Zao Wou Ki, Untitled (Autumnal Hike), Undated

Original offset engraving printed on Velin BFK Rives®
20 x 15 cm each, unframed
Condition: Fair, with foxing throughout.

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Zao Wou-Ki (French-Chinese, b. 1920–2013) was a Chinese-born French painter who became one of the most prominent figures bridging Eastern and Western modern art. Born in Beijing and trained at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou, he moved to Paris in 1948, where he remained for most of his life. In France, he found his artistic freedom, gradually moving away from figuration to a more lyrical and abstract visual language. Zao became a French citizen in 1964, and his influence reached far beyond the canvas—he taught at the École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs and was elected to the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 2002.

Zao’s work is known for its deep sense of rhythm and motion, evoking landscapes, calligraphy, and cosmic energy without directly depicting any of them. Inspired by both Western abstract painters like Paul Klee and traditional Chinese ink painting, he developed a style that defied borders. His compositions often balance vast empty spaces with bursts of intense colour and dynamic brushwork, conjuring a sense of spatial vastness and emotional resonance. There is a strong undercurrent of poetry in his work, a visual form of meditation that transcends language.

Though he distanced himself from traditional representation, Zao’s art remains deeply rooted in his heritage. His works are visual dialogues—between cultures, between gesture and silence, and between the earthly and the infinite. His large-scale paintings, especially those from the 1950s to 1970s, are often seen as visual symphonies, rich in texture and luminosity. Through abstraction, Zao Wou-Ki captured a world that felt both ancient and contemporary, personal and universal.

“Everybody is bound by a tradition. I am bound by two,” the artist once reflected.

(Photographed in February 2025)