There is stillness everywhere if you know where to look. Dapeng Liu’s latest exhibition presents this immovable state in both painted abstract landscapes and recreations of split-second frames from popular films, news and the internet. Displayed side by side, from the disparate surfaces, something harmonious emerges.
“They have a different sense of stillness,” says the Sydney-based artist of his paintings. “I got a lot of feedback for my previous works from audiences—they can see calmness, peacefulness and stillness in there. I’m expanding this into a different realm.”
Born in Beijing, Liu takes inspiration from traditional Chinese landscape painting, adapting its shifting perspectives into his own work. The artist’s colourful landscapes depict mountains and water through this lens, often with translucent areas where the overlap creates a new shade. “I always mix geometric shapes, that I think belong to the human-made world, with natural shapes,” he says.
Stillness-juxtaposed takes subtle cues from traditional Chinese scroll paintings by presenting diametrically opposed images together—as the eyes scroll, the perspective changes. It represents a new mode of thinking for the artist. “I’ve started using more variations on colour and gradients,” he says. “I’m still using hard edges, but I want to bring the softness in.”
By referencing images from the news cycle, Liu invites viewers to slow down and take time to digest what they are seeing. “Because of the influx of information nowadays, a certain piece of news or information does not stay in people’s heads for too long,” he says. “I’m picking what I want to stay longer, and presenting it to the audience in a different form… Everything goes on so fast, but I think there’s important value to still images.”
Stillness-juxtaposed
Dapeng Liu
Art Atrium
21 October—4 November
This article was originally published in the September/October 2023 print edition of Art Guide Australia.
Suggested Reading
The ceramics of the Central Desert
Developed in 2022 by Artback NT as part of Apmere Mparntwe—the Australian Ceramics Triennale— touring exhibition Clay on Country, showing now at New England Regional Art Museum, showcases the diversity of ceramics in the Central Desert.
Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen
About Face mirrors the alluring world of contemporary portrait painting
About Face is a smart piece of marketing. The new book on portrait painting from Australia and New Zealand has a mission to change buyers’ minds about the field. But as Jane O’Sullivan discovers, any sales pitch wears thin if it’s repeated often enough, and the close attention to how portrait painting is received by the market means that other important conversations fade to the background.
Jane O'Sullivan
Elizabeth Mbitjana Pitijana and inherited influence
In Anmatyerr artist Elizabeth Mbitjana Pitijana’s first solo exhibition in Melbourne—which focuses on the Central Desert food source Arnwekety (bush plum)—the influence and love of her Country and culture is palpable. Elizabeth Mbitjana Pitijana is now showing at Niagara Galleries.
Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen
Vipoo Srivilasa on heritage and healing
Vipoo Srivilasa is a Melbourne-based, Thai-born Australian artist whose ceramic artworks emanate a sense of positivity, playfulness and joy. In an interview with fellow ceramicist Sassy Park, he discusses his early introduction to the medium, curating the Australian-Asian ceramic exhibition Generation Clay, and his upcoming project re/JOY.
Sassy Park
Dispatches from Tennant Creek
With their iconic painted poker machines and installations, notably featured in the 2020 Biennale of Sydney, the Tennant Creek Brio are now taking over Melbourne with a new show at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art.
Andrew Stephens
Archie Moore’s family ties
For Lardil and Yangkaal writer and curator Maya Hodge, Archie Moore’s presentation at this year’s Venice Biennale is a powerful symbol of reckoning—one that asks the world to bear witness to the long shadows of colonial violence and clears space for possibilities ahead.