Indeed, this phenomenological interpretation might seem universally applicable to any painter today, but there is something unique about Xu Hongxiang.




一

In early May 2024, I visited Xu Hongxiang’s studio in the suburbs of Beijing for the first time. At the entrance were stacks of canvases leaning against the wall, and around the corner was a spacious studio of nearly 100 square meters. The room was a bit chaotic, with paints, books, and miscellaneous items scattered everywhere, and the walls were covered with new works for an upcoming exhibition. The artist told me that some paintings were finished while others still needed work. Unless painting from life, Xu Hongxiang usually spreads out multiple works in his studio, adding a few strokes to one painting and then moving to another. He is unsure where a painting starts or when it ends. Because of this, it is easy to find similar or related themes and forms throughout his series of works, often with the same morpheme running through all the paintings. To the artist, they are essentially one painting. 


However, during the hour I spent in the studio, it was not the neatly arranged works on the walls that captivated me but the artist’s figure moving back and forth. He would take me to one painting and then to another, explaining the relationships between the pigments in one painting and the shapes in another, the recurring brushstrokes, and so on. This reminded me of Eadweard Muybridge’s The Horse in Motion (1887) and Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase (1912). The montage-like “collages” on the wall stemmed from his multiple embodied practices. Specifically, in the triptych Wander (2023-2024), the depicted scenes could be three groups of people or one group of people at different times. Alternatively, one person could perform continuous actions at three different times.


The grass stretching across the bottom of the three canvases reminds us that this is the same moment, while the one group of figures and the three different forms of plants behind them seem to suggest that this might also be three different moments. Unified yet divided, Xu Hongxiang gives us a real yet mysterious illusion. Each group of figures is primarily rendered using line drawing. Based on flat painting, he creates a dynamic scene through overlapping and intersecting contour lines, resembling the overlapping shadows of three figures or the oscillating shadow of one figure. Particularly, the shadows are colored in the artist’s preferred golden-yellow tones, complemented by bright reds, purples, and other vibrant hues, akin to the white shadows cast by strong light in the darkness. Their tones match the grass at the bottom and the plants behind, making them seem as if they are growing out of the ground. Especially the unidentified white objects at the top of the grass, resembling white flowers or white sprites—including the white dog in the middle of the figures looking back at the viewer—add to the painting’s sense of mystery and fantasy. It is no coincidence that these two images or motifs precisely constitute the theme of another large piece in the same series, Seven Dogs. As previously mentioned, we might consider both to be a single work. 


In contrast, Wander (Seven Dogs) lacks human traces, featuring only seven stray dogs scattered across a similarly styled grassland. The seven stray dogs, each in a different posture, are also outlined in white lines. The same unidentified white objects resembling flowers or spirits permeate the scene, making the stray dogs appear more fantastical, like sprites or seven shadows left behind by a wandering stray dog. If the two paintings are considered one work, the seven dogs here are followers of the dog in the middle of Wander, implying that the latter is not looking back at the viewer outside the painting but at the seven dog shadows in Wander (Seven Dogs). Therefore, what connects the two paintings is not physical space but the shadows and wind through which the artist moves back and forth.


Notably, in the upper right corner of Wander is a hazy yellow light spot reminiscent of moonlight partially obscured by clouds at night. Correspondingly, on the grass in the upper left corner of Wander (Seven Dogs), there is a circular red patch, which, unusually neat and flat, seems out of place among the surrounding flowers, grass, and hills. It looks like the sun but is not the sun. For the artist, it is an unidentified intruder, just like the stray dogs roaming the painting (including those pervasive little white sprites), which are also intruders here. Perhaps in the artist’s imagination, numerous invisible shadows of stray dogs and white sprites accompany his movements. At this moment, painting becomes a game of “catching wind and shadows,” and the studio turns into a wild field full of infinite potential. Painting is no longer something created but something that grows spontaneously.


In this process, the painter becomes an auxiliary role, resulting from the painting’s automatic growth. Xu Hongxiang never considers the canvas and frame merely material carriers of painting; he rarely prepares standard canvases and starts painting with just a layer of adhesive. The canvas is exposed everywhere in the paintings, acting as the ground. Additionally, Xu Hongxiang does not confine himself to conventional painting methods. Sometimes, he abandons brushes and smears paint with his hands or uses printmaking techniques and scraping to enhance the layers and primal quality of the painting. This embodied practice carries the essence of Pollock’s “action painting” and Kazuo Shiraga’s “foot painting,” but his aim is not to oppose painting but to bring it back to its origins as an active form of primal depiction. This suggests that the plants in the painting are not so much from the land depicted as they are spontaneously growing from the canvas. The artist reminds us that the conceptions and methods of his creation in this new series relate somewhat to his residency in Australia a year ago.




二

In October 2023, invited by the Lal Lal Estate Artist Residency Program in Australia, Xu Hongxiang and his family went to Melbourne for a three-month residency. During this period, he was completely captivated by the vast lands, mysterious lakes, and various strange natural phenomena, deeply immersing himself in them. He gained a more profound understanding of the relationships between humans and nature and between humans and animals. Of course, he pondered one question: What is the purpose of painting in such a living environment? What is left to paint if one is already living in a giant painting? 


Wildly growing plants became Xu’s most frequently depicted subjects during this time. He encountered many plants he had never seen before and was stunned by their bizarre forms. However, unlike an anthropologist who would document these as specimens, Xu was moved not by their basic attributes as objects of knowledge but by their external forms and exuberant, heterogeneous vitality. Here, he realized that plants are greater than humans, who are merely another species living among them. In works like Three Rocks (2023), Yulan (2023), On the Windowsill (2023), and March No. 1 (2023), he used symbolism to imbue plants and the land with a strong will to live. In other works, such as The Sun Has Nothing to Do with Middle-aged Men (2023), Under the Tree (2023), and Artist (2023), humans seem to have become part of the land. Poet (2023) depicts his son bending down curiously, staring at a cluster of plants. His son’s head is outlined as part of a hillside’s geological layers, with the stark contrast of his glowing red shirt and a similarly colored circular spot in the lower left corner. This spot later appears in Wander (Seven Dogs). This is an intruder for the artist, and similarly, the painter and his son are intruders to this land. However, the true intruders here are the British colonizers from over two hundred years ago. It is no coincidence that the red of the child’s shirt matches the color of the uniforms worn by the British colonizers at that time.

In fact, during the residency, Xu Hongxiang did not devote much time to painting. Aside from completing some small sketches, he spent most of his time exploring and “adventuring” with his 8-year-old son. Only after returning to his studio in Beijing did the visual impressions and bodily memories from that period begin to resurface and unfold. 

The diptych Look Up (2023–2024) depicts the backs of two people resting on lounge chairs, surrounded by lush vegetation, with a lake in front of them. We cannot see the faces of the figures; the artist concisely outlines their basic shapes. Apart from the heads and limbs rendered in flat colors, the lounge chairs are sketched with lines to suggest their shapes. Because the figures and the lounge chairs blend into the environment, it becomes difficult to distinguish between people, plants, and land. The overall composition of the painting seems to consist of several horizontal bands. Still, there is also a clear upward momentum: firstly, in the vertical direction of the vigorously growing plants, and secondly, in the upward-moving, earth-brown brushstrokes converging from the sides to the center, corresponding to the direction the figures face. Another noteworthy detail is the yellow circular area at the bottom of the painting, resembling a parasitic unidentified organism or an unnamed intruder. It might also serve as an index for the entire painting because I found a similar “index” work in the corner of the studio, annotated with various shades of green.


Correspondingly, there is the work Brothers (2023–2024). The yellow unidentified object as an intruder also appears in this piece. Although it is no longer a circular shape and looks like a substitute for the sky, it still stands out conspicuously in the entire painting. Aside from this, there are no other discordant elements. The painting depicts a mountainous landscape, with a small tree almost as tall as a person on the right and two young men standing side by side on the left, one tall and one short. By comparison, the figures are painted very thinly, directly using the technique of color printmaking to imprint them on the canvas, rooting them in the background land. Correspondingly, the small tree on the right resembles a standing person with its cloud-like leaves and uniquely shaped trunk. The ground is still covered with wildflowers, grasses, and "white sprites" flying around. Notably, the bluish-purple background of the painting could be a lake, distant mountains, or clouds, with two clusters of green brushstrokes in the middle. The direction and speed of these brushstrokes echo the folds of the T-shirt worn by one of the figures in the foreground, creating a sense of dynamic horizontal rotation as if trying to blow everything in the painting out of the frame or sweep the viewer into it.


Interestingly, this wind-like rotation transforms into a torrential downpour in Sparkle No.4 (2024). This is a diptych depicting a couple resting outdoors. The lower right corner of the painting is occupied by the back of a figure lying on the ground, while on the left is a large tree extending beyond the upper edge of the frame. The artist uses a thin layer of brown paint to render the texture and weight of the tree trunk, thereby shifting the focal point of the painting to the left. The figure’s contours on the right remain clear, but because the colors—light blue and flesh tones—match those of the water surface and distant mountains (including the scattered circular flesh-toned patches on the ground), the entire right half forms an organic whole. Balancing the entire composition then becomes a challenge for the artist. Xu Hongxiang employs a rather crude method, directly dripping a swath of orange paint onto the upper right part of the painting, resembling a torrential downpour or a forceful intrusion by an unknown entity. This aggressive or overwhelming approach maintains the painting’s balance and imbues it with a wild upward momentum. Simultaneously, its materiality and tactile quality continually escape the depicted objects, reminding us that this is ultimately still a painting. Of course, for Xu Hongxiang, this is less about the artist’s subjective will and more about the manifestation of the painting’s inherent dynamism.


Resting, wandering, and strolling are recurring themes in Xu Hongxiang’s recent works. However, the figures depicted are neither the detached urban flâneurs described by Benjamin nor the artist figure close to Baudelaire’s view—“The crowd is his element, as the air is that of birds and water of fishes. His passion and profession are to become one flesh with the crowd.” Instead, Xu Hongxiang’s figures escape to forests, lakesides, or hillsides outside the city. Nevertheless, they share with Baudelaire’s willingness to integrate into the collective and nature: “For the perfect flâneur, for the passionate spectator, it is an immense joy to set up house in the heart of the multitude, amid the ebb and flow of movement, amid the fugitive and the infinite.” Undoubtedly, the shock of intrusion and the surprise of capture continually draw Xu Hongxiang’s gaze to these marginal “mixed zones.”


In 2016, he executed an independent project titled Li Qiang in his hometown in Hunan. He painted a giant portrait of his childhood friend Li Qiang, 6 meters wide and 9 meters high, and placed it in a weedy wasteland opposite the Li family home. He and Li Qiang grew up together but led vastly different lives. Years later, they unexpectedly reunited, and despite the changes over time, Xu discovered an extraordinary resilience in Li Qiang. This inspired him to create a large portrait and place it in the wild. The artwork serves as a testament to Li Qiang’s life and their friendship and prompts the artist to reflect on the painting and its potential. For this wasteland (including his homeland and all of nature), painting is an aimless intruder, wanderer, or drifter. In the grand scheme of the world, aren’t humans the same?!




三

On June 8, 2024 afternoon, I visited Xu Hongxiang’s solo exhibition “Wander” at the Aurora Museum. Although I had seen most of the works in his studio, the exhibition space's long, irregularly shaped, double-layered white box presented a completely different visual experience. At that moment, with few visitors in the gallery, I had the opportunity to re-examine these familiar paintings quietly. The most noticeable difference was that each painting had its own independent light source, and the spacing between them was much greater than in the studio. Each painting appeared like a screen, showcasing various heterogeneous landscapes and scenes. 


I pondered how the narrative was constructed as I walked through the exhibition. Aside from the thematic connections between certain works and the chronological distinction in their creation, there seemed to be no information guiding the exhibition’s storyline. The montage effect, as was the artist’s shadow flitting between the works, was gone. Even when I reached the second floor, I still couldn’t complete a narrative. It wasn’t until the end of the exhibition, upon seeing the older painting Black Dogs in the Dark (2017) and the video Big Wild Dog (2019), that I realized if “Wander” is the explicit theme of the exhibition, it has a hidden theme — “Big Wild Dog.” Perhaps this is the true theme of the exhibition. Suddenly, a cold wind swept through, and the white dog shadows from the Wander series flickered before my eyes.


In the video, Xu Hongxiang narrates: “In the spring of 2019, after six years, my studio near Beijing’s Ring Railway faced demolition. After emptying it, I painted a black wild dog that often appeared at the studio’s door on the wall. A few days later, the black dog and the studio were torn down.” Facing the wall about to be demolished, Xu Hongxiang, holding a spray gun, quickly outlined the wild dog. Perhaps, tens of thousands of years ago, early humans similarly expressed their visions and fears, leading to those magnificent prehistoric cave paintings. The black paint splattered across the wall, with the spray gun’s violence echoing the wild dog’s ferocity. Unlike the prehistoric cave paintings, this was a temporary ritual that would soon vanish entirely. Xu Hongxiang truly depicted not only his emotions and memories of the place but also his personal fate, as homeless as the wild dog. In this context, the two paintings Living by Night (2023) are undoubtedly the best footnotes. In these paintings, the deep purple wild dogs and the similarly colored human figures create a subtle mirroring effect. They seem to be set against the background of the grassy field, yet they also appear to be pasted onto it. At the entrance to the video room hangs the painting of the wild dog from two years ago (Black Dogs in the Dark). The wild dog has lost its wildness in the painting, looking timidly at the viewer, perhaps just humbly begging for a bite to eat.


Over a decade ago, Fang Lijun remarked that artists “live like wild dogs.” Xu Hongxiang, having spent many years as a drifter in Beijing, resonates deeply with this sentiment, experiencing it even more acutely. However, while Fang Lijun chose to confront the societal torrent and its violence with powerful symbols, Xu Hongxiang abandoned such resistance. He had long realized that, whether as an artist or through his paintings, all one can do today is roam aimlessly and intrude recklessly, leaving everything to fate. As Fang Lijun often reflects, regardless of the outcome, “Every happy ending is a life’s tragedy, and every failure and pain also brings fullness to life.”