Li Yuan-Chia

Li Yuan-chia was one of the most important Chinese artists of the 20th century. He lived in China, Taiwan, Italy and Britain and spent the last twenty-eight years of his life at Banks, Cumbria, in northern England, in a house next to Hadrian’s Wall.

Li had a unique vision, a kind of spiritual vision of space, which represented a fusion of the open field of 20th century Western abstract art with the Chinese tradition of summing up all phenomena in a system of simple signs. Words were among these signs; Li incorporated words in his visual art, and also wrote poems. He evolved what he called the ‘cosmic point’, a visual element, sometimes as small as a tiny dot, which defines or stimulates the void. After working in painting, sculpture and installation modes, Li developed photography in a highly personal way.