As I made my way to John McLean’s home in London last December, I was curious to know what kind of painter could devote himself to abstract painting for 50 years. The evening air was chilly, the wind biting. I arrived at McLean’s home and after some small talk our conversation moved to his life in painting. He began to make abstract art in the 1960s, since when he has never laid down his brushes. We met again the next day in his East London studio, part of a four-storey converted warehouse where two dozen artists now occupy space. McLean’s secondfloor studio has a view of the Thames slowly flowing past. His studio only covers 20 or so square metres, but a communal area on the same floor offers joint storage racks for each artist, and this is where most of McLean’s work rests. In this small space, somewhat off the beaten track, McLean has painted for decades. No bustle, no noise, just the constant rolling of the Thames beyond the window pane.
McLean was strongly influenced by his father, who painted abstract art only in later life; the son came to abstract painting at a much younger age. Clement Greenberg wrote about his work after seeing it in the early 70s in London. McLean was highly regarded in the transatlantic world from the 1970s, in the US, Canada and Britain. Besides Greenberg, he has been admired by major critics such as the great Cubist scholar Christopher Green and important figures such as MOMA’s former chief curator of painting, John Elderfield. An encounter with McLean inevitably leads one to reflect on the question of abstract painting in China.
Even if abstract art has become more of a trend in China in recent years, frequently exhibited and discussed, it was only in the 1980s that it began to regain attention and advocates, after China ended its international isolation. Before that, art in China was dominated by realism, which remains the dominant form to this day. This is due in part to traditional fine arts education, which passes over abstract art in the modern era, but also to the prevailing view that abstract art, when practised in China, is something alien, a mere imitation of Western abstractionism. A more trenchant critique argues that abstract painting is a modernist form and as such is outdated and not“ contemporary art”. These factors continue to consign abstract art to a niche audience at the margins. The small amount of abstract art that does emanate from China is frequently subjected to public musings on how it ought to be “sinicised” – a“ Chinese abstract art”, imbued with a stronger cultural identity.
The lesson McLean’s oeuvre has for us here is that, in formal and semiotic terms, abstract art is a universal currency. It has practitioners in every land, and theirs is a personal, not national or ethnic, creation. Yes, different national, cultural and aesthetic traditions do push abstract painting in different directions – some prefer bold colours, others monochrome, or variations of geometric form – but overall, abstract painting is a highly recognised form internationally. Viewers experience the work as that of an individual, rather than abstract painting with certain national features or classed in terms of national cultures.
Abstract painting as McLean practises it is an exploration of three-dimensional space. His studio is filled with models large and small through which he observes and explores space and the relation of points, lines, planes and colours; this gives him his special artistic voice. His rich fields of colour are simple and lively; their structural edges appear straight and robust but are infused with feeling and expression. His works radiate warmth, elegance, frankness and concision. McLean has always been at pains to emphasise that his painting is a product of his own life experiences. He seeks his own distinctive abstract form; his compositional geometry differs from Mondrian’s cool abstract composition and Sean Scully’s grids and blocks. McLean’s deceptively simple shapes give voice to the tides and currents of his inner psyche, to a state of mind that draws on decades of experience. The serenity of McLean’s approach is the source of his artistic gravitas as he achieves a deft synthesis of artistic experience and rationality. These are the grounds for his recognition in the West as a master colourist.
Another lesson McLean holds for us is not to be intimidated by“ contemporary art” or to be discouraged by those who say modernist art is passé or at its end. The evergreen tree of art will always have individual practitioners who continue to prove that their art is alive, and who refuse to be hobbled by what the theorists declare. Contemporary art has space for the experimental, it has space for explorations of any form. Abstract painting remains a living and breathing art form thanks to the energy of the individuals who choose it; it is taken forward by the sheer force of their will. It can and does dare to be different. It is necessary only that abstract art has personality, not to prove there is a need for it. You cannot employ the terms of one discourse system to negate another. Abstract artists in China should hold their heads high in the face of such attitudes.
This revelatory exhibition of John McLean serves to shed light on the practice of abstract painting in China today – which is in no way to be seen as behind the curve. The distinctiveness of abstract painting is that of painters as individuals, not of the country they happen to come from. The more personality an abstract creation has, the more it has universal value; convergence and imitation are the enemy. John McLean’s coming to China reminds us that the abstract is a worthy artistic endeavour for a lifetime; unfettered by all fear of modernism and modern art, you achieve incalculable freedom. Only when freed from all superficial pronouncements can we approach final artistic truth. The special significance of the abstract in China guarantees its continuing relevance. It also shows the range of possibilities offered by this genre, if we can mentally accommodate such possibilities. Chinese abstract art could do with more scientific, rigorous, and rational pursuits; it still falls far short in this respect. Some expression is too superficial to be termed abstract.
For his lifetime pursuit of abstract exploration and practice, John McLean deserves our respect, both for his personal charisma and for his artistic dignity.
Dr Wang Chunchen is the Chief Curator of the Department of Curatorial Research of CAFA Art Museum, Beijing. In 2009 he was honoured with the coveted Chinese Contemporary Art Award and has received numerous other awards for his art criticism. He was the Curator of the Chinese Pavilion at the 55th Venice Bienniale.
