One of today’s most distinguished ink painters from China, Yang Yanping’s artistic autonomy and elevated ideals of visual quality have allowed her to embrace modernism without jettisoning lessons from classical Chinese high culture.
She initially studied architecture at Tsinghua University. Here, Yang met painting teacher Zeng Shanqing, whom she would eventually marry. After graduating in 1958 and a brief spell in teaching design, Yang decided to study art at Beijing Art Academy’s oil painting department. At the same time, she studied traditional Chinese painting on her own and has excelled in depicting the lotus flower, a symbol of purity, transience, the fragility of nature and the potential for regeneration. ECKART ASIA’s The Juanita Collection has acquired one of these iconic pieces that depict this sacred symbol.
In 1986, both Yang and her husband were awarded fellowships at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. They have remained in the United States since.
One of the highlights of Yang’s career was a major retrospective at the Art Museum of Beijing Fine Art Academy in 2013. In 2019, she had an exhibition together with Zeng at the Art Institute of Chicago. Her works have been acquired by major institutions all over the world, including the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford University and the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.
