Artwork Description
Hung Liu – Battlefield
Dimensions: 32 x 29 1/2 paper / 23 1/4 x 23 1/4 plate
Year: 2012
Medium: woodcut with acrylic ink
Edition: TP 2/3, ed 25
Hung Liu became widely known in the United States for her paintings of Chinese workers and concubines, whom she encountered while she worked along side them in the fields of the Chinese countryside during the years she was being “re-educated” via the Cultural Revolution. Hung Liu follows the Chinese cultural tradition of “calling spirits home” after death. Liu feels that lest these workers and concubines be forgotten and their spirits never “called home,” she should prepare a place for them to rest for eternity. Thus, she creates gorgeous, quasi-imperial homes for them in her paintings.