The Essence of Li Jikai’s Image [Art of Post-1970s]

Li Jikai’s art presents an allegoric condition, in which his own generation rapidly declines from Idealism of earlier time. He also contributes a genuine form of painting that belongs to this generation. As a representative artist of art of the post-’70s, he is also one of the main activists of oil paintings in Cartoon Style.

If compare to the cruel visual effect and the anxious psychological motifs of early works by post-’70s generation, Li Jikai’s work is quiet and full of meditation. This can be regarded as an ontological transformation of the expression of the art of post-’70s from the sentimentalism of youth, or cruelty of youth imagery. Li Jikai takes the painting of post-‘70s to the in-depth revelation of the internal condition and nature of self, and forms a self-expression for such nature which is unique for his generation.

The earlier stage of the post-’70s paintings was the Cruelty of Youth group of painters which could be represented by several artists such as Yin Chaoyang. This phase initiated the way of expression based on imagery of the artists himself and allegoric narration of the conditions of this generation of post-’70s. However, in terms of themes and the subjectivity, it focuses mainly on revealing the pain and anxiety of this generation on a psychological level, as well as the state being absent of the self due to the diminishing Faramita and a certain sense of social responsibilities. Such rough outline of the distinguish characteristics between generations was undoubtedly a milestone.     

However, the Cruelty of Youth paintings didn’t go much beyond, not yet really reaching a level of self-analysis, whereas Li Jikai achieved this more or less around 2004. He replaced the photographic imagery of Cruelty of Youth paintings with cartoon style imagery. This enabled the post-’70s paintings to find a truly unique vocabulary for the presence of their essence.   

Li Jikai’s painting goes beyond the photographic and psychological expressionistic approach for the façade of the youth, and then gets to a level of exhaustive self-investigation. His painting A Child Contemplating from the Height is the landmark interpretation. This is such symbolic portraiture for this generation, they being in the middle of transformation from being Idealistic to more contemplating. Works by Yin Chaoyang and several other painters from the Youth group were more statement of a kind of post-Idealistic era, in which, boys under the sun feel the anxiety and contradiction because of the absence of Idealism and Faramita. It seems they’ve lost the past but the future hasn’t yet really been built.    

However, the unique characteristics of post-’70s generation were expressed straightforwardly here. He touches upon the theme from daydreams, meditation, and their jitter, to rival with some concrete issues so as to get closer. This down-to-earth journey from daily ideal to self-realization enables Li Jikai captures the nature of none-idealism of generation, and finished the self-portraiture of imagery.   

Li Jikai’s A Child Contemplating from the Height stands at a height at all allegorical and imaginative level, be it giant mushrooms, tall wooden stakes for Kongfu masters in former time or Buddhist penances, pillars built with big toy bricks, etc. These various styles of pillars, with strong fairy-tale-like color, are a highly instable dynamic scenario. Such image conveys an illusive state of mind with vulnerable sense of balance and daydreaming. The child from height doesn’t feel the danger of falling, but rather keeps meditating just like a Zen master or an old man, who cares solely about his own inner world not the ideal the outside world. Despite the fact this series of works are usually not big in size, such absolute self-meditation and the ignorance of danger of falling makes Li Jikai’s painting visually very powerful.       

Li Jikai’s work is no longer expressions for passion like the several generations earlier. Such passionate expression could be still found in Cruelty of Youth group. However, what Li Jikai tries to convey is a kind sticky personal feeling of his generation. He reveals the condition of this generation who perceive themselves from high, a fictitious height solely in self-imagination, a kind of self-awareness that could be only found either in daydreaming or in the state of meditation. Such awareness didn’t emerge until the visual approach of the art of post-’70s. Cruelty of Youth paintings reincarnate the sentimental visual style from Scar Paintings group since the end of the 1970s, which was later interrupted for a period of time. It plays a role in the transition from contemporary painting to post-’70s style.  The work from Cruelty of Youth group started to test on picturing such inter-generation characteristics, while the level of imagery still stayed within the phase of outline of themselves, not yet forming a unique individual style in their expression.

The individual symptoms of post-’70s are then completed by Li Jikai and a few other artists. Through his painting, Li Jikai successfully accomplished these two tasks: at one level, he sets up a bottom-line for the state of minimized ‘meaning’; at the second level, he finds his own personal forms that matches the images and his own characters for this status. The minimized sense of meaning mainly refers to the expression of mini-pain that is distinctive for the post-’70s group, and the images for a new generation in a materialized society. The majority of Li Jikai’s work conveys such mini-pain, which is neither happy nor unhappy, but rather status such as depression, disgust, daze and languish. They are not at all showing the overwhelming sense of pain as in the works of several generations before, who were driven by Faramita, by Idealism and a sense of obligation among intellectuals. At this level, Li Jikai and several other artists not only accurately grasp the spiritual feature of such mini-pain, but also found suitable forms to express such post-’70s experience. The image of the boys in Li Jikai’s work tends to look delicate, sensitive, nervous, indulging, self-playing and contemplating, which reflects the sense of void and floating of spirit of the post-’70s, and the new image of this new generation who grow in a materialized society. Images as such have never appeared in the generations before them.

There is a trying process of the image of the boys in Li Jikai’s work. It was a boy who could fly like a meteor as Firefly (2000); later in Dust (2001), it was a boy who was closer to a pure form with vague outline of images; since By the Side of Happiness (2002), a boy with closed eyes appears, as well as the subject matter like indulgence, meditation and daydreams. In Daydreaming (2003) it begins to have an image of a super-man who has rabbit ears and tails.  After almost five years experiment, the image of the boy in Li Jikai’s work finally returns to more realistic forms, but with more subtle and delicate facial expression and the state of himself. Gradually, the characters of the post-’70s start to emerge above the surface.

During the painting practices on the symptoms of the post-’70s, the features, attitudes and meanings of the images are one of his main lines, while the other one is the experiment on the language of forms. Apart from cartoon figures, he has also tries graffiti painting and abstract lines in Expressionistic style. His experiments on both imagery and forms finally converge to one main line of individual forms. Li Jikai’s work is neither a sheer experimentation for forms or concepts, nor realistic or surrealistic expressions, although he did try along with both these two potentials.   

Since the end of 1990s, Li Jikai tried, for a period of time, purely formalistic brushwork and composition, but very soon he turned to form an imaginative images of himself. In the series of By the Side of Happiness (2002), he painted a few boys shouting and singing as emotional abreactions, but most of them are in the state of meditation and depression. Although this series adopted cartoon forms, they are more close to realistic image and status. Nonetheless, By the Side of Happiness makes Li Jikai marching into a cartoon-style with imagery of self-portrait. His earlier brush-stroke work now merges into such cartoon style. The nature of cartoon in lines, color and forms truly helps to match the character of post-’70s, such as kawaii, mini-pain, and self-centralism. From Scar Painting, Cenozoic School, to Cruelty of Youth group, the expression of inter-generation characters has been represented mainly through the realistic depictions of self-portrait and formalistic expression of oneself only start from the Cartoon paintings since Li Jikai and a few others.  

By the Side of Happiness accomplished a fundamental transformation of his individual style, after which Li Jikai has had hyper-productive time recent two years around 2005. He painted A Clearance Day, Wait for Time to Pass, Sharp Blade, Turbulence, Vomit Day, On the Height. After the combination of forms and symptom of himself, his works approaches a more profound self-state and subtler allegorical realm.

In Sharp Blade, it manifests the kawaii but extreme nervous self-crankiness of this generation. In Turbulence, the boy is punting against the riptide with a red flag. Vomit Day and Clearance Day depict the self-struggling from more physical side of body. Wait for Time to Pass and On the Height show the contrast between the actual sense of insecurity in the sky and the kawaii imperturbation of the boy. Li Jikai’s images convey strong sense of stickiness and awkwardness. They all seem to have a desire for ascending, but not in the sense of idealism or sublime. They might be confronting with the reality in their heart, but such confrontation is not at all a conflict when facing a gigantic structure or resistance against it, but more entangling with a few concrete matters, which stand in their way of freedom.   

Which is different from most of cartoon style painting, which tends to be solely at the level of kaswaiiness in forms and expression, Li Jikai’s work explores the dilemma of his own and salvation of the post-’70s. The origin of the painful feeling of the boys in Li Jikai’s work due to be restraint within a tiny psychological space between two poles of happiness and sadness. This is so-called mini-pain or stickiness, a pain which is not painful. Here is a transformation of situation and individual characteristics that belong to his time, from idealistic to meditation, from being insightful to kawaii, from resistance to daydreaming, from extreme to stickiness, from Sublime to clime to the height. These are all the transformation of the entire post-’70s group of artists.

In the painting, Li Jikai’s boy couldn’t help the helpless game that resembles meditation and daydreaming. He doesn’t intend to confront with the outside world, and would rather pursuit the sense of transcendence from inner world or even from rootless height. It seems he gradually indulges to be accompanied with these delicate and sticky status. Within manageable small range of psychological space, he establishes a kind of intimacy between all fragments and meaningless objects within this cramped inner space, and ontological being as well as its aesthetic meanings with transcendental nature.     

Just at this point, Li Jikai’s art records the internal pilgrim of spirit of the post-’70s artists. He represents an inner status of the essence of one’s own of this entire generation.

May 26th, 2006, Beijing