Li Songsong: Excavating History Through Layers of Paint

3 hours ago7 min read

Li Songsong transforms the canvas into an archaeological site, using thick impasto not as paint but as stratified layers of cultural memory. The Beijing-based artist employs a labor-intensive technique, laying down heavy, broad strokes that build a tangible topography.This physical process is a deliberate act of veiling and unveiling, where sourced historical photographs—primarily from China's 20th century—are broken apart and submerged beneath the material. The outcome is a powerful dialogue between abstraction and representation, where a familiar public image is destabilized, compelling the viewer to become an active co-author of its meaning.The resulting surface, a complex symphony of texture and hue, evokes the ambiguity of a collective recollection or a weathered statue in a public square; the central event is discernible, yet its specifics are softened by time and individual interpretation. Songsong functions as an editor of history, isolating poignant fragments and magnifying them, thereby divorcing them from their original narrative to highlight their enduring emotional weight.His practice fundamentally questions the idea of a monolithic, objective past, suggesting instead that history is a personal assemblage of layered, incomplete shards. To encounter his large-scale work is to undertake a forensic examination.Your gaze travels across the painting's rugged terrain, probing the peaks and troughs of pigment for the spectral figure beneath, engaging in a visual archaeology not unlike deciphering the dense metaphors in a Tarkovsky film. In this artistic investigation, the paint itself is the central character—its palpable, almost aggressive presence insists that history is not a polished document, but a rough, corporeal, and profoundly human artifact.

#featured

#Li Songsong

#impasto painting

#abstract art

#contemporary artist

#art exhibition

#oil painting

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