Divine Light Series No. 59, The Floating Incomplete Circle

1998

Not on view

Returned to lender

This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.

A leading figure of “experimental ink” since the 1990s, Zhang has sought to bridge disparate artistic traditions across time and culture through mining the potential of the ink medium in nonfigurative work. In this monumental piece from Zhang’s Divine Light series, a giant circle surrounded by a radiant halo is suspended in a dark “sky” spangled with starlike dots of uninked paper. In the darkness above the sphere, the artist has impressed a single small seal that reads “Shiyu bi” (Brush of Shiyu)—Shiyu, or “stone rain,” being Zhang’s sobriquet. Dwarfed by the scale of the sphere, the red seal nonetheless declares man’s presence within this vast firmament, an allusion to the artist as creator.

Artwork Details

Overview

Provenance

Exhibition History

References

Title: Divine Light Series No. 59, The Floating Incomplete Circle
Artist: Zhang Yu (Chinese, born 1959)
Date: 1998
Culture: China
Medium: Ink on paper, framed
Dimensions: Image: 9 ft. 7 3/8 in. × 70 7/8 in. (293 × 180 cm)
Classification: Paintings
Credit Line: Lent by a private collection, Hong Kong
Curatorial Department: Asian Art