Cameo painting Liu Mingwu

Liu Mingwu (1949-)

Liu Mingwu has been found great talent in arts since his childhood. He was able to draw without teacher’s instruction and won the first place in art contest when he studied in primary school at the age of six. In terms of art crafts, and wooden and stone sculptures, he has shown more outstanding ability than any other. He had taken apart of part of a house and a pig barn, and used the material to build a little house under a big tree outdoors.

Out of his great passion for arts, Liu Mingwu leamnt the world most difficult realm of art, Taiwan’s classic temple architecture. He became a student of the renowned master of temple building in Taiwan, Lin Wenhsien. He firstly learnt for the master’s son, Lin Dengchuan of “cut-and-paste art”.

Liu Mingwu met his wife, a daughter of a Christian family, in 1977. This has great influence on the rest of his life. He then has become an elder in the church and been invited to preach all year round because of his eloquence. In 1982, Liu Mingwu developed the Jiao Zhi pottery of temples to be art works. An incident happened when he exported them from Keelung Customs which caught media’s attention. The Customs withheld those he was going to export and accused him of trafficking national treasure. His works were then sent to National Palace Museum and they were identified as very important national treasure which should be prohibited exporting. Liu Mingwu had been very sincere as a Christian and ignored any attack or scolding. He neither fought back nor attack but praised his counterpart as his response. Finally, these organizations realized the fact and admired his tolerance, and gave him the title of ‘Living National Treasure” as the happy ending.

A blessing came in disguise. Liu Mingwu became more well-known because of this incident but he then encouraged himself to study harder. He travelled around the world with the supports from the church and has been even more cultivated in twenty years. He started trying to create. Firstly, he broke through the set pattern of art crafts and improved the traditional Jiao Zhi pottery to high-temperature jewel pottery, which earns him much positive response and acclaim. He has held many huge exhibitions in Taiwan’s museums, cultural centers, and Taipei City Art Museum. Many countries also invited him to preach along with exhibiting his works. These all keep earning him very good reputation. The President of Argentina praised him as “Eastern Michelangelo” and gave him an Honorary Doctorate Degree of Philosophy of Arts. He is also given the title of Mr. Formosa by the media of the U.S.

Chronology

Subtle Fragrance
2006
90×120 cm
Gam glaze

Lying asleep on a cozy chair in the aftemoon in late

autumn with mild sunshinc illuminating slantwisc

across the table.

The memory of decadcs cmerging in mind over tea.

Life, passion and poems are building up in silence.

Mother-In-Law
2007
Gam glaze
120×92 cm

The greatness of mother is similar to lake; it is gentle and beautiful in tranquility,

her moisture provides vitality to all beings and her tolerance is without is without constraint.

We used to be poor family and we had nothing in such humble house.

However I was fortunately to have a kind and lovely mother who loves her

children with her own life and she never r raised her vo volume to scold the children.

Water used to leak from our broken hut during rain season, the sun shun

h the holes les,forming oval circles of lights that looked like duck eggs. When

even it rained, Mother would ask us to get wok or metal cans to catch the watcr. Even

under such dilemma, my y mother still smiled and told us: “Don’t be depressed, child.

Our house is very special because the rain drops give us sunny duck Cgg.”

Beloved mother, you have sacrificed yourself to nurture our life.

Our family of Liu is able to cxpand our generati tion and we shall always keep you in mind.

I love you. Mother

through

The Past in Kyoto
2007
Gam glaze
120x165 cm

Remembering past memories

Recalling a rainbow over clouds

Campaign
2010
Gam glaze
120×240 cm

I never cared what was in fashion or what people pursued,

as it is only a passing trend. Inspiring artistic creation should

make people muse by demonstrating touching Beauty.

Either an aboriginal tattoo or an artistic painting should

express nothing other than pleasure and joy.

The earliest of the Koji pottery (created in 1977), the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl
1977
Koji pottery
28x12x26 cm

In 1982, the work was detained at Keelung Cuastoms along with the same batch of works,

and charged with theft of national treasures, shocking the world.

In the end, the work was identified by the National

Palace Museum as nati tional cu ultural treasure assets.

Koji pottery is a kind of modeling clay made in low temperature with sintering temperature

of 78o degrees

When this work was created, Liu, Ming-Wu was only in his twenties. At that time,

Koji pottery must imitate the ancient times as they were ordered by antique dealers

Life Is Like a Show
2012
Gam glaze
90×120 cm

Life is like a show, show is like life. No matter you came from

which rank such as emperor, king, duke, marquis, general, minister,

earl, viscount, baron, rich people, noble people, ordinary people,

mediocre people, pauper people, poor people, or humble people, in

lifetime you always play a role of Sheng, Dan, Jing, Mo, or Chou,

and you can not decide it at all, so what to care? Why to care?

It is heard that the Creator has his arrangement, and whatever the

role you play, in his script you are the protagonist.

San Francisco Bay

(Cameo painting from the early transition stage)
2003
Cameo painting
43×60 cm

In 1991, the European and American Art Society told me that your pottery

is beautiful, but retains a strong craft component. If you improve from

the aspect of painting, you can reach the highest level of art in the world.

Later, I spent more than ten years studying, even almost bankrupt. Finally,

with the help of a number of scientists, it was sintered successfully.

This work is a cameo painting in the process of transforming a stereoscopic

surface into a flat one.

Misty River of Love
2010
Gam glaze
72×90 cm

The meaning of looking at a painting can not only make beauty tangible

but also create a magic ambiance in one mind.

Foggy riverbanks at night are as beautiful as a poem including a

mystery beyond description.

I am a poet admiring truth, goodness and beauty.

I wish you a more virile life and that your desire lasts forever with this

painting.

The Fragile Craft Has Already Passed Countless Mountains
2011
Gam glaze
120×240 cm

My glazes were extracted from gem mines, and the secretformula of gem glazes is a result of painstaking R&D andtest through nineteen generations of founders.

And the texture and quality of the pottery painting burnedout with gem glazes is never the same as a general painting.If viewing with an illuminated high-expansion magnifying glass, it will bring you into another universe to feel the sorich colorful world, and the beauty of that realm is hard to imagine unless witnessed.

Cenesis
2012
Gam glaze
90×120 cm

Having painstakingly worked for fifty years, this is Liu Ming-Wu’s latest creation. The world’s most popular arts can be divided into two categories,one is Western oil painting, the other is Oriental pottery art; Liu Ming-Wu has integrated the two as one, that is, the pottery painting baked through using gem glaze, it neither belongs to oil painting nor pottery art.