Luo Zheng's art is more,
much more, than a freak show
by Lisa Movius
If you only see one art exhibit in Shanghai this year, make
it the exhibition of Luo Zheng's works, opening Saturday and
running until 8 December at the Lu Xun Memorial Hall (100
Tian'ai Lu, Lu Xun Park, Hongkou District).
Luo Zheng is a
great artist. His abstract yet precise splashes of color
are sheer brilliance. Some paintings capture the essence of a
place--the Eiffel Tower, Venice --the Old Summer Palace
(Yuanmingyuan)-- and most express the subtleties of the
classical music pieces to which he listens as he paints, but
all are surprisingly poetic layers of thought and
emotion. Random color dabblings represent a popular
technique in contemporary art, and dozens if not hundreds of
China's modern artists practice this style. But where
they try, Luo Zheng does. Where they whisper, Luo Zheng
screams. Luo Zheng started painting seven years ago, at the
age of 27. Much is made of his lack of formal training
in or even significant exposure to art. Knowledge might
stand in for wisdom, and training for genuine talent, but why
lament the absence of the substitute in the presence of the
real thing? One suspects that training would if anything
reduce the spontaneity and energy that differentiate Luo
Zheng's works from others of the genre. Sadly, in art
there tends to be an inverse relationship between technique
and emotion. Bad artists paint with their hands,
mediocre artists paint with their heads, and great artists
paint with their hearts.
Public attention to Luo Zheng, however, has focused not on his
art or his talent but on the fact that he is, in the words of
many reporters, "an imbecile" and "a retard." Luo has Down's
Syndrome, a common genetic disorder that results in mild
retardation. In the modern West, individuals with Down's
Syndrome often lead relatively normal, integrated lives, but
in China, Down's Syndrome patients are, unfortunatel, often
regarded as "imbeciles" and "freaks". Luo Zheng has been
portrayed in some of the Chinese media as nothing much more
than a performing monkey.
Son of renowned composer Luo Zhongrong, Luo Zheng's mother
and sister are also classical musicians. Growing up in
an artistic and intellectual family explains Luo Zheng's
creative bent, and the music he was exposed to from an early
age provides the inspiration for much of his work. Many of his
paintings are named after the composer or work that inspired
them, and he is said to respond to music with very strong
emotions.
I think we can
spot the true imbeciles: the reporters and the public who fail
to see the forest for the trees, who can't see the art beyond
the "retard". Luo Zheng is a great artist whose success stems
from the fact that he paints from the heart. The only
relevance of his disability is that it has perhaps given him a
bigger heart than most. Perhaps he has the "mind of a
two-year-old," but I suspect he has a better understanding of
life, emotion, humanity, and, above all, art, than the
supposedly "normal" folk out there.
Lisa Movius is Listings Editor for ChinaNow.com
