Qi Baishi’s Journey from a Peasant to a Painter

The famous Chinese painter Qi Baishi was born in 1864 in Hunan, China, to a low-income peasant family. His family was big with parents, grandparents and seven siblings. He trained as a carpenter and learned painting through a book of Chinese painting “Manual of the Mustard Seed Garden”.

He started painting animals, birds and insects. He learned painting techniques from Hu Qinyuan, who trained him in traditional ‘Gongbi’, which uses fine brush work and details. From his other teacher Tan Pu, he learned painting landscape. From both the teachers, he learned that every feature of a painting matters, from the subject to the process of painting. However, Baishi did not fully follow ‘gongbi’, instead, he relied upon “Sketching thoughts” style. Check out Qi Baishi ‘s artworks online and if you like his art you can always read up on Qi Baishi biography online.
Gradually, his work became popular and he started adopting different techniques. He used opera artists as models for his paintings and later shifted to his friends. At the age of forty he started travelling through China and came to Shanghai, where he became associated with Shanghai School.

His paintings reflected his experience of travel. They were free of Western influence and simple in style. He learned calligraphy and seal-carving. He believed that an artist must have an extra sensitivity to his surroundings. After his travels, he settled in Beijing and started reading and writing poetry. He also painted landscapes depicting the mountains he has seen. One of his series ‘Twelve Landscape Screens’ created in 1925 was sold in 2017 at a record price of 140.8 million dollars making him a member of ‘100 million Club’. His wood carving work also gained high accolades. During World War II, many Chinese traditional paintings were destroyed, except those of Qi Baishi, as he was highly regarded for his creations. He was elected to the National People’s Congress and made honorary chairman of the National Artists’ Association in 1953. In 1955 he was awarded the International Peace Prize.  In 1957 he died in Beijing aged 93. Have a look at the paintings created by this legendary artist and if the artworks of Qi Baishi interest you know all about him reading up on Qi Baishi ‘s biography.

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