A-Sun Wu

Biographical Data

Born in Taiwan in 1942. He lives and works in Paris and in Taipei. A-Sun Wu studies Fine Arts in Taipei (1965-1968) and, later, at the Academia Real de San Fernando in Madrid (1971-1973). From 1974 to 1990 he travels to every continent, immersing himself in the so-called “primitive” cultures and their representations of which he becomes an enthusiastic collector. He is considered the great master of Taiwanese painting.

Brief Chronology

After a first period during which A-Sun Wu works on very colorful paintings inspired in Goya and Spain, he begins making representations of urban life, streets, and New York’s skyscrapers. In 1979 “attracted by primitiveness and originality”, and after his first visit to South Africa, he begins creating landscapes in which he tries to represent “the sun and air’s light”, expression of his deepest feelings. From now on his source of inspiration will be the representations of “primitive civilizations” (from Amazonia, Africa, Papua Guinea, the Pacific Islands, etc.). Masks and totemic symbols, ideograms, Chinese calligraphy, archaic symbols, geometric motifs, animal hieroglyphics, and symbolic figures populate his canvases. He uses acrylic paint to work on solid wood or on tree barks; symbolic colors predominate: red (for life and energy), black (for power), and white (for peace). In 1995 he begins creating polychromous sculptures with recycled material or, when they become monumental, with carved tree trunks (Jungle métropolitaine series).

P.L.T.

Wu

Une mère apprend à son fils à lire, 2008, Acrylic on canvas, 91 x 116,5 cm / 35,8 x 45,8 in.