Pang Xunqin, the Pioneer Who Reinvented Chinese Art

Few artists did more than Pang Xunqin (1906 - 1985) to imagine a China that could embrace modernity without losing sight of its cultural roots. A major exhibition brings together more than 400 works and archival materials, tracing the remarkable career of one of the most innovative figures in twentieth-century Chinese art. A painter, designer, scholar, and educator, Pang was among the first Chinese artists to engage with the European avant-garde during his years of study in France. Returning to China, he transformed that experience into a distinctive artistic vision, combining the language of modernism with an in-depth study of traditional Chinese decorative motifs. The exhibition explores this extraordinary legacy through paintings, design projects, documents, and archival materials, while also highlighting Pang's role as a founding figure of the Central Academy of Arts and Crafts, today the Academy of Arts & Design at Tsinghua University, the first higher education institution for art and design in the People's Republic of China. It reveals how Pang's vision of modernity was never about imitating the West, but about creating a new artistic language in which innovation and cultural identity could coexist.