Universe in the Mind 宇宙心印

Liu Guosong is widely recognized as a pioneer of the modern ink painting movement. The experience of growing up in enforced and self-imposed exile during a tumultuous period in China’s history affected Liu deeply and may have driven him to seek a new language of art that could reconcile the worlds of tradition and modernity. By the 1960s in Taiwan, Liu had developed the bold and powerful vocabulary upon which his unique art would be based, one that drew on Chinese ink painting, and the abstract and conceptual art of America. As for his works from the 1960s to the current decade, Liu developed the abstract potential of ink painting, using experimental techniques and materials to modify the effects that can be achieved with ink and colour. Often suggesting landscape and cosmos, Liu’s works are bold, innovative compositions that depict a parallel universe in which the elemental forces of nature run wild.

劉國松獲譽為現代水墨運動的先鋒。劉國松成長的年代是中國的動盪時期，他從年幼至成長到處流徙，這些經歷對他影響至深，促使他追求嶄新的藝術表現手法，協調傳統與現代的不同規範。到了六十年代，劉國松在台灣已發展獨特的雄渾藝術風格，既有中國水墨的韻味，亦具美國藝術的抽象和概念形式。至於六十年代以至近十年的作品，劉國松嘗試以嶄新技巧和素材去改造傳統水墨和顏色所形成的效果，發揮水墨畫的抽象潛能。這些作品多以風景和宇宙為題材，構圖大膽創新，呈現宇宙各自然力量運行的境界。