Huang Zhou painting sets new auction record for artist

Gaiety on the Grassland, by Huang Zhou. Photo provided to China Daily

A large ink and color painting by noted artist Huang Zhou (1925-1997) fetched 128.8 million yuan ($21.14 million) Monday night in Beijing, smashing his previous auction record.

The painting, titled Gaiety on the Grassland, was made in 1981 and pictures a lively scene involving "wrestling on horseback," a traditional sporting event of the Kirgiz people in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

The work depicts seven women riders, nine dogs and more than 70 horses along a canvas that stretches 3.6 meters wide.

The painting stirred up a heated and long bidding race at the Beijing Poly International Auction Company's autumn auction. Zhao Xu, Poly Auction's chairman, revealed that the buyer is an entrepreneur from South China who collects modern Chinese and contemporary ink paintings.

"Huang Zhou's works had long been devalued by the market. This record-breaking work will give a boost to the prices of Huang's other top pieces," he said after the sale.

Huang was born in Hebei province and fled to Shaanxi province with his family after the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression (1937-1945) broke out.

He dropped out of school following the death of his father. He taught himself how to paint by sketching people from China's lower classes lower, and then later improved his style under the guidance of painters such as Han Leran and Zhao Wangyun.

Together with Zhao, he founded the Chang'an Painting School, an artists' group based in Xi'an, capital city of Shaanxi province, known as Chang'an in ancient times. The group rose to fame in the 1960's for painting magnificent landscapes of the Loess Plateau and detailing the life of farmers in Northwest China filled with earnest and deeply human concerns.

Huang is mostly known for his artistic depictions of ethnic people and donkeys.

He also started a fine art foundation which was named after him along with the Yanhuang Art Museum.

"I'm just a painter. Painting is my job, and the job is an important part of my life. That's what I only have to live on," he once said.