2021.53
Western Pass
Artist
Hung Liu
(Changchun, Jilin Province, China, Feb. 17, 1948 – 8/21/2021)
Title
Western Pass
Creation Date
1990
Century
20th century
Dimensions
60 x 60 x 10 in. (152.4 x 152.4 x 25.4 cm)
Classification
Paintings
Medium and Support
oil with silverleaf on wood, ceramics on canvas
Credit Line
Museum Purchase, Lloyd O. and Marjorie Strong Coulter Fund
Copyright
This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s
Copyright Terms and Conditions.
Accession Number
2021.53
Created in response to events of Tiananmen in 1989, Hung Liu offers a complex interpretation rooted in layers of history, politics, and language. The image derives from a photograph taken by a British botanist in 1900, depicting two Chinese prisoners awaiting execution during the Boxer Rebellion (1899–1901). Liu’s linseed-oil washes dissolve the realism of the image, while a Tang-dynasty poem by Wang Wei (699–761) humanizes the subjects and inserts them into a literati tradition, in which poets bid farewell to those setting out on a journey: “Wait till we empty one more cup [of wine] – West of Yang Gate there’ll be no old friends.” The porcelain bowls, offered like a commemorative gesture, further evoke a linguistic homophone—linxing as “awaiting execution (临刑)” and “on the eve of departure (临行).” As mundane objects likely purchased by Liu in San Francisco’s Chinatown, the bowls subtly reference the artist’s own diasporic background and compel us to consider the work’s many implications.
