Pang Tseng Ying

Tseng-Ying’s maturation as an artist coincided with the realization that ‘western style’ painting fitted him uncomfortably like a suit sewn for someone else. To find his own pattern, it was necessary to travel backwards in time to the art of his ancestors and look to the present. This introspective journey led to a vantage point where cultural memory served the 20th century man in his search for identity. Now Pang was ready to face the difficult task of learning to let his hand do what his heart dictated.

What finally emerged on the rice paper which replaced the less felicitous canvas were exultant, bounding staccato images which leap off the brush as readily as the calligraphic strokes taught him in childhood by his artist- mother. Calligraphy is also seen in the delicate traceries woven in and out of sweeping color galaxies. Pang prepares the paper he uses with meticulous care to enable it to receive the colors applied again and again until the emotional demands of the painting are satisfied. Deep, muted colors have the rich complexities of embroidered silks in some pictures; in others, the spacial quality of Chinese landscapes painted on scrolls is felt in the floating, weightless forms.

Pang has found his aesthetic vocabulary in an East-West equation: his ancestral heritage on the one hand; on the other the indomitable urge to express the immediacy of the moment. Armed with this equation, he began, cautiously at first and in total absorption, to communicate his vision. Recent paintings, however, indicate that the pace is quickening. In the current scene, he moves surely and with grace.

What the New York Times called Pang’s “genuine visionary power” has begun to flex its muscles. For many collectors, Pang-watching is bound to become a fascinating pursuit.

EVE MEDOFF
Associate in Art Research,
Hudson River Museum;
Arts Editor, Yonkers Record