Zhang Xiaotao

ZHANG XIAOTAO (Hechuan, China, 1970).
"The decayed of landscape", ca. 2007.
Oil on canvas.
Signed and titled on the back.
Measurements: 150 x 100 cm.

"The Decay of Landscape" is the title of a series of paintings by Zhang Xiaotao composed of dead birds, pieces of ripe fruit, insects and other elements that are difficult to distinguish because they appear to be in a state of putrefaction. What is striking in these paintings (like the one shown here) is that the Chinese artist imbues these emblems of decadence with an arcane beauty. Vanitas of decay and yet they are also sensually emotive metaphors with a subjugating existential charge.

The Chinese artist explains to the journalists and critics who interview him that his obsession with capturing decadent scenarios, thresholds between life and death, is rooted in a traumatic experience: he was seven years old when he almost drowned in the Yangtze River.

Zhang Xiaotao is one of China's most sought-after artists. His work "Condom Series" sold for $64,500 at Sotheby's Hong Kong in 2007.

Zhang Xiaotao is a Chinese painter based in Beijing and Chengdu. He graduated from the Department of Oil Painting at the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts in 1996. He then became a professor at Southwest Jiaotong University in Chengdu, a position he held from 1996 to 2009. In 2010, Xiaotao taught in the Department of New Media at the Sichuan Institute of Fine Arts. He now lives and works in Beijing and Chongqing. Zhang makes paintings with complex imagery, sometimes with sexual overtones, often involving small animals such as frogs and snakes, and incorporating images of decay and pollution.

Selection of exhibitions: 2007, Three Languages Three Colors, UM Gallery, Korea. 2006 Jiang Hu, Jack Tilton Gallery, New York, U.S.A. Unclear and Cleanness, Heyri Art Foundation, Korea. Beautiful Imbroglio, He Xiang Ning Art Museum, Shenzhen, China 2005 Dreamscapes, Foundation3, 14 Bergen, Norway. Dream Factory - Rubbish heap, Tokyo Gallery, Japan. 2nd Prague Biennial, Prague, National Gallery Veletrzni Palac, Prague, Czech Republic.
2nd Triennial of Chinese Arts, Nanjing Art Museum, Nanjing, China. 2004 Officinal Asia, Galleria d'Arte Modema, Bologna, Italy. New Perspectives in Chinese Painting, Marella arte contemporanea, Milan, Italy. 2003 Materialistic Decay, Gallery Akie Aricchi Art Contemporary, Paris, France.