喻仲林   Yu, Zhong-Lin   1925~1985

Zhong-Lin Yu, whose domicile of origin was Guan county, Shandong province, was born in 1925. His grandfather and uncle (a famous freehand Flowers-and-Birds painter of his time) were fascinated by calligraphy and painting. Growing up in an environment with a strong ambience of culture and art, Yu developed deep interests in Chinese calligraphy and painting, which led to his inclination for Flowers-and-Birds painting. In 1949, he moved to Taiwan with the Nationalist government and sat at the feet of Qin-Bo Jin, who enjoyed a reputation as “the best Flowers-and-Birds painter of the court painting style” in Taiwan’s calligraphy and painting communities. In 1956, he established “Lishui Atelier” with Jia-Qin Sun and Nian-Zu Hu, and won the “Jin Jue Award” (The Art Society Of China) and the 5th Zhongxing Literature and Art Award in 1975. Following in the footsteps of Qin-Bo Jin, Yu inherited the tradition of the court painting style and the Xuanhe style of the Song Dynasty, which helped him to lay a solid foundation for his claborate-style painting and his achievements in art. Zhong-Lin Yu’s career as a painter spanned more than 30 years. He made two assertions for the creation of art: 1. Paint more. 2. Paint with eye-catching themes and harmonious colors. His claborate-style Flowers-and-Birds paintings preserve the elegant and refined decorative effects of traditional claborate-style painting. The use of a water-and-ink rendering technique enabled Yu to demonstrate the richness and voluptuousness of multiple layers. Some people commented that his paintings were “splendid but not vulgar, meticulous but not rigid.” The delicacy and luxuriousness of the claborate-style and the floating elegance of literati ink painting are complementary. By employing the claborate-style as the form and the freehand style as the spirit, Yu succeeded in conveying his art concepts and achieved the peak of claborate-style painting.