News

The Art Museum has been honoured to receive two major donations: one from the family of Lui Shou-kwan, acclaimed Hong Kong artist of the twentieth century, for 28 of Lui's paintings, and another from the 2014 global Art Conservation Project funded by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The media briefing was held on 29 January 2015 at the Art Museum. The monetary donation will be used to conserve the masterpieces.

Lui Shou-kwan (1919–75), one of the representative figures in the modern history of Hong Kong art, was a leading advocate of the new ink painting movement from the 1960s to the 1970s. He was recognised for blending Western abstract art with traditional Chinese painting, and striving to revitalise Chinese ink painting.

In 2013, the Art Museum, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), joined forces with the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford University, for the exhibition 'Two masters, two generations and one vision for modern Chinese painting'. This popular exhibition led to a donation of two paintings by Lui Shou-kwan from the Friends of the Art Museum in March 2014. This time, Lui's family has shown incredible generosity by donating 28 of his works. The Art Museum is honoured to be entrusted with these important paintings by the artist's family.

Created between 1967 and 1972, most of the works donated by Lui's family are exemplary paintings that he painstakingly prepared for his students on the ink painting course in the Department of Extramural Studies, CUHK. It is especially meaningful that the university will be the paintings' long-term custodian. Professor Joseph Sung, Vice-Chancellor of CUHK, notes that 'It is important to point out that CUHK can preserve this body of works for many generations to come'. This group of paintings not only attests to Lui's profound understanding of the Chinese tradition, it also constitutes primary research data that offer new insights into Lui's artistic practice.

Thanks to Bank of America Merrill Lynch's global Art Conservation Project, a generous donation has been made to the Art Museum, CUHK, for the restoration of Lui Shou-kwan's paintings. This enables their long-term preservation. The works will be put on display in a special exhibition in 2016, on completion of the conservation project.

(Source: Institute of Chinese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong)