Hurlingham Fine Arts

Description

A very fine watercolour by Chinese artist and writer, Chiang Yee (1903-1977).Illustrated Plate 2, The Silent Traveller in London.

Chiang came to Britain in 1933, where he lived and worked until 1955. During this time he wrote a successful series of illustrated travelogues using the pen name 'Yaxingzhe' or 'Silent Traveller'. The books describe Chiang's life in London and Oxford during the turbulent years of the Second World War and record his travels to the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales, Edinburgh and Dublin. Illustrated throughout,with his own unique ink and watercolour paintings, sketches and poems, they represent a significant artistic, as well as literary project. Notably among the first Chinese writers to write books in English in the first half of the 20th century, Chiang enjoyed a prolific publishing career in Britain, in which he also published two seminal texts on Chinese painting and calligraphy, memoirs of his childhood in China, and several children's books.

Although very few Chinese artists came to study at London's art schools (preferring to study in Paris and Berlin) Chiang still received many distinguished artists as guests at his Hampstead home, including Xu Beihong (1895-1953) and Liu Haisu (1898-1994). When Xu visited London Chiang often accompanied him to museums and galleries.

Chiang's circle of friends and acquaintances included W.W.Winkworth,Laurence Binyon,Herbert Read,Roger Fry and George Eumorfopoulos. Keen to demonstrate his associations and encounters with London's intellectual and social elite Chiang made special mention of many of these relationships in his subsequent travelogues, often accompanied by portrait illustration.

Exhibitions: Victoria and Albert Museum, 23rd April to 9th November 2012. The Silent Traveller: Chiang Yee in Britain 1933-55

Literature: Professor Zheng,Da. Chiang Yee: The Silent Traveller from the East. New Brunswick, New Jersey, and London: Rutgers University Press,2010