Recently, as I reflected on the work and personality of Ding Yi, whom I have known for exactly thirty- two years, the expression that came to mind was astratto ma non troppo, for a pun on the musical instruction allegro ma non troppo (“fast, but not overly so”). The term “abstraction” historically refers to a type of painting that lacks recognizable elements of reality. It comes from the Latin word abstrahere, which means “a mental process where one thing is isolated from others with which it stands in relation,” but also the “condition of one who is dominated by a thought and detached from his surroundings.”1 This term has become associated with and defines Ding Yi’s work since the beginning of his career. In Chinese, the term chouxiang 抽象 (“abstract”)—used to describe something “outside what appears,” in contrast to juxiang 具象 (“tangible image”), which refers to representational art—has become a common style since the late 1980s for a group of painters including Ding Yi, Yu Youhan (though exclusively for the series of works titled “Yuan” 圆, or “circle”), Qin Yifeng, Shen Fan, and others who are active in Shanghai. Abstract painting emerged during the development of China’s most “international” city, and was seen as a Westernized phenomenon. Wu Guanzhong (1919–2010) was one of the first Chinese artists to champion a painting style relatively devoid of realistic content, emphasizing formal and abstract beauty as “weapons” in the artists struggle to assert their freedom, in defiance of the post- liberation dictate of art “serving the people” after 1949. This distinction was made even though traditional Chinese painting—especially xieyi 写意, in which subject/meaning (yi 意) is expressed/written (xie 写) with a few simple strokes of a brush dipped in black ink—appears on closer inspection to have so little “realism” as to require a solid cultural background in order to be interpreted. During the period of revolutionary realism, when the “masses” were the primary audience for art, works had to be easily “understood” first and foremost. In common parlance, this is referred to as kan de dong 看得懂, or seeing and understanding, or rather “understanding through the act of seeing,” when presented with content intended to be self- evident. Anything that does not clearly convey meaning elicits the opposite reaction, known as kan bu dong 看不懂, which literally translates as “seeing and not understanding.” The latter is a blunt admission that acknowledges one’s inadequacy and can sometimes carry a hint of suspicion toward whatever “is not understood.”

I believe it’s worth noting that when Ding Yi began his career as an artist, his works aroused a sort of covert perplexity and lack of understanding even among insiders. His participation2 in the important China Avant- Garde exhibition in February 1989 (the Exhibition of Modern Chinese Art, Zhongguo xiandai yishuzhan 中国现代艺术展 in Chinese)3 was quite disruptive. Although he was not the only abstract artist featured, his art was not easily readable: it lacked aesthetic appeal, overt displays of technique, expressions of sentiment, and explicit allusions to any modern Western artists. In short, it was decidedly different from any art seen in China until that moment. However, his works were met with interest and curiosity. To introduce more people—including ordinary individuals—to a “different” kind of painting, devoid of educational, narrative, or symbolic purpose, where the point is not “understanding” or “not understanding,” but rather surrendering to visual impressions, Ding Yi made a determined effort to show his works in public spaces, wherever possible at the time. I remember his first solo exhibition in March 1994 at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts at the invitation of Chen Tong.4 The works on paper were simply titled “Appearance of Crosses”5 followed by the letter B to indicate that they were, in fact, on paper. Ding Yi had prepared postcards with reproductions of his works, which were a great novelty and flew off the shelves. During the opening, he entertained students, teachers, and a few bureaucrats with the same patience and consideration. For his first significant solo show in October 1994, he chose an official location: the Shanghai Museum (Shanghai Meishuguan 上海美术馆), in the former library of the People’s Square, which employed Li Xu, a young critic open to “innovations,” and with the contribution of Dutch theorist and historian Hans van Dijk, who had been supporting Ding Yi for several years. This relationship of mutual esteem had already resulted in an exhibition (also titled China Avant-Garde)6 held in Berlin in early 1993, cocurated by van Dijk and featuring many works by Ding Yi.7 For his show at the Shanghai Museum, the artist had a small catalog printed at his own expense with a black-and-white cover, simple and understated, reflecting his aesthetic taste. On display were both works on canvas and paper, a screen, and some fans densely covered with “crosses”; the appropriation of these “traditional” media made them fully modern and topical. At the 1993 Venice Biennale, the Passage to the East exhibition featured two large black-and-white canvases by the artist, sharing space – not completely comfortably – with Xu Bing’s large installation piece.8 Ding Yi attended the opening wearing a black silk shirt that he had decorated with his usual motifs. His self- identification with his works was as committed as his attention to detail. Nothing was left to chance.

In 1995, he spent the summer in Bologna, painting about twenty works on paper that would later be part of his first solo show outside China, at the Galleria degli Archi in Comiso, Sicily, under my curatorship. His previous participation in the Venice Biennale had sparked interest and curiosity, but at the time, Sicily was still very attached to the figurative tradition, and the praise never went beyond words. A local critic compared him to Piero Dorazio, whom Ding Yi was unaware of at the time. Knowledge of modern Italian art in China was limited. People knew about Transavanguardia thanks to the translation of a text by Achille Bonito Oliva, and something about Arte Povera, but that was it.

I recently had the chance to revisit a reproduction of a very early work from 1986, a square oil- on- canvas painting (33 by 33 inches) titled Taboo (Jinji, 禁忌). Here, the “B” glyph, painted repeatedly with long expressionist strokes in black and white, within squares on a background of muddy grayish shades, is given a stronger, more symbolic significance by the title. This is in stark contrast to the neutral, formal connotation of the following years, where the same symbol is interchangeable and overlaps with the “A.” In fact, the “B” (except for algebraic sign conventions) signifies negation or prohibition for many cultures, including the Chinese. In Japan, crossing one’s arms in an “B” is a firm invitation to cease a certain behavior. Ding Yi was only twenty-four years old, and maybe in that still immature work, he had revealed a rush of annoyance and impatience with something: perhaps with some aspect of his reality, with the stylistic restrictions imposed by artistic tradition, or even with the artistic/social environment in China at that time? I wonder if he remembers. I perceived it as an artist’s resolution, his self- exhortation to devise a way to sublimate and exorcise the “chaos” inherent in human life by subjecting it to the scrutiny of rare intelligence and great self- discipline, through the translation into formal relationships of “simple” graphic symbols over which to exert strict control. His deep interest in structure9 had led him to reduce the components of his painting to a few combinable traits—like subatomic particles—in various ways while always remaining recognizable, transparent, and explicit. The analogy with the smallest unit of matter, and thus of energy, composed of electrons (–), protons (A), and neutrons (B), as expressed in physical laws, highlights the similarity of artistic creation with divine creation, a belief that runs throughout the history of art from its origins, without any need to justify itself on scientific grounds.

The idea, already implemented in the 1980s, of changing the second ideogram of his name, replacing rong 荣10 with yi 乙, where yi 乙 is made up of one stroke as opposed to the nine strokes of rong, is yet another formal simplification and shows the permeability—or nonexistence—of the seam between art and life for the artist. Subsequently, the strokes composing his surname and first name total three.11

I know how careful and cautious Ding Yi is in every aspect of life, not at all “dominated” by thought and “detached from his surroundings” but rather a protagonist in that abstracting process that is precisely, in my opinion, a wider perspective allowing him to see more clearly, a consummate ability to determine his own reality by bringing it back to personal style “motifs” that let him have an active role at every moment, allowing him to be the master of his own life. I believe that the choice to work ten to twelve hours per day, stretching out his “face- to- face” time with the medium, patiently and determinedly covering it with thousands upon thousands of marks, is also a way of limiting contact with an external world that escapes control, and often presents disagreeable realities.

And yet, when he steps out of the huge, perfectly neat space devoted to his work,12 Ding Yi also moves with ease and unexpected knowledgeability in the culinary sphere, of which he has become a refined connoisseur. As a consummate gourmand who keeps himself constantly updated on the restaurant scene in his city, he invites guests to ever- changing establishments, each one of them exceptional as pertaining to both food and attention to the ambience. His conversations with friends happen in spaces of aesthetic tasting and provide an alternative to the simple, solitary daily routine in his studio. By his own admission, Italian- style coffee and a very exclusive selection of cigars “sustain” him throughout the long hours of work.

The intuition that initiated Ding Yi’s singular approach was choosing to use a language made up of a few alternating and juxtaposed strokes in repeating patterns to express synthetically, and in a way that transcends the merely personal and cultural, his relationship with the world and with painting. And it was perhaps precisely this extraordinary intuition that granted him the ability and determination to continue on that path, which in time has become increasingly unique and recognizable. As he stated in a recent conversation, the chance to indulge in very “concrete” and purposeful thoughts during the long hours devoted to the creation of his works, which from the very beginning has required great patience and painstaking effort, has strengthened his feeling of having found a “custom- made” approach to life and artistic expression: extreme rarefaction combined with keen attention to the smallest details of reality.

Both quotes taken from Treccani Encyclopaedia.

In the small catalog printed for the occasion, one of his exhibited works is featured among the fifty-three photographs out of approximately 150 participants. It is Appearance of Crosses III (1988), a meticulously geometric work with “dotted” crosses in varying shades of light blue. The other work submitted to the exhibition was Appearance of Crosses I (1988), vertically split into three stripes—red, yellow, and blue—with black crosses.

The exhibition was held at the China Art Gallery, Beijing; making the first display of non- academic art authorized by the government in an official venue.

He is a painter himself and a teacher of traditional painting, as well as an intellectual and literature expert. He is also the owner of the Borges bookstore in Guangzhou.

shi shi 十示, where the first character shi 十 is exactly what it represents and is therefore used by Ding Yi to signify the number 10, while the second shi 示 translates as “to show” or “to educate.”

At the Haus der Kulturen der Welt.

About fifteen works, created on both paper and canvas.

Titled “A Mirror to Analyze the World” Xi shi jian 析世鉴.

In Chinese, jiegou 结构.

Meaning “honorable, glorious.”

In Chinese, the surname always comes before the first name; in this case it is ding 丁, made up of two strokes. The number and order of strokes making up each character follow fixed rules. Another reason for the choice of yi 乙 might be its belonging—together with ding 丁—to the group of the ten “Heavenly stems” Shi tian gan 十天干. Since ancient times, they have been used to catalog years and historical eras, in a list beginning with the four characters jia yi bing ding 甲乙丙丁, in which yi 乙 means “second” and ding 丁 “fourth.”

Even back in the early 1990s, when his studio- cum- bedroom was in fact very cramped, in the space reigned the same order and care for his work and living environment.

Translated by Dafne Calgaro Thanks to Christopher Taylor