts. He was stimulated intensively by the challenges. Feng can still remember Zhou Chunya’s lecture in his sophomore year. Zhou, coming back from Germany, projected many slide shows of “Today’s Western Art Phenomena” to the students of his alma mater. Feng admitted that he had known very little about that modern art in the slide shows; however, Liu Hong, the presider of the lecture, reminded the audience of the importance of “being lively”, the character that keep people’s mind in restless motion, not allowing it to become rigid. For artists to make artistic opinions, sensibilities are essential. From this lecture and teacher Liu Hong’s advice, Feng learned the word “daily-ize”. The classics of human art came from the daily quests of artists in the past and art itself resulted from the feelings in our routine lives. The obscure impression of this key word appeared to have exerted a subtle influence on Feng.

　　Unity 1989, Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts had been continuing its teaching method of “going out to gain life experience” in those minority territories. It became a serious problem for Feng who was not willing to be an obedient student. He wanted his teachers to answer one question: Do not our daily lives deserve to be experienced by art?

　　I had already been strongly suspicious of this method of “going out to gain life experience for art’s sake”. When the academy arranged us to spend a time in Mt.Dabie, I was no longer willing to go. I at that time had already realized that social changes as well as daily life within or without the academy were more attractive to me, and I had a deeper understanding of them. (Memoirs, 2009, Feng Zhengjie)

　　Obviously, Feng was not interested in Luo Lizhong’s and He Duoling’s painting subjects of farmers and minority groups. Feng recalled his then understanding of “life” as follow:

　　In reality, China underwent a rapid social change in the early 1990s; after 1989, lots of people chose to “plunge into the commercial sea”, and many members of elite sectors began to go into business. Therefore, the economic development of the whole country became so fast that many people’s life styles were changed. As economy turned better and people began to have money in their pockets, ways of life and consumption style were transforming. Indeed, those things changed a lot. When you left the gate of the academy, at Huangjueping, the very location of Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, you would feel strongly of that change. Popular songs could be heard everywhere on the street; actually, one can see our lives around us. (Art Focus, “Interview in 2008”)

　　This understanding had a decisive influence; for from either his reading or his perceiving, Feng determinedly started to believe that: the phenomena before our eyes (the exterior world) was deserved to be paid attention to. In the early 1990s, students in academies of fine arts had received sufficient information of Western art history. They can read and buy a large number of books of Western fine arts. As a result, when Feng and his classmate Zeng Hao worked for the Exhibition of Gymnastic Art of the Beijing Asian Games, they can enjoy trying some new expressions; for example, they finished a work of mixed media. The artist said later,” that work of mixed media was almost a homage to Jasper Johns.”(1990-1993) Until 1994, Feng had still been looking for the possibilities in various expressions, among which surrealism and pop art were two kinds of most common methods. He transformed Luo Lizhong’s Father (1989-02) with an unclear attitude, or put a woman’s body into an obscure environment (1990-02), and he even tried to combine the taste of surrealism with pop art (1990-01). In 1991, he painted a work called sick bird, a young man opening his hands wide and a small bird lying down at the middle bottom of the painting. The implication of death and scheme of composition revealed a mood of transcendence; since 1989, however, Guo Wei, Shen Xiaotong, and Xin Haizhou, three artists who graduated from the same academy, have been all producing the same kind of “surrealistic” works. One thing is sure, that these young artists are under the influence of “the Age of the Wounded”. The environment and the teachers made contributions to this; the chaos and vigor of the junction between city and countryside as well as the heavy air triggered the sentiments of these youth; daily life was just like this. The work sick bird came from Feng’s personal experience; nevertheless, he tried to search for his expression in those ready-made words; apparently, with sincerity, he had been piecing together those factors of modernism, and indeed, we can find in Feng’s then works the elements from art books and his teachers; because of this, his works naturally proved to be obscure. In 1993-10, the bird is the genuine main body of the composition, but she has completely died. The young man portrays her skeleton in perspective, and by this the query of expressionism about life seems to be continued; still, the whole composition is recognizable to be the style of Pop Art. Feng made that query apparent, and in this way, it looked as if he had already lost interest in his teachers’ “depth”. He took part in the preparation for the Chinese Experiences exhibition planned by Wang Lin and was in charge of file and record. He learned what the essential meaning of his teachers’ idea of “depth” was; however, it seemed that he was out of reach of “depth”, or he had a different understanding of the notion. The exterior world was funny enough, and Feng had no interest in pursuing “depth” and “essence”.

　　In 1992, along with his classmates Yu Ji and Zeng Hao, Feng held an art exhibition, which was supported by their teachers Wang Lin and Ye Yongqing (and the latter was Feng’s advisor of graduation work). Feng presented his series of Dissection in this art exhibition called “Today’s Circumstances, 1992”. He wrote something for the product, and those words became the earliest evidence for understanding his springboard of art career.

　　Art is a subtle or even nearly cunning transformation of reality, and in this process the aura of human reason and spirit is illuminating.

　　Today in China, media such as movie, TV show, video, and picture have changed the meaning of words. Image, with its character of simpleness, liveness and immediateness, catches the rhythm of contemporary life, and consequently makes the culture of image an apparent priority, which exerts a broad and profound influence on our contemporaries’ culture lives.

　　Here, words, together with their meanings toward depth by prolonged reading, are fading out, while images, with their two dimension of flatness, emphasize the significance of surface layer. The culture of image brings up many star idols (singers, film stars, athletes, news celebrities, and cartoon characters). A same structural dissection of these images will be very funny, which includes the ordinary or unique human images from our surroundings as well as the images that gain their graphical and exterior significance through high frequency of showing up. The wrap is torn open, and in the wake of a feeling of chance, the feelings of tease, mock, and cynicism steals over us.

　　“The rapid development of communications media, mainly of images” became Feng’s question; from the very beginning, he had developed a deep doubt about “experiencing life” in the woods; thereafter, he realized the importance of daily life; now, he started paying his attention to the daily life in urban areas. Nevertheless, this daily life consisted of assorted images rather than mysterious backgrounds behind the images. This was different from his teachers’ understanding of “real life”: the exterior images constituted the world where we were living now. The angle of observing reality and daily life apparently changed; however, what Feng provided was the “dissection” picture rather than the surface shine of those muscles. The logic is imaginable: it seems that Feng wants to tear the surface off to see what happens inside. Still, this logic is similar with his teacher’s. Namely, you should express inner things, and this is also a demand for approaching the “depth”. In 2004, the critic Li Xianting asked the artist, “Did you try to dissect such an image to show your intent of ‘dissecting’ the deeper things beneath popular art?” Feng said “yes”. But what did a young art student want to see in this “dissection picture”? Indeed, nothing! Still, this state of mind where he was trying to figure it out what was inside led him to practise and understand the means of expression further. School education did not teach students how to deal with the outside world other than those patterns of flirting and wrinkling, and those wishy-washy expressions of ideas. But for the students who walked in the streets of Huangjueping everyday, they were accessible to popular art, and without teachers’ instruction, how should they treat these vigorous and diverse phenomena? In the early 1990s, popular art was despised by old-fogyish intellectuals, and they believed popular art was trashy, indelicate, and short-lived. Why should we express such a culture? But they did not answer: why does popular art have such an impact and such a lure? Feng “dissected” himself as well as the beauties in popular images and the figures in world classic paintings. He conveyed to the audience all he saw in his “dissection process”, and his teacher explained as follow:

　　Feng is trying to use his means of figure dissecting to analyze the surge of contemporary life and pop culture. In front of fashion and stars, and those enthusiasms conveyed and agitated by mass media, the painter stands back with uneasiness. He started from analyzing those voluptuous women (though not without some divinity) under the brush of Rubens to parse a variety of faces in our city lives: actors’ faces, singers’ faces, teachers and friends’ faces and his own face. Some of those faces are invaluable; some of them utterly worthless; however, one by one false faces, full of sensation or without sensation at all, only have common and vapid foreheads, nose muscles, corrugator muscles, and mouth muscles, etc. The exterior difference between different human beings is bewildering, but the fundamental coherence among people is more dreadful.

　　Wang Lin analyzed Feng’s works in terms of essentialism; for example, his words like “the fundamental coherence among people is more dreadful” were ambiguous. Still, he seemed to find out the uniqueness of his student’s works. In September of 1992, when Cynical Realism in the North and Pop Art in Wuhan, a city located in the midsection, came into fashion, Feng started his graduate school life at Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts. The works of pop art became the main body of the Biennial Exhibition of the year in Guangzhou. As a student, Feng won an opportunity to see China Modern Art Documents Tour Exhibition, held by his teacher Wang Lin in the library of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, and the First Guangzhou Biennial Exhibition, organized by fourteen critics. Later, Feng recalled:

　　That was the first time I saw such a big scene of China modern art, and so many artists came from every corner of the country. At the time, we were all poor but full of passion, which made me recall those paragraphs in novels, the meeting places of heroes who ganged up and enjoyed their wild time.…For myself, I once again strengthened my idealism and romantic passion for pursuing modern art. Though the exhibitions were market-oriented, they inspired our spirits!

　　The artistic atmosphere of the 1992 Guangzhou Biennial Exhibition was denser than ever since 1989, and thousands of artists from all around the country came to Guangzhou. Of course, the young artist was greatly animated by the stirring speeches (Shang Yang said——“one era ends, and another begins.”) in the exhibition. Stimulated by free expression, perhaps plus the early memory and experience in the countryside, in 1994, Feng finished some works bearing the colors and forms of folk art, which indicated that he was still at the time of looking for his own words.

　　The artist with particular sensibilities and ideal would not give up his visual experience easily. In his second year as a graduate student (1994), Feng was sent by his academic advisor to “survey the traditional Chinese art, mainly referring to the Three Big Grottoes. Hence, equipped like a backpacker, I started my rewarding though laborious journey. The first stop was Xian, then the Longmeng Grotto in Luoyang, the Jin Temple in Taiyuan, the Yungang Grottoes in Datong, and the Suspended Temple of Mt. Heng; after that, I returned to Xian, and from there I went to the Mogao Grottoes of Dunhuang, the Jiayu Pass, and the Maiji Mountain Grottoes; finally, I went back to Chongqing by way of Xian. Xian is a city full of historic art sites. Whether history museums, the Forest of Stone Tablet, or the Terracotta Army all demonstrate the brilliance of Chinese artistic creation; the Longmeng Grotto is the most badly ruined, but we can still perceive its enormous charming and majesty; in the Yungang Grottoes, besides that well-known big Buddha figure, I was more astonished by those numerous small-size figures of Buddha in No.4 and No.5 grottoes, whose splendid and dazzling colors are more fascinating; how miraculous the architecture of the Suspended Temple is! And the Huayan Temple is full of grandeur! The frescoes of the Mogao Grottoes, its frameworks and colors, are the treasures of the whole world, while the engravings of the Maiji Mountain Grottoes are touched by divine inspiration, and its peculiar landform is marvelous!”

　　After so many years, Feng’s story of the past might be a little bit literary, but it was no doubt that he was impressed with those variegated historic images. In his later works, we could see it clearly that he built an understanding of the starting point and character of traditional art. Especially, he transformed and preserved the secularity and folk qualities of traditional religious art. Indeed, what he wanted was not the mere copy of the tradition but the character revealed by those sublime expressions.

　　In 1993, when Feng was arranging for the Chinese Experiences exhibition the documents of Zhang Xiaogang, Zhou Chunya, Ye Yongqing, Wang Chuan, and Mao Xuhui, he noticed one saying by Zhang Xiaogang: “Do we want to make an exhibition of ‘good works’ or make an exhibition of ‘importance’?” At that time, the artists of the southwestern cities were thinking of how to continue the art of new era, and the “Chinese experiences” seemed to be understood as aiming at the ideology of Cynical Realism and Political Pop. Some of the critics of the time had a severe suspicion of those arts favored by the Western: Why should the value of Chinese modern art be judged and decided by the Western? Can we create our new art with our particular experience? Is it true that the content of ideology is related to art? Regardless of what kind of reasons, some southwestern artists and critics anticipated to demonstrate their own unique visual experiences. They had gotten stimulated intensively by Cynical Realism and Political Pop. The phenomenon was a little similar with the emotional clash between the northern Rational Painting and the southwestern Stream-of-Life in the 1980s. In the new era, however, the Cynical Realism and Political Pop had a much stronger impact, which make the southwestern artists began to rethink their art. At the time, the true implication of “importance” was: Can those works play a role in the history? What is the art of today? Feng’s understanding of new art is initiated by the teachers’ thoughts. Since art is related to our daily life, he begins to observe and meditate the current reality over again:

　　In September of 1994, the first semester of my third year in graduate school started, I began to work on my graduation project. I had apparently felt the huge change of Chinese society after Deng Xiaoping’s South Tour Speeches in 1992. The idealistic myth of the intellectual elite in 1980s was brought down by the realistic defeat of 1989. After years of shock, many intellectuals began to face the reality and chose to go into business. Chinese economy entered a time of accelerated development. Consequently, the way of daily life altered and consumer culture emerged; many problems and conflicts gradually came to the surface. There were huge changes in ecological and cultural environment, ethical value, and moral ideas, all of which encountered severe challenges. In order to express my then feelings and confusion, I decided to cut into the theme from the angle of conflicts and problems brought by the development. I chose “skin” as the break-in point of the visual language, because I felt that skin is the medium between people’s inner and exterior worlds, and its transformation mostly embodied the human beings under the influence of social environmental changes (regarding either physical body or state of mind). Fleck, as a symbolic and conceptual element of pathological changes, by nature became the most important visual symbol in the picture. I added to the picture my favorite new year or new year-like paintings that represented happiness and blessness, and it certainly made the picture bear a more intensive tension; on the other hand, it implied that the traditional Chinese values were challenged.

　　There were many physical carriers that can help understand the exterior and essence of the object. The reason why Feng chose skin might be related to his knowledge and training of human body and dissection in the academy. The structure of muscles in the dissection picture reminded Feng of using pop art to produce his series Dissection; however, it seemed that he did not find more secrets in this further work; instead, in our daily experiences, we could often find the exterior changes. In this way, Feng naturally regards the surface “pathological changes” as the problems being discovered: Even though the society provides us countless beautiful and colorful images, it is very easy for people to find the abnormalities of those images. Feng’s experience corresponded to the Strange Scenes exhibition, held at the Art Gallery of Sichuan Academy of Fine arts by Xin Haizhou, Guo Wei, Guo Jin, and Zhang Bin in December of the year, and the Sections exhibition, held by He Sen, Zhao Nengzhi and the other four artists at the same time. Since those artists of close ages had similar microcosmic and superficial experiences, unlike their teachers’ generation, they were not interested in interior abstract expression but focused their attention on visible and touchable “scenes” and “sections” that were even enlarged by them. Feng decided to amplify the “pathological changes” being observed by him. He used bright colors to portray the surface “skin” and admitted that the social environment had changed a lot, often with a delightful way. However, those “pathological changes” were on the fresh surfaces, and constituted the indivisible parts of the whole.

　　In June of 1995, Feng’s graduation exhibition was held at the Art Gallery of Sichuan Academy of Fine arts. He wrote an explanation for his viewpoint of “skin”. In his creation notes, he emphasized on the important interrelationship between social reality, cultural environment, living conditions, and art. He repetitively and even literarily reminded, “In the wake of the further reforms and opening-up, a closed nation with a civilization of thousands of years had been undergoing the profound and enormous change; either lengthwise development or transverse conflict and communication posed the serious challenge. You can say there are both opportunities and risks, and the development is interwoven with the crisis.” But when he talked about the crisis resulting from material and economic prosperity, his feeling was real. He chose some appositional words to present a picture of reality:

　　satellite, TV set, telephone, movie, nuclear energy, computer, highway, automobile, airplane, train, high-rise, neon light; porn video, adult literature, toilet culture, illicit prostitution, the illiterate, cheap labor; living crisis, aloneness, vacuity, tension, environmental pollution, disease, crime, alienation of man, lost of faith, fall of morality…

　　Hence, as a carrier of reality, “skin” was used to account for the existential question. At the time, Feng’s “skin” was more or less related to expressionistic state of mind in 1980s, as he still wanted to use physical body to connect those notions regarding “life”. In 1980s, Mao Xuhui laid miserable human bodies on concrete floor, and he wanted the audience to see the malformation of human life, while in the new era, the exterior “skin” was stressed and amplified by Feng, and presented a state of plumpness or even prettiness; but the small or large spots on the skin told us that human life had problems. Once again, Feng adopted the symbolic method to render his view of life:

　　Obviously, here the skin has the physiological and realistic meanings; on the other hand, it also embodies a symbolic meaning of artistic visual image. Physiologically, the pathological changes of skin imply environmental pollution, the disorder of nature, overflow of sex, and other realistic factors of possibility, while exaggeration, emphasis, stimulation, and inconsistency as visual images predict the inner ingredients of spiritual confusion, lost of values, and decline of morality as well as conflicts between life and culture, ideal and reality. All of those can precisely represent the grave problems and deep crises beneath contemporary social reality and cultural environment.

　　From the logic of Feng’s artistic choice, we can see that more or less he inherited the ideological tendency of “the Age of the Wounded”——A critical perception of reality.

　　In December of 1994, before his graduation, Feng had attempted to find a way to stay in Beijing. Under the help of Li Xianting and the new generation artist Wang Jing, he found a job in Beijing Institute of Education; in July of the next year, he became the formal faculty of the institute and started a new life there. Still, new environment, new habits of life, and economic pressure bred Feng’s feelings of loneliness, suspicion, and melancholy; on the other hand, they contributed to the inner urge of the new arrival. In December of 1995, Feng’s Narration of Skin——Red Double Happiness participated in the 3rd Annual Exhibition of China Oil Painting planned by Liu Xiaochun, which encouraged him a lot. Feng continued to work on his series of Skin until April of 1996 when his Narration of Skin was exhibited at the Art Gallery of Capital Normal University; the exhibitions of Life of Bright Makeup at the Yunfeng Gallery and Mass Model at the Museum of Wanshou Temple were held at the same time. Thereafter, people can frequently hear the notion of “Flowery & Vulgar Art”.

　　Flowery & Vulgar Art is regarded as one more art phenomenon summarized by the critic Li Xianting after Cynical Realism and Political Pop; indeed, Flowery & Vulgar Art is the mixed offspring of Cynical Realism and Political Pop. To a large extent, Flowery & Vulgar Art is the last means of expression to passively avoid the conflict between different ideologies, and it concludes the inconsistency and conflict between political structure and the notion of free economy, which emerged after China had fully entered a market economy. After two years, in his essay An Irony to “Farmerlike Upstart Taste”——Review of the Context of Flowery & Vulgar Art (Continued), Li Xianting connects Flowery & Vulgar Art to the politics:

　　Since from Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao in the late Qing Dynasty to Chen Duxiu, Qu Qiubai, and Lu Xun at the time of the May 4th Movement, they had all aimed at our literary tradition from an angle of saving the nation. They yearned to arouse the mass, and consequently advocated for the popularization of the art in contrary to the elegance of classical literary tradition. As one of the communist leaders, Qu Qiubai went to the Chinese soviet areas personally to promote popular art. The Yenan Literature & Art Movement happened a little later than the appearance of the monthly calendar pictures; in 1943, Mao Zedong published his Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art, which pointed out a direction for the Yenan Literature & Art Movement——For creating the new style to please workers, peasants, and soldiers, the only way is to follow the example of farmers and their art. None of the new art works inspired by the vigorous movement did not borrow the elements of farmer’s art, such as the music Yellow River Cantata, the opera White Hair Girl, and the products of fine arts like Gu Yuan’s wood engravings. (Contemporary Art, No.15, Hunan Fine Arts Publishing House, February 1998)

　　Li Xianting analyzed the evolvement of mass culture since the 20th century, especially since 1949, which carried the character of farmers, resulting from political structure and the corresponding ideological language of power. He tried to find the historical and ideological origins of the “vulgarness” being pursued by Flowery & Vulgar Art.

　　Feng did not follow any directive notion in his experiments of art until people started to use the term “Flowery & Vulgar Art” frequently. He merely yearned to express his understanding of the relationship between art and reality, but the flowery colors and superficial images were considered a new art trend by critics, and were labeled as Flowery & Vulgar Art. After reviewing the 1996 documents, we found that both Wang Lin and Gu Chengfeng, who wrote art criticism for Feng (Wang Lin’s Sensitive Art, Sensitive Man——A Preface of Feng Zhengjie’s Oil Paintings, February 1996, and Gu Chengfeng’s The Secret Under the Sun——On Feng Zhengjie’s Narration of Skin), did not use the term “flowery & vulgar”. In the eye of Wang Lin, Feng’s works, which took a “long-lost ideological attitude——seriousness and meditation”, were completely different from the “hippie hood” of those new generations and Cynical Realism. Nevertheless, he said the words like “the ulcer of beautiful skin is shocking, but what Feng seeks to do is to portray the shock of the beauty”. Here, the particularity of skin’s fineness was still observed, while the “ulcer” resulted in the “shock”; the similar observation was rendered in Li Xianting’s essay, who used the words “the touch of ulcer, brilliant like peach” to describe Feng’s new art. (The Touch of Ulcer, Brilliant Like Peach——A Preface of Feng Zhengjie’s Series Paintings Narration of Skin.) But more or less unexpectedly, he had not yet adopted the concept of flowery & vulgar in the essay. In this art review, Li Xianting spent more space to describe the paintings themselves, and he concluded:

　　From the author’s words about the causality between flamboyance and ulcer, we can most directly figure out a connection with the sex world; beneath flamboyance and happiness is the disaster brought by sex and AIDS to the world, but it is only a symbol, and it uses a prophesy as metaphor or a image of the world where we live, a image bringing to us the joyful and flowery earthliness——though “brilliant like peach”, it is “the touch of ulcer”. Indeed, the artist is conscientious and sensitive about our today’s situation. We have to face the age of broken spirit, and we are coming into a desire world of showiness and flamboyance. (March 1996)

　　We can see, Li Xianting did not regard Flowery & Vulgar Art more as part of an ideology, he preferred seeing it as a new changed reality.

　　In Account of Skin——Red Candle (1995), Feng chose a man and a woman in ancient clothes, with ulcers on their faces, and the outcome of their wedding night was announced by image of children. The artist rendered the traditional account of life cycle; however, his emphasis was on the problem rather than on the happiness.

　　A society with rapid change always shows its character by the supersession of fashions. Though “skin” is a surface of the physical world, the way of the artist to reveal the ulcers on the skin is very symbolic. In terms of Feng’s early experience, he can find more corresponding expression in his daily life. After the exhibition of Narration of Skin, he walked around the alleys and streets, joined friends’ parties, and drank and chatted with newly-known artists who were in poor living conditions. Indeed, It seemed that Feng had realized his art would need a more clear expression, and he had to look for the new possibilities.

　　In those years, taking bride photos were very popular, and you can see photography studios everywhere in the city. My friend Xu Feng also took a position as art director in the “Sun Lovers Studio”, which was opened by his classmate of Chongqing Business College and located in Xidan district, Beijing. I used to ride there once I had spare time. I did not feel anything wrong at the beginning, but slowly I thought the process of taking bride photos was very interesting. As a kind of commercial photography, in order to control cost and time, and guarantee the effect of photos, there was a whole process of how to posture and how to show your expressions; the lovers, who at first had been lively and ardent, received orders from assistants of photographers to posture like two puppets, sometimes looking up gazing into the eyes of each other, sometimes full of stiff affection, and their real emotions soon disappeared. This made me feel ridiculous and phony. The feeling suddenly caught me. The economic development of those years was rapid, and consuming desires of people increased dramatically. There were a variety of modes of consumption, but the states of mind revealed in the course of pursuing consumption proved often artificial due to their emphasis on appearance. For example, large numbers of world parks were built in various cities, with miniatures of the world's major tourist attractions, which were highly welcomed as having mostly satisfied the domestic tourists’ vanities. (Essentially, many domestic tourists were interested in taking photos rather than appreciating the scenes.) The feeling greatly inspired me to reflect on this phenomenon that carried a character of the era and imaged people’s general consumption ideas through my products. Inspired by the mimetic character of bride photos, I decided using the method of mimesis, plus my favorite image and effect of new year picture, to continue my new painting, and consequently, the series Romantic Journey came into being.

　　The Feng’s statement clearly rendered the reason he switched from “skin” to the real daily life. In fact, the idea that art should reflect the real life was a longtime ideological topic in the realm of art. Except the political art before 1979, even in the late 1980s, some artists were very cautious of such a methodology. The Abstract Painting starting around 1988 was not merely a style (like the art of some abstract artists in the early and mid 80s in Shanghai) but a psychological state of being anxious about the too close distance between art and real life. Hence, after some modernistic attempts, a number of painters (such as Beijing artist Meng Luding, who became known by his The Way to the New Age) entered into a domain of pure abstractness. On the other hand, to those artists who were born in the 30s and 40s (most of them were teachers in China Central Academy of Fine Arts, China Academy of Art, Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, and some of them were “artists” of official institutes of fine arts), the real life must be reduced by a high aesthetic attitude (mostly, a political attitude or an habitual ideological attitude). Not every kind of life can represent today’s life, and much of reality should be avoided. it raised a problem for Feng, who was sensitive to daily life. However, at the time, he insisted that “what art concerns is about the real living condition of human being”, and he noticed that “Cynical Realism, with its strong concern for current human condition in reality, ended the increasingly inflated and empty pursuit of art since the new tide of 85”. He agreed with the strategy of Cynical Realism, that is, opening you up rather than “against it” was an effective means to promote art. As “political man” was turned to “material man”, the way to establish independent personality needed to be changed. What Feng said of “political man” meant the human being’s condition before 1992, but the market economy accelerated such a change in national structure and values that “material man” had started to play the leading role since 1990s. What made things more complicated was that the political and economic transformations of the society were not as easy as people had thought. The political and ideological elements did not disappear but penetrated the skin of market economic life, just like bacterium, making our daily lives more complex. Therefore, by the end of 1996, Feng would say like this:

　　Flowery & vulgar Art is a strategy of art and a mode of discourse. “flowery & vulgar” is the exterior rather than essence of Flowery & Vulgar Art. The essence is irony, while the method is mimesis. With the mimic appearance of flowery & vulgar, irony becomes more intensive, more penetrating, and more impressive, so flowery & vulgar art should not be regarded as the object of simple moral criticism of unidirectional emotion, but as an inevitable way of artistic reflection in the social and cultural environment of contemporary life.

　　When the conditions of the mass become popular modes, it is not that there is a difference between elite culture and vulgar or folk culture, but that the values of a nation or country have changed decisively. The majority enjoys the fruits produced by the change, and their numbness causes severe problems in an evolving civilization at a time when there is a vacuum of values or an underlying ideology. Brilliant faces, flowery clothes, and the colorful world, those are today’s situation. Feng presents such a situation, seeming to ask: “isn’t it?” He said: “mimesis became a mode in which life turns to art, and irony is the essence. In this way, artists pursue their desires for complete personality and individual dignity in contemporary society.” But where were the “complete personality” and “individual dignity” hinted or expressed? Precisely because of those paintings composed of voluptuous scenes, some critics thought that Flowery & Vulgar Art might have just gone with the stream. Feng said at the time, “Romantic Journey can be said combines together all three of Falseness, Bigness, and Emptiness, plus a bit of effect of popular new year picture that is welcomed by the mass; in this manner, it tries to pursue the real value and dignity of ‘human being’ in contemporary society.” (The Creation Notes of Romantic Journey, December 1996) “Falseness, Bigness, and Emptiness” is a term used by the artists in the 1980s to criticize “the fine arts of the Great Cultural Revolution” in the 60s and 70s (including the entire ideology of the then literature and art, of course), but the artist Feng believes, in the new era, “Falseness, Bigness, and Emptiness”, which lacks an enlightened quality, has found its new form to spread, and this causes serious society problems of the time. In truth, Feng does not adopt the cynical attitude of modernism in the 80s to encounter the reality, and he even uses an exaggerated way to tell people: that is the reality! Romantic Journey is a crucial phase for Feng to establish his own particular artistic expression, and the series paintings have been added to the classical “programma” of Flowery & Vulgar Art. After that, Feng was soon accepted by critics and exhibition planners, and participated in a greater number of important exhibitions.

　　In the summer of 1997, one of his series Romantic Journey was collected by the art collector Uli Sigg.

　　In 1998, the Art Gallery of Dongyu at Shenyang bought one of Romantic Journey, and he also, among other Flowery & Vulgar artists, participated in the Ambisextrous Platform Art Exhibition at the Taida Modern Art Museum in Tianjin,

　　In June of 1999, Feng participated in the large-scale group exhibition of The Cross-Century Rainbow——Flowery & Vulgar Art planned by Li Xianting and Liao Wen. He designed the art catalogue, invitation cards, and posters for the exhibition that was held at The Taida Modern Art Museum in Tianjin.

　　In 2000, Feng toke up some experiments of “Cool”. The artist told us: That was the series work produced at the turning point of his art, and he attempted to further weaken the apparent details of narration and relevancy. He hoped his art would not be understood as only approaching in a descriptive direction, and he wanted the critics to understand that Flowery & Vulgar was not the offspring of theory of reflection, but that of the idea. “Cool” was a tentative result of artists’ concerns about popular art. At the time, “Cool” is a well-known word among those younger groups who were inclined to game and cartoon culture. This series of paintings did not continue the images in Romantic Journey, but had a direct connection with toy and cartoon figures. Therefore, to a certain extent, the artist ceased the logic of an image. However, the experiments liberated Feng from narration, and he decided to simplify the content of composition and develop the notional element of painting. He hoped that the audience can grasp the artist’s idealistic and aesthetic attitude by seeing rather than reading.

　　Feng started to use the section of head in Romantic Journey as the only content of his composition, and then finalized its mold and color. He preserved the character of flowery & vulgar art: fake smiles and showy colors, because he believed the society was still “flowery & vulgar”.

　　After 2000, economic development, abundant goods, and advanced information system make the whole society look like a more urbanized and internationalized one. virtually, there are still flowery and vulgar elements at the core of society, only with a different taste. Many exterior signs appear not to be so obvious and phony and look natural and decent, but who of us can deny the inherent emptiness beneath those exteriors? Who can tell how much we have lost of our inner essence at the time when we receive so many external things? Or do our interiors seem to be as shiny as our exteriors? Or do we dress up just for concealing our inner bareness?! No, I don’t want to criticize it simply, and indeed I myself am one of them. What I want is just to express my feeling honestly. (Hi Art Interviews, “Feng Zhengjie: Look Left or Look Right”, 2008)

　　The Artist began to add halos to his portraits, a kind of effect of illusion and incredibleness; in comparison with the human figures of Romantic Journey, those portraits seemed to be more “internationalized, urbanized, and fashionized”, but did this exterior change make any fundamental difference from that of the past? What Feng wanted to say was “No”, and in fact, it was the same. The exterior world might have changed a lot, but our spiritual world was still hollow, inconsistent, and confused, and lacked of enlightenment. Feng painted his portraits more glabrous and smooth. Probably getting the hint of computer and digital technologies, his paintings became very “sharp” or “soft”. Those head portraits from fashion pictures were treated to form a more typical “flowery & vulgar” style of his character. From his green and red (pastel green, emerald green, rose red, peach red, pink), from his treatment of human eyes (cross-eye, asquint) and of scarlet, thick lips, we can clearly figure out the artist’s manner. As a result, Feng created a new pattern for our consumer culture.

　　The artist likewise kept a good record for the initial point of the series:

　　The series China was started since August of 2000, and it was an advance and deepening of the series Romantic Journey of the past years. The essence of the works did not change, but I tried some new ways of visual language. In the pictures, there were less narrative clothes and figures as well as less provocative colors and less joyful atmosphere of the earlier period, but more subtle contemplation of inner state.

　　If we say the works of the previous period contrasted the surface showiness and flamboyancy with human inherent emptiness and vanity, then the current works used the simple form and condensed color to pursue the interiors of the figures. They were not specific portraits, but the “portraits” of those Chinese who had been witnessing the frequent turbulences of Chinese society and politics of the 20th century, the traditional culture and personal spirit clashed with the dominant Western civilization and global market culture, and the broken spirit ground by the rapid economic development, who lacked the support of effective values at the turning of the century and had a showy exterior and complicated, subtle, or even hollow state of mind! (September 2001)

　　The series China was not the portrait of some specific person, but the mental picture of the social group who glanced right and left, who lived in the late 20th century and the early 21st century, with exterior showiness and flamboyancy, while its state of mind was complicated, subtle, or even hollow! (2003)

　　In 2001, Feng also adopted historic images to enrich his “flowery & vulgar” aesthetics. He used the images in monthly calendar to remind us of the way of people in different times to deal with fashion, consumption, or even modern life. The series called Butterflies Lingering Over Flowers was very delightful. Once again, the artist resumed the taste of the new year and folk paintings, which he had known since a child, and it seemed that he was doing a comprehensive job of aesthetics with ease. There was one paragraph in Bright Illusion (2007):

　　In those works called Butterflies Lingering Over Flowers, what is the difference between modern nude and early reserved woman? No difference, indeed. At least, Feng wants us to believe there is no difference between girl in clothes and chubby nude. They might be sisters, or a lesbian couple. The core is that they are woman, the most apparent sign of sex. Crane, airplane, building, and flying butterfly…etc. Those are symbols of an illusive world, scattered in the picture by the artist only to decorate the world that merely exists in art. Hence, the artist borrows the element of the early illusion to interestingly link himself with the painters of a voluptuous world such as Hang Xiying and Xie Zhiguang.

　　In fact, Feng has been working on different series at the same time. Once he finds a new possibility, he always compares it with the previous works to keep a connection with one another. It is true that this advertness to connection is required by the style and decided by the attitude.

　　In later days, Feng is widely accepted by art galleries and art museums. He has more opportunities to participate in a variety of exhibitions including international ones. Now he can easily see those original Western art works that he used to see in art books. Although he has established his style, it is important for him to review those art classics. When he saw French painter Gustave Courbet’s works, he gave a deep sigh, “only seeing Gustave Courbet’s paintings in Musée d'Orsay can make a person once more feel that strength coming from the depth of the canvas.” In truth, the experience of visiting Western art museums strengthens his more comprehensive understanding toward art questions, well beyond the concepts of different schools and fashions.

　　The comprehensive understanding of art is reflected in the artist’s practice of the last two years. For instance, after both of his parents passed away, the theme of life and death reappears in Feng’s works——he uses the “dead bird” as a symbol in his early years. Now, death is no longer a theory, but an immediate feeling and acquaintance of losing your beloved ones.

　　After finishing a series of three paintings My Father and Mother, the artist began to paint his series Flower of Life. For his theme of life and death, Feng even used the mode of installation to amplify his flowery & vulgar style. In the exhibition scene of Dead or alive of imago in October 2008, the artist adopted comprehensively the methods of painting, sculpture, installation, and electric device for extending the notion of flat plane to that of three-dimensional space. Indeed, “Dead or alive of imago” once again abstracted the death. Though he painted his parents’ head portraits, he generalized the image by the mold of skeleton heads. Therefore, when he answered about the reason of change, he said, “This is my private experience, and a relatively abstract reflection on life and death at the same time. It has no relation to the things that have a stronger connection with social reality.” He used the color of gold to represent the sublimity of life; however, this glittery color made the audience remember his taste of “flowery & vulgar” and, furthermore, the concept of money in a consumer society, but the artist himself did not mind. He answered, “some people think I has already finished with the ‘flowery & vulgar’, others believe that I has been advancing forward within it; I think both of them might be justifiable. I myself won’t think it from this angle. I only feel I have a strong emotion, and correspondingly I must find the best way to express. If I can use the method of painting to express, I will use; something can not be expressed by painting, then I hope I can express them by using sculpture or installation; if the static ones are not enough, I would hope to use the dynamic ones.” In retrospect of the artist’s thoughts of the early years, Feng’s narration is reliable. Those specific colors are preserved as unconscious gene almost from the very beginning, and once the artist needs them, they emerge as the materials of choice. Just as Feng himself said, those colors have already become his “preferences” or “habitual choices”.

　　For the artist, the most important thing is not to either use new material and tool or looking for new expression with intent, but to absolutely listen to his heart in practising his art. (“I have never thought of the change of style, etc. In fact, I believe what I do in every stage is to listen to my new feeling and find the corresponding way to express it.”) The passing away of his parents and the birth of his son fully inspire a theme of life and death. The newest subject of Feng is to answer this fundamental question of human beings. From this point of view, the artist certainly breaks away from the idea of “flowery & vulgar” and directs the question of art back to the understanding of life. Nonetheless, now, the understanding of life is different from that of modern artists in 1980s when they had read the works of Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, and Kierkegaard. At that time, the avant-garde artists merely wanted to find the new knowledge of human being in Western works to achieve the freedom of thought. with his longtime artistic and personal experiences, Feng has a more individual understanding of the question:

　　I don’t believe in metempsychosis, but on the other hand, I believe in eternal life in the physical sense. Indeed, I really fall into contradiction when I face the concept of life and death, for I always think life isn’t the life as you understand it. They often say the soul is eternal, which is exactly the thing I refuse to believe. I believe the objective existence, that is to say, you are eternal by objective standards. For instance, now you sit here, with the light waves of your body being refracted to the air, and I see you at this moment, but if I could, I would see you after ten thousand years at the place ten thousand light-years away, because until then your light will reach there. In other words, human being or any other thing continues to refract light to one hundred million light-years away, or a billion light-years away. Actually, the light waves are always there, and they can see we are chatting here.

　　In fact, your sound is the same. The energy spreads out and it will exist in the air forever, just as we see a twinkling star, which might have disappeared many years ago, in terms of human language, but we can still see it twinkle there. Namely, it’s in the air, it still exists, although its original body has no longer existed. From a different angle, it will exist forever. Hence, from this angle, everything is eternal, merely not in your mind. I don’t believe in the eternalness of the soul, but I believe in the objective existence of material. To yourself, death means the end; to others, everything is eternal. (An Interview With Feng Zhengjie by Zhang Yizhou, 2008)

　　Feng is not the kind of artist who pursues the support of idea intently. To a large extent, his trace of art is similar with that of his teachers and classmates at Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, in other words, following your inner feeling and needs to practise your art. Since the 80s of the last century, the northern artists have been always able to provide some new concepts and terms in contrast to the bashful southwestern artists. Besides talking of their feelings, the southwestern artists only express them in their works; meanwhile, they do not search for the basis in Western art and art thoughts with much intent. Feng’s art bears a strong symbolic meaning, or even some classical signs, but this symbolic and classical implication comes from the depth of his life and from his particular understanding of painting language. As a consequence of the thirty years of the reforms and open-up, the artistic achievements of all civilizations are presented in front of the artist; however, after he saw and appreciated those achievements, he returns to his inner world, to the historic heritage and traditional art that he is familiar with. It is easy to use some post-modern terms decorating Feng’s art, but we should choose the words as accurate as his art, carrying a character of sticking to the real. In January of 2008, Singapore Art Museum held the Feng’s solo exhibition of True Quality, and the opening speech by the critic Li Xianting shows the same understanding:

　　I have known Mr. Feng Zhengjie since he studied in Sichuan Academy of Fine Art. At the time, the consumer culture of China barely emerged, but he has begun to analyze it in his student works. And then, since his graduation until now, more than a decade passed, he has created a classic of consumer culture. This classic consists of bright colors of red and green used in traditional Chinese holiday celebrations, the colors of happiness and blessness; it also succeeds the mode of Shanghai monthly calendar picture in the 1920s and 1930s of China. He melts that culture slowly into the modern context to develop a kind of head portrait of beauty, with the color of pink and pastel green. Facing the consumer culture, the artist cannot resolve the problem, but he raises the question and transforms his feeling into his products, to let us understand the world through his works.

　　Based on our story and the “true quality” of the artist’s works, Feng’s art that gives a peculiar expression of Chinese contemporary society should be regard as the unneglectable document in contemporary art history.

　　August 5th, 2009, Wednesday