At 83, master painter Huang Yongyu has lost none of the impish humour and frankness that once made him a principal target during the Cultural Revolution. In town for an exhibition of his work, he delights in putting interviewers on the spot, regaling the press with an anecdote about how he ejected a television crew from his Beijing home when they annoyed him by shifting furniture to position a camera. Never one for polite small talk, Huang, who lived in Hong Kong for long periods during the 1950s and 1990s, is typically blunt when asked for his feelings about the 10th anniversary of the handover. It isn't easy for Beijing to tolerate rebukes from Hong Kong people, he says. 'I thought some of [my] exhibits would be excluded, but, no, works like the nude sculptures of Adam and Eve [are on display]. So, Hong Kong is still very open.' Asked if he has met anyone famous during his illustrious career, he quips: 'Yes, I look into the mirror every day.' Although best known for his bold ink brush paintings, Huang is a versatile artist whose work embraces many mediums. His exhibition at Times Square in Causeway Bay showcases more than 50 items, from woodcut prints and sculpture to oils and calligraphy. Organisers say the exhibition is valued at up to HK$200 million and most works are on display for the first time. Hong Kong Museum of Art curator Szeto Yuen-kit, who organised an enormous exhibition of Huang's work in 2004 to mark his 80th birthday, says the artist's greatest achievement is being able to integrate elements of design, print-making and mural painting into Chinese painting and deliver the image with humour and immediacy. Fish, one of the paintings on display, bolsters this view. Forcefully executed in bold, black brush strokes, the 1987 oil of a school of fish is a memorable image. Huang, the son of artistically inclined teachers, was born in the town of Fenghuang in Hunan province, but left home at 13 to attend school in Xiamen, where he learned how to woodcut. Some-thing of a rebel, Huang didn't get on in school and got into fights. The country was being wracked by internal strife and the war with Japan, and he left after a couple of years. He became an apprentice at a ceramics workshop and taught art in schools. Later, he began taking part in political work in Shanghai, producing woodcut pamphlets to protest against the civil war, poverty and social injustices, although his passion lay primarily in art. In 1948, he and his wife, Zhang Meixi, fled the fighting and came to Hong Kong, where he worked for newspapers such as Ta Kung Pao and New Evening News. Although he was just 24, the calibre of his art drew sufficient attention to stage an exhibition at the Fung Ping Shan Museum. He also found friends among intellectuals and writers such as Louis Cha Leung-yung. Huang returned to the mainland five years later at the ncouragement of his uncle, writer Shen Congwen, and taught at the Central Academy of Fine Art in Beijing. During the Cultural Revolution, his irreverent style and outspoken personality led to many of his works being labelled anti-proletariat and, like many artists, he was sent to the countryside to work as a labourer. Huang returned to Beijing in 1972, as the political turmoil wound down. But he soon got into trouble when his painting The Owl, which depicted the bird with one eye closed, was condemned as a veiled critique of communist officials for turning a blind eye to wrongdoing. Huang said the hostility was a bid by Mao Zedong's wife, Jiang Qing, to discredit political foes such as then premier Zhou Enlai, who had supported several painters' projects. Consequently, The Owl was included in the 'Black Painting Exhibition' that Jiang and her allies organised in 1974. Other artists may remain bitter about that painful period, but Huang has little patience for dwelling on his life under the Red Guards. 'Do I see [returning to the mainland] as a right decision now? If I hadn't done that, you wouldn't have come to me today,' he says. Despite his run-ins with authority, Huang was invited to create the design for a tapestry decorating Mao's mausoleum after the chairman died in 1976. For Huang and many surviving artists, the next few years were a flowering period during which they received recognition and a freedom few others enjoyed. The world was curious about the work of Cultural Revolution survivors, and Huang was invited to hold numerous exhibitions abroad during the 80s. His feelings about the mainland remain ambivalent. In one of the paintings on show at Times Square, Huang writes: 'I am lucky as I managed to survive in a crack for more than 80 years.' He settled in Hong Kong towards the end of the 80s, joining family members, and was outraged by the June 4 crackdown in 1989. Although he didn't agree with the students' protests, Huang was appalled by the suppression. He published cartoons attacking then premier Li Peng and held an exhibition at the City Hall the next year featuring several works critical of the Beijing leadership. Typically of Huang, it was an emotional rather than a political response. One of the seals he used at the time read: 'After drawing the tortoise, I'm not going back to my home town.' It seemed as if he'd opted for a life of exile. Yet in 1997 Huang deemed the situation on the mainland to be sufficiently improved to return home. 'Why go back again? I'm an artist, not a politician,' says Huang. 'I was against the June 4 [crackdown] in my writings and in my paintings. But I was invited to go back. China is getting better and there are hopes. Now, Beijing delivers on its promises - for example, some officials who took bribes are prosecuted.' Huang has enjoyed steady recognition at home and abroad and in 1999 the Xiangquan Group, a Hunan brewery, reportedly paid him 18 million yuan for the copyright to two wine bottles that he'd designed. That's modest compensation compared with the astronomical prices young mainland artists are fetching for what sometimes seems like mediocre work, but the octogenarian isn't resentful. 'Don't judge the younger generation of artists with traditional values,' he says. 'Each generation is different. Artists shouldn't be jealous of others' success. Also, Chinese art isn't just modern Chinese art. It [includes] art from thousands of years ago, such as that from the Tang dynasty. It should be regarded as a whole.' Huang Yongyu Art Exhibition, open piazza, 2/F, Times Square, Causeway Bay, ends Aug 1
