Way, John

1921, Shanghai, China-2012, San Francisco, USA

Introduction

Born in Shanghai in 1921, John Way was a Chinese-American artist, who became known for his bold paintings that combine layers of colours inspired by Chinese calligraphy and Abstract Expressionist painting. Way began studying calligraphy at the age of ten under the famous artist Li Zhongqian, the nephew and student of Li Ruiqing. At sixteen he had his first calligraphy exhibition, which garnered him praise for his works. In 1949 he and his family moved to Hong Kong where he joined the Hong Kong Art Club and for the first time was exposed to and able to study Western art. His paintings of this period are typically figurative in the subject matter. He moved to Boston in 1956 and studied engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. During 1960s, Way began to feel that abstraction best enabled him to express himself as an artist. Notably, his oil paintings became suffused with colour in such a way that space breathes and gives the impression of great depth. He “wrote” over these layers with a thick brush of darker paint, reminiscent of the free-flowing movement of the calligrapher’s brush. He went to Paris for further studies in 1975 and published a series of four Chinese calligraphy books in 1981, 1986, 1991 & 1999. He passed away in 2012.

Alisan Fine Arts has organised three solo exhibitions for him in 2001, 2003 and 2006, and exhibited his work as part of Syncretic Visions: The First Generation of Chinese Diaspora Artists in America, a curated selection of Chinese-American diaspora artists shown at Fine Art Asia in 2015. His works have been exhibited in over forty solo and group shows around the world, including in the United States, France, Switzerland, Germany, China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. He was chosen in 1965 to exhibit alongside Hartung, Pollock, and Warhol in an exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston titled Painter without a Brush. In 1997, he was listed in “Who’s Who in International Art” and in 1998 he was Appointed Art Professor, at the Accademia Internazionale Greci Marino, in Italy. His work was selected in Switzerland to be part of a postage stamp series in 2000, 2002 and 2004. A major catalogue was published for his retrospective in 2001 at Shanghai Art Museum. In 2006, an exhibition of his calligraphy and oil paintings were on show at the Honolulu Academy of Arts in Hawaii, and a 90-Year Retrospective in Beijing 2010. His works have been collected by the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, United States; Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, United States; Hong Kong Museum of Art.


BIOGRAPHY
1921    Born in Shanghai, son of a collector of Chinese painting and calligraphy
1931    Began to study Chinese calligraphy under Li Zhongqian (1881-1956), nephew of the great master Li Ruiqing (1867-1920)
1949    Left Shanghai for Guangzhou in May and settled in Hong Kong in September
1951    Joined the Hong Kong Art Club and for the first time experiments with Western Art techniques such as sketching from live models
1956    Emigrated to Boston, MA, USA with his family
1957-8    Studied engineering at MIT, enrolled in “Form and Design” at MIT School of Architecture to learn the theory of modern art
1973    Moved to Los Altos, CA, USA
1975    Lived and studied in Paris, France
1981    Published Chinese Calligraphy Series No.1 “Mao Kung Tin”
1985    Ten oil on paper paintings accepted in “Le Salon Des Nations à Paris 1985,” Paris, France
1986    Published Chinese Calligraphy Series No.2 “Oracle Bone Couplets”
1991    Published Chinese Calligraphy Series No.3 “A Thousand Character Essay in Cursive Chinese Calligraphy Style”
1997    “Hommage à John Way” published in Who’s Who in International Art.  A painting was selected for reproduction on a Swiss postage stamp
1998    Appointed Art Professor, Accademia Internazionale “Greci Marino,” Vinzoglio, Italy
1999    Published Chinese Calligraphy Series No.4 “Yeh Hoa Ming” in Shanghai, China
2000    Another painting was selected for the Swiss postage stamp series “Celebration de l’Annee 2000, Artistes et Maitres”
2002    A painting was selected the Swiss postage stamp series “Celebration de l’Annee 2000, Artistes et Maitres”
2004    A painting “Red and Blue” was selected for the Swiss postage stamp series “Celebration de l’Annee 2000, Artistes et Maitres”
2012    Passed away in San Francisco, USA

 

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2010          

  • 90-Year Retrospective of Chinese-American Artist John Way, Art Vim Gallery, Beijing, China
2006           
2003            
  • Alisan Fine Arts, Hong Kong
2001 
  • New Age Gallery, Taiwan
  • Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai, China
  • Alisan Fine Arts, Hong Kong
1994           
  • Gallery On The Rim, San Francisco, CA, USA
1984           
  • The Academy Gallery, Academy of Art College, San Francisco, CA, USA
1981           
  • Calligraphy, National Museum of History, Taipei, Taiwan
1977           
  • Oil Painting on Paper, Galerie Serogian & Bahls, Heidelberg, Germany
1976           
  • Oil Paintings, Rubican Gallery, Los Altos, CA, USA
1970           
  • Oil Painting, Joan Peterson Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1968           
  • Oil Painting, Stratton Center, MIT Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1967           
  • Joan Peterson Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1963           
  • Joan Peterson Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1960           
  • Nexus Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1946           
  • Calligraphy, Painting and Seal Carving, Art Gallery of China, Shanghai, China
1937           
  • Calligraphy, Sun Gallery, Shanghai, China

 

Selected Group Exhibitions
2024              
 2018              
 2016              
 2015            
2014          
1997           
  • Geneva-Palexpo, Geneva, Switzerland
1993           
  • International Biennial, Museum of Modern Art of Miami, Miami, FL, USA
1985           
  • Le Salon des Nations à Paris 1985, Paris, France
1975-1976
  • American Painters in Paris, Paris, France
1969           
  • Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA, USA
1968           
  • Decordova Museum, Lincoln, MA, USA
1965           
  • Painter without a Brush, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA, USA, chosen to exhibit alongside deKooning, Pollock, and Kline
1964           
  • Boston Arts Festival, Boston, MA, USA
1963           
  • New England Art of Today, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA
  • Turn Toward Peace, Boston, MA, USA
1962           
  • Chapter of Our Time, New York, USA
1960           
  • Art Gallery, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA
1959           
  • Nexus Gallery, Boston, MA, USA
1958           
  • Mystic Art Exhibition, Mystic, CT, USA
1951-1955
  • Hong Kong Art Club Annual Exhibitions, Hong Kong


SELECTED MUSEUM COLLECTIONS
Iris and Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Art, Stanford University Museum, Stanford, CA, USA
Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, CA, USA
Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, CA, USA