Acquainting with Zou Tao was on freshmen enrollment day in the university. When queuing up to receive some freshmen’s stuff, he was standing behind me, I forget what we had talked, anyway after a few words we sort of knew each other. But what really drew my attention on him was a piece of his works in the exhibition of freshmen’s works. Back then was the start of university, while my passion for art was rising, yet I didn’t know how to create and even didn’t think about creating by myself, as if it’s far away from me. With a mind of spying on the levels of these students, I gave a hurried and cursory glance at these works, suddenly one work caught me, it was a picture of Margaret Olley’s, but different, the original image was a broken window with two red curtains, outside which there’s some distant scenery, shattered glass scattering around. In this picture, however, there was an additional figure, Chairman Mao was standing beside the window. It was very interesting, instantly caught my attention, showing a mature temperament beyond our age, although he was one of our peers then.
What’s unforgettable about this work was the sense of humour inside, it was simple but impressed straightforward, I imperceptibly watched for a long time, I didn’t realize it was Zou’s work until I saw the name. Since then the figure of Zou Tao immediately became high and noble in my heart, although he is much higher than me firstly. This is why I couldn’t understand why such a tall and rough guy painted such a work, you can never judge people by their appearance. This was the first time I was touched by his work.
We were in the same department in the university, but different majors. We didn’t communicate much for quite a while afterwards, because I still didn’t figure out a way to start creation. Just like this, I had groped for more than a year, drawing a clutter of messy works. Once when I was idling around online, I accidentally saw a series of works, god forbidden, it really shocked me that these were Zou’s works, so terrific. Fused with a kind of melancholy, absurd yet humourous unique atmosphere, the figures in his images included a female teacher standing in front of the blackboard pointing to the catalog of human organs, a drooling silly boy wearing sweater vest with glazed eyes, a middle-aged man with a green nose wearing a Chinese tunic suit grabbing a dead rat, a double-headed kid standing in front of mottled broken wall holding an enamel mug, and a small train that consisted of a row of kids with blurred eyes sitting on the bench as well. I was dazzled by these works then, and deeply attracted to them. Especially the approach he handled mottled wooden floors and smudgy walls had a powerful influence on me. That kind of image with narrative structure in a simple space let me understand a lot of basic forms in artworks at that time. I at once felt I should paint a batch of works. This was the second time I was touched by this guy’s works.
Since then, we frequently found some time for ouselves to exchange ideas about artistic creation while drinking, chatting and nibbling chicken frames. We were the only two people that practiced some creative act besides the peers in Oil Painting Department, so naturally we often hung out together. Back then mostly of Zou’s works were narrative – based, as his mind is a very rich world. Colours and characters presented on canvas colours and characters show a quality of black humour, his works seem simple and rough but all the details are manifested through a relaxing pattern, colours combined with fantasy and reality build a artistic world, which is a unique temperament and painting language. Zou’s works mostly come from the closest minutiae in his life, which combined with the fantasy world in his imagination are converted into an aesthetic sense almost bizarre world through his expression. In his works, I always perceive a sense of humour about his helplessness and satires on real-life. Although many of his works reveal his evil taste, this kind of taste however seems particularly lovely and mysterious in his expression. He can create a feces-producing factory, all the details of which is portrayed nuanced. Some workers and researchers in this factory even are animals, which are studying fresh dung just made out in all seriousness, this kind of evil taste and sense of humour in his blood fascinates me most.
I don 't know which artists Zou Tao likes and what literature and art works influenced him, but I can imagine what fascinated him should be something greatly polarized, so he has such bold yet friendly imaginations.
As I came to Beijing after graduation, he stayed in Shenyang. I know he has been exerting himself in painting, but in Beijing I rarely have the opportunity to see his new works, until he passed me his new works on the Internet a while ago. This time I was touched once again. A whole new form of expression appears in his pictures, still so crude yet refined. The composition of the entire image is no longer stick to a particular scene, but in a screen nearly flat. The character is still his features, becoming more exaggerated, more concise and more characteristic. Floating banners appear in the pictures from time to time, the banners are painted with English words which probably are the names of the works, that style has an old-fashioned aesthetic sense for illustration design and a style intertwining antiquity, modern and even future. What I really like about is the modeling of figures in Zou’s new works, I had never before seen such modeling, and I don’t know from where he was inspired to combined a pile of bones into a shape I 've never seen before. The styling of humans and animals are also very characteristic, curved lines of all the characters are natural and smooth, as a result, the actions of the characters is very soft and elegant but without losing intensity. His fascination with the narrative seems more intense, montage narrative effect in a simple image is achieved through different objects in close and distant view. Zou fuses several major hues from different periods, instead of one primary color for each series, which makes the emotions of new works more abundant and more intuitive. Although what Zou focuses still revolves around the minutiae in his eyes, but his image reveal a sense of nostalgia of Europe at the end of 19th century. That’s when you can no longer sense evil taste in his picture, but a little more unrestrained elegance. This is the third time Zou’s works charmed me.
Having known Zou Tao for almost eight years, his works keep giving me new feelings and affections, and I believe he can still continue to touch me in the future. Now we have unwittingly been walking on the road of art, maybe this road is doomed to be a long long way, but we are still blessed as we can constantly be moved by art.
Liu Guangguang
Feburary 2014,Beijing
