He was the youngest official in a State-run art museum in China in the late 1980s. In an era when average Chinese residents earned less than 80 yuan ($13.02) a month, one of his art works was bought by a private art foundation in the US for $10,000. In his early 30s, having established his name in the Shanghai art circle, he decided to move to New York and start from scratch.

He is Chinese contemporary artist Zhang Jianjun. For the past 20-plus years, he has been moving back and forth between the cultures of the US and China. But wherever he is, his creations always maintain their connection to the roots of Chinese culture.

Zhang Jianjun paints at an event in Shanghai Himalayas Museum. Photos: Courtesy of the artist

Change of perspective

Soon after graduating from the Fine Art Department at the Shanghai Drama Institute (today known as Shanghai Theatre Academy) in 1978, Zhang shifted his focus from representing the visible world to highlighting the spiritual origin of art.

The change was a result of his visits to Buddhist and Taoist sites like the Mogao Grottoes in Gansu Province. Instead of the strong colors he had been fond of using previously, Zhang turned to black and white and the application of natural materials like stone, sand and wood became a trademark of his works.

"These works are two-dimensional but they can reach into people's inner world," Zhang told the Global Times.

One of his works during the period, Eternal Dialogue, is an example of Zhang's stylistic approach. To highlight the theme of eternity, Zhang applied plaster, sand, broken marble pieces and stone to present a deep feeling of firmness and worn-resistance. In 1984, a foundation paid $10,000 for the piece.

In the mid-1980s, Zhang had become a frequent arts prize winner in Shanghai. In 1987, aged 32, Zhang was made the assistant curator of Shanghai Art Museum, the youngest official in a State-run art museum at that time.

But the stable and enviable position didn't hold him for long. The same year, Zhang got an offer from the Asian Cultural Council under the Rockefeller Foundation to visit the US as an exchange scholar. "I was very excited." he said. "The 1980s was an era when everybody was looking forward to going out and exploring the larger world."

Chinese contemporary artist Zhang Jianjun

Exploring the outside

In November 1987, Zhang arrived at a big apartment at Central Park West, was given free access to all the art museums in New York and elsewhere around the US, and a monthly subsidy of $3,000, all from the foundation.

He got to see original masterpieces, which completely reversed his previous understanding of these works. "We had very little chance to see originals in Shanghai back then. What we could access were all printed copies. The quality of these prints misled us quite a lot." He said that in comparison, the original works looked "very refined."

The eight-month-long experience enabled Zhang to understand the contemporary art environment in the US and get a new perspective on China's arts circle. Back then, the 85 New Wave movement, a Chinese avant-garde art movement in the late 1980s, saw a group of young Chinese artists copying Western art forms. A large number of influential art groups emerged across China during the period.

But at the same time in the US, Zhang saw that individual artists rather than groups were the driving force of the scene. "American artists pay much attention to diversity and individualism," he said. "They won't follow suit. They look for themselves and present their own understanding through art."

After a short return to Shanghai, Zhang decided to move to the US as an independent artist. In July 1989, he set out again. However, this time he went without any foundation support. Zhang soon spent all the savings he had within less than two years.

Like many other independent Chinese artists in the US, he picked up repairing antiques to make ends meet.

But the life of six working days every week didn't last long. He won a prize of $20,000 from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, allowing him to quit his job and fully focus on his art.

During this period, Zhang's art- works got larger in terms of scale, and escaped the canvas to become installation art. In addition to stone, wood and sand, other natural materials like water, paper and ink also appeared.

Eternal Dialogue

Evolving differences

In 1994, Zhang came back to Shanghai and started assisting with the founding of the Shanghai Biennale. When the first one was held in 1996, he displayed his video installation Taichi • Disike. The piece uses 50 televisions, half of which show elderly Chinese people dancing disco in a consistent manner while the other half showed a foreigner performing substandard tai chi.

"When I came back from the US, I found many misunderstandings between the two cultures, which I tried to present through this piece," he said. Zhang also became involved in building international academic exchange platforms for Shanghai Art Museum. In 2004, he arranged an exhibition of works by young artists from

Shanghai and New York.

After New York University opened a branch in Shanghai in 2007, Zhang, a part-time arts professor with the school since 1997, moved a part of his life back to Shanghai. He now teaches and at the same time carries on with his creations in his studio in Pudong New Area.

More than 20 years after his first visit to the US, Zhang believes the distance between the art circles of the US and China has changed substantially.

"In the 1970s and 80s, the difference was the existence of the market concept," he said. "Chinese artists had no idea what the market was back then. China's art scene has changed drastically. In the early stages, it was purely about idealism. But now things are very pragmatic. On the contrary, idealism continues to survive in the US."