Do You Like This Form Of Art?

Hello Art and Artists Community. It really feels great to be able to post here again. I have only happy memories of those few times I posted here. I very seldom post mainly because I am not an artist. But I do appreciate art or what I think is good art. And when I see one, just like the one I am about to show you here, I go out of my way to post about it. I hope you will find this as interesting as I felt when I first saw this. So, here goes.

About two years ago, I met a Swiss national through my artist daughter. He wanted to sell some of his Chinese paintings which he began collecting since the early 1980's. Apparently, he had quite a good number in his collection. According to him, he likes these kind of paintings and collected them because they have a very calming and soothing effect on him whenever he looks at them. It's his stress reliever.

The photos below show one of the paintings in his collection he planned to sell. This was hand painted on rice paper, framed on silk cloth and mounted on a scroll so it can be hanged easily. This form of painting is called Zhōngguó huà or simply Guo Hua.

The photo below will give you an idea of the size of the painting. It's held up by the Swiss who stands about 1.78 meters tall or about 5'10".

For those not in the know (as I was also), here's what Wikipedia has to say about this traditional Chinese art form.

Chinese painting (simplified Chinese: 中国画; traditional Chinese: 中國畫; pinyin: Zhōngguó huà) is one of the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world. Painting in the traditional style is known today in Chinese as guó huà (simplified Chinese: 国画; traditional Chinese: 國畫), meaning "national painting" or "native painting", as opposed to Western styles of art which became popular in China in the 20th century. It is also called danqing (Chinese: 丹青; pinyin: dān qīng). Traditional painting involves essentially the same techniques as calligraphy and is done with a brush dipped in black ink or coloured pigments; oils are not used. As with calligraphy, the most popular materials on which paintings are made are paper and silk. The finished work can be mounted on scrolls, such as hanging scrolls or handscrolls. Traditional painting can also be done on album sheets, walls, lacquerware, folding screens, and other media. Wikipedia

I was informed that this art style was developed during the Tang Dynasty in the years 618 - 907.

Anyway, here are some of his collections which he has framed and hung in his home 2 years ago. These pictures below were taken by my daughter, @jacinta.sevilla for which she has given me permission to use. Thank you dear.

These paintings, according to this Swiss guy, are now quite difficult to procure in the open market, unlike during the time that he started collecting them. He thinks then that the Chinese government put a clamp on the sale of these heritage treasures. He did not plan on selling these when he bought them but the covid pandemic had put a strain on his finances so he is now forced to sell some of them. His opening bid per painting was US$1,000.

Well, that was more than 2 years ago and I have not checked on him if he was successful or not in disposing some of the paintings. I haven't actually talked to my daughter about it too. But now that I did this post, I will surely ask her and give you all a heads up about it, hopefully in another post.

And that's all. Thank you for your time and hospitality for the use of this community, @wakeupkitty.pal and @joslud. Stay safe and healthy everyone and may you all have a great and blessed day ahead.

(Unless otherwise specified, all photos are mine.)