Bathtub
Zhang Xiaogang
张晓刚
Production date
2017
Object Detail
Media
oil on canvas
Measurements
260 x 600 cm (triptych)
Notes
Zhang Xiaogang’s famous ‘Bloodline’ and ‘Big Family’ series of paintings introduced his Cynical Realist style to western audiences and collectors. Melancholy images based on Family photographs and disquieting memories of the suffering of the artist’s family during the Cultural Revolution, they generally featured small nuclear family groups staring bleakly out of the canvas, their gaze slightly clouded as if contemplating private miseries. His recent works, such as ‘Bath’ are far more ambiguous. Zhang says his oft-repeated image of the bathtub is because he sees it as a container, like the wooden boxes, beds or cupboards he likes to paint; they are ‘vessels to contain things like memories, emotions and other special items’. Here, though, the bathtub becomes a stage on which his characters are forced, seemingly unwillingly, to ‘perform’. Zhang does not explain the imagery in his allegories, but he says his paintings show a kind of black humour: ‘In this indoor show, everyone is performing’.
Accession number
2019.001