The Art of Mu Xin

Book excerpt: Mu Xin (b. 1927) is one of the leading artist-intellectuals of the Chinesediaspora. Now living in New York City, he is known for his complex writings and paintings. A formidable figure in the cultural and intellectual history of Chinese modernism, Mu Xin is admired for his unique synthesis of Chinese and Western aesthetic sensibilities and intellectual traditions. This beautifully illustrated catalogue focuses on a group of thirty-three landscape paintings that Mu Xin painted between 1977 and 1979, in the immediate aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. Many of these works have never been exhibited or published in the West. In addition, the book features Mu Xin's Prison Notes, sixty-six sheets that were written when the artist was in solitary confinement in China in 1971-72. This catalogue will accompany an exhibition on view at the Yale University Art Gallery from October 2 to December 9, 2001. The exhibition will then travel to the David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art at the University of Chicago from January 24 through March 31, 2002, at the Honolulu Academy of Art from October 2 to December 1, 2002 and at the Asia Society in New York City. Other venues to be anounced.