融汇海棠花 2015

王新福 made this painting, 融汇海棠花, with thick swirls of bright oil paint. Can you imagine the artist building up the surface, one dab at a time, pushing the paint around with a brush or maybe a palette knife? I'm thinking that the artist was working quickly, trying to capture the fleeting beauty of the flowers, the way the light hits them, the way they seem to vibrate with life. This gesture over here, a thick stroke of yellow and white, it almost looks like the paint is still moving, still wet, even though it's dry. It reminds me of some of the abstract expressionists, like Joan Mitchell, who used color and gesture to express emotion. But it also reminds me of traditional Chinese landscape painting, which often focuses on capturing the essence of nature. Painting is a form of embodied expression which embraces ambiguity, allowing for multiple interpretations and a constant exchange of ideas across time.