Zhaoming Wu is a Chinese-born painter. Wu grew up in Guangzhou City, China. and he received his BFA from Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts and his MFA from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco, California.[1][2]
Contents |
Zhaoming Wu grew up during the Cultural Revolution. At the age of 8 the government closed the schools and he had to leave. He spent his days copying comic books and studying Chinese brush painting from a book. When he was 12,[2] his mother, a doctor, recognizing his talent asked a patient, a professor at Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, to train her son.[3]
Both an artist and a teacher, Wu served as a professor of painting at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts. He currently teaches painting at the Academy of Art University.
Wu lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Wu focuses on figurative work, using live models, mainly women draped in cloth, although his repertoire includes landscapes and portraits. The curves of the body and folds in cloth remind Wu of nature, such as mountains, water, and sunrise and sunset.[4] Wu's style is impressionistic and moody. It has evolved from initially painting "quickly and spontaneously" with exaggerated values and colors to growing more logical and conscious, according to Wu.[4] Art of the West magazine described his work as "nothing if not Western in style and theme," despite Wu's training in China.[5] This is also reflected in his choice of models.
Since 1983, Wu's work has been exhibited in Asia, Europe, and the United States. He has won awards including the Merit Award at the sixth National Art Exhibition, Beijing; the Gustafson Fund Award; the National Oil and Acrylic Painter's Society Award (United States); first place in the ninth Biennial National Figure Painting and Drawing Exhibition; second place in International Artist magazine Challenge No. 4 (Aug/Sept 2001); and the Daler-Rowney Award from the Oil Painters of America.[1][6]
Wu has released two book of his work.[7] His work has been published in International Artist Magazine (April/May 2003, August/September 2005), Art of the West (September/October 2004, July/August 2007), Art Talk Magazine (February 2005), and American Art Collector (January 2007).[6] Wu was featured in the DVD Solitude: In the Studio with Zhaoming Wu, released December 2007.[8][9]