Portfolio of disturbing images

A PALLID naked man lies huddled on the floor holding the severed head of another man, party streamers hang down. Such are the disturbing images found in the oil paintings of Christopher Cheung whose first solo exhibition in Hong Kong, The Transient and the Returning, is at the Trigram Gallery, 3/F, Omni the Hong Kong Hotel, Tsim Sha Tsui, from today until December 9.

Born in Hong Kong in 1945, Cheung has lived in Paris since 1970 and this exhibition puts together his works from 1974 to the present day.

The artist's inscription expresses good wishes tinged with doubt: 'The way to the top of the mountain is winding, how I wish China a bright future.' Her motherland is often a prevailing concern for landscape artist Fang Zhaoling, subject of a big and brilliant retrospective, The Passionate Realm at the Hong Kong Museum of Art until the end of next month.

With bold colours, free calligraphic strokes and shallow depth, Fang evolved her own style influenced by the Chinese tradition but expressing her sentiments in a modern stylised language. The museum has also produced an excellently informative educational pamphlet available free at the exhibition.

The calligraphic paintings of Jiang Baolin have been summed up as conceptual naturalism; using the traditional Chinese ink and brush technique, Jiang paints fruits, flowers and landscapes, balancing the abstract and the concrete. Alisan Fine Arts, 315, Prince's Building, Central, is displaying Jiang's works from November 29 until December 17.

Portico, the restaurant in Citibank Plaza, Garden Road, presents Sounds of Nature, recent oils and watercolours by Beijing artist Feng Jianwen from December 6 to January 30. In his watercolour Crane Dance Feng depicts an angular and scantily dressed woman dancer, striking and almost Egyptian in feel.