The China born and Dublin-based painter Jingze Du has one thing to say: \u201cI love animals.\u201d In Jingze\u2019s minimalist and angular paintings, the \u201cunfiltered and true\u201d nature of animals is front and center. It’s true, there\u2019s just something about animals that\u2019s so endearing and hilarious, even when they aren\u2019t doing anything. Jingze\u2019s interest in animals is explored in his monochromatic pieces that inflate heads and bodies to cartoonish proportions, flooding the canvas with a simplicity that brings out humour and cuteness. Living in Ireland, the unlikely inspiration for these paintings, Jingze became inspired by the \u201cquietness and sense of scale\u201d at the edge of the Atlantic. \u201cYou\u2019re never far from the sea or a mountain or a field, that proximity to nature makes you feel both grounded and fragile,\u201d says Jingze. \u201cIt\u2019s poetic in its own way \u2013 a stark contrast to the noise and structures of cities like London or New York.\u201d<\/p>\n
The stillness of his paintings, in their glossy, almost frozen textures, represents a sense of detachment from the machinery of the wider world. Each furry subject brings a personality of its own, whether it\u2019s an angry gorilla, miniature pony, or a contorted rabbit, Jingze\u2019s greatest speciality is bringing out the vastness of their black eyes, sparkling like obsidian marbles.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s tremendous how much colour Jingze can remove and yet still retain the entirety of his zoological figures with just the smallest contours and feathered shadows. Through trial and errors, Jingze developed his style organically, attempting to communicate the soft serenity of his paintings by refining his techniques, in order for it \u201cto appear effortless and simple\u201d. Jingze\u2019s Chinese heritage plays a part in his paintings. \u201cSomeone once said to me \u2018Chinese paintings are invitations to complete the experience of looking,\u2019\u201d says Jingze, whose main goal is to create paintings that allow people to bring a part of their own narrative to the deceptively simple animals. Working with thinned-out paint on canvas, Jingze also mirrors the fluidity of ancient Chinese scroll paintings and the contemplative simplicity of the subjects. \u201cPeople often tell me they see themselves in the paintings, which I find deeply rewarding,\u201d says Jingze.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The China born and Dublin-based painter Jingze Du has one thing to say: \u201cI love animals.\u201d In Jingze\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3939],"tags":[4021,4020,4022,77,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-335585","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-design","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}