The Changes Of Famers’ Image In Chinese Contemporary Oil Painting

Arts are the products of time, as well as the products of history. The image of farmers is the most significant subjects in the hundred years of the development of Chinese oil painting. Oil painting artists in different historical periods pay close attention to farmers under diverse historical circumstances and create an oil painting scroll that reproduces the live of Chinese peasants over hundred years and vivid image of peasants which represent the changes over time. Nowadays, drastic changes occurred among the social structure of Chinese rural areas and the survival conditions of farmer. This stimulates the rapid division among peasants; furthermore, some brand new features and indications appear which in turn make oil painting works focus on contemporary peasants make progress in terms of the richness of information and the deepness of emotion. Therefore, it also demonstrates the concept of creation which goes that "arts not only are derived from life, but also exceed life. Art creators tend to extract artistic materials that they themselves consider to be valuable with their personal inclination, make their work more intense through processing, refining, and exaggerating those materials. At present, the actual progress of population division among farmers is complicated. The image of certain group is familiar to us, and is vividly presented by oil painting artists. Meanwhile, there are still more images of peasants that we should pay attention to; for example, new generation of migrant workers, left-behind people in the rural areas, and rural elite farmers. There are already some oil paintings artists explore in those fields which opened a new era for the representation of new image of farmer. I created eleven images of peasants in my work for graduation creation in which I focused on presenting the image of a rural elite farmer who became rich first due to his trade in oyster acquisition, and the confidence, calmness, relaxation, and comfort presented by other farmers who devoted themselves to the countryside and cultural development.