Gu Gan is considered the forefather of the modern calligraphy movement being one of the first to reinvent Chinese calligraphy for a contemporary audience. He was also the founder of the Modernist School of Chinese Calligraphy. His works are typically multi-layered, with the title revealing the theme, with that thematic word or phrase becoming an integral part of the composition. He experiments with the shapes and forms of characters by sometimes blending multiple characters or separating them into radicals to reinforce their meanings. Over the years of his practice, Gu Gan had increasingly integrated Western media such as acrylic paints and color pigments, combining painting and calligraphy into an entirely new art form.
Gu Gan’s works are in the collections of the British Museum, London; Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford; Museum of East Asian Art, Cologne, Germany; Museum of Fine Arts, Vienna; National Art Museum of China, Beijing; Chinese Olympic Museum, Beijing; Xunyao Chinese Characters Museum, Chengdu. In 2002, he was included in the important exhibition Brushes with surprise: The Art of Calligraphy in Modern China at the British Museum in London. In 1996, through an introduction from Michael Goedhuis, he was chose by Baroness Philippine de Rothschild to be the first Chinese artist to have his painting printed on the Mouton Rothschild wine label, an honour also bestowed to Asian artists Zao Wou-ki. Lee U Fan and Xu Lei. He joins other household names who have designed a Mouton Rothschild label — Henry Moore, Picasso, Warhol, Francis Bacon, Chagall, Hockney, Jeff Koons and Lucian Freud. Prince Charles designed the label in 2004.
