C.C. Wang, Chinese-American Artist/Collector
Bill Schenley
C.C. Wang, a Chinese-American artist and collector,
who sold important and sometimes controversial
examples of classical Chinese painting to many
American museums and who was viewed by admirers
as the last in a centuries-old line of Chinese
scholar-artists, died on Thursday in Manhattan. He
was 96 and lived in Manhattan.
Mr. Wang (pronounced wong) was born Wang Jiqian
near Suzhou in 1907. In his teens he began developing
the interrelated skills of painting, collecting and selling
traditionally associated with the Chinese art expert. In
his view, knowledge of classical Chinese painting was
most successfully shaped through a personal mastery
of painting techniques, particularly the use of brush and
ink.
After studying both law and painting in Shanghai, Mr.
Wang decided to devote himself to art. In 1936 he was
asked to be an adviser to the committee organizing the
ground-breaking London exhibition of art from the
Palace Museum in Beijing. This allowed him to examine
all the paintings in the imperial collection, something no
private citizen had ever done. "Not yet 30 years old,"
Arnold Chang wrote in 1997, "Wang Jiqian had already
studied more important Chinese paintings than virtually
anyone alive."
In 1949, to escape the political chaos of postwar China, he
moved to the United States. Settling in Manhattan, he
took courses at the Art Students League and, deeply
influenced by Abstract Expressionism, began to work in a
highly colored abstract mode derived, in part, on
calligraphic forms.
In New York he supported his family by teaching, consulting
at Sotheby's, dealing in real estate and collecting and selling
art. In 1973 the Metropolitan Museum of Art bought 25 Song
and Yuan paintings from him and eventually acquired some
60 works, including the colossal hanging scroll "Riverbank."
Although the Met attributed the painting to the 10th-century
painter Dong Yuan, some scholars dismissed it as modern
fabrication.
He is survived by a son, S. K. Wang, and two daughters,
Hsien-chen Wang Chang and Yien-koo Wang King, all of New
York City, and 11 grandchildren.
His own art, which has made him a cultural hero in China, was
included in numerous museum exhibitions. A show titled
"Mind Landscapes: The Paintings of C. C. Wang," was
organized by Jerome Silbergeld for the Henry Art Gallery in
Seattle in 1989.
Mr. Wang viewed a life in art as a total-immersion experience,
with varied but intertwined rewards. He wanted to be
remembered above all as an artist.
Although he rarely spoke publicly about his work, what he said
of the 14th-century scholar-painter in exile Ni Zan, he might
have said of himself: "He does not have an elaborate story to
tell, but mainly wants to express his thoughts and feelings."
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More on C.C. Wang:
http://www.echinaart.com/Advisor/adv_ccwang_intro.htm
http://antiquesandthearts.com/archive/wang.htm