Fu Wenjun（傅文俊）, Chinese contemporary artist, was graduated from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute. He creates principally through the art media of photography, installation, sculpture and oil painting. Fu Wenjun has developed his unique fine art photography style: Digital Pictorial Photography (数绘摄影).

5 Red Cherry, Fu Wenjun, Digital Pictorial Photography, 100x100cm, 2017.jpg

With his Digital Pictorial Photography, Fu Wenjun turns away from the recording function of photography commonly acknowledged by the public, and aims at exploring to place photography art in dialogue with other art media, like Chinese painting, oil painting, sculpture etc, as a result to widen the boundary of photography art in the current digital age.

His solo exhibitions were presented at National Art Museum of China, Museu Europeu de Arte Moderno, Guangdong Museum of Art etc.

Tell us about your nominated art piece for the Global Art Awards?

This time for the Global Art Awards, two pieces of my artworks are nominated, entitled separately “Dubai Fish” and “Origin”. They are fine art photography artworks presented in an innovative and pioneering style of Digital Pictorial Photography that I put forward. In the Digital Pictorial Photography artworks, apart from the aesthetical beauty you could feel easily from the image, while creating the works, I consciously to express some of my thinking and reflection and on the global or regional history, culture, human life and so on. After I went back from an exhibition held in Dubai, I created the work “Dubai Fish”: fish, water and the city landscape surrounding by deserts leads to think over and over again， if human is capable to change the aspect of nature, could he change also the essence of nature existed for hundreds and thousands of year on the planet?

How does it make you feel that you are a nominee for the Global Art Awards?

In April 2018, for the first time my works of Digital Pictorial Photography were shown in Dubai on the occasional of World Art Dubai art fair. Many people told me that your works were fascinating and very interesting. Some were curious about how the works were created because they never saw this sort of artworks before. People always have the same reaction when my works presented no matter in my home country China, or overseas, like the USA, Spain, Germany, Italy. In 2017, two solo exhibitions were held by National Art Museum of China (Beijing), one of the most influential art museums in China, and Museu Europeu de Arte Moderno (Barcelona), one of the most important museums in Europe. Several pieces of my Digital Pictorial Photography artworks are among their permanent collection. In the upcoming October 2018, an American art organization will present another solo exhibition of my Digital Pictorial Photography. I believe the unanimous acknowledgement of my art from art museums and the public is not occurred by chance. I am a confident nominee for the Global Art Awards.

What drives you?

Well, in short, is the passion for art that drives me, a lasting even growing passion. In China most male citizen take retirement at the age of sixty. In Chinese culture, sixty years are regarded as a circle of life, which means after the accomplishment of sixty years old, one step into another stage of life. For me, I have no willing to get retired at all. But on the contrary, I can’t stop myself spending day by day to do my art. My experience, knowledge, insight acquired from the past has become a treasure and inspiration for the creation. More and more passion drive me to do better, and make me believe sometimes even the rest is a waste of time.

How do you deal with artist's block?

I think every artist will encounter the same problem of block, even the best ones like Picasso. Personally when I realize it, I will not insist any more. Change the mind, do something make me feel relax, like watching movies, taking a walk. Or even go to have a trip, visit some places interest me for a long time. Sometimes I will also read books of art history or catalogs of great artists. Give yourself enough time to get completely relax, and then you will be filled with energy to break through the block and create something wonderful.

Where do you see your art going in ten years?

There is no doubt in the ten years I will continue to work on contemporary art, especially Digital Pictorial Photography. I always believe photography as art, has great potential and possibility in art creation. Many people have not realized it maybe because photography has been so widely and commonly acknowledged as a tool to record our world, especially in current days almost everyone has a smart phone to take photos. Currently I focus on placing photography art in dialogue with other art media, like Chinese painting, oil painting, sculpture etc, so as to widen the boundary of photography art in the current digital age. My latest Digital Pictorial Photography, emphasizing on the relation of photography with painting and sculpture, will be presented at PHOTOFAIRS|Shanghai and Fine Art Asia in September and October. Recently I am doing some research and try to make new possibilities in my works. Let’s see how is going on. In the ten years, I hope to constantly provide Digital Pictorial Photography richer content and meaning, and diverse presentation methods.