Titled: 40.
Artist: ChenXi, Chauncey
Size: 30x40cm
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
About Artist
Chen Xi (b. 2000, Shenzhen, China) is a painter based in Shenzhen. He received a BA in Oil Painting from Sichuan University and an MA in Fine Art Painting from Camberwell College of Arts, University of the Arts London.
Drawing inspiration from cartoons, urban signage, and contemporary visual culture, Chen's practice explores the relationship between image making, social reality, and abstraction. Influenced by Guy Debord's concept of the spectacle, his paintings combine saturated colour, simplified forms, and symbolic imagery to examine how visual culture shapes everyday experience.
His work has been exhibited in China and the United Kingdom and has received several awards, including the Highest Award at the 10th National (Dafen) Chinese and Youth Oil Painting Exhibition in 2021.
Artist Statement
My practice departs from Guy Debord’s The Society of the Spectacle. Given that the social spectacle is to a large extent controlled by a small portion of the population, my aim is to engage in creative and unconventional production within an existing framework. During my studies in the UK, my research direction was closely tied to the notion of cartoonish abstraction. I am particularly drawn to animation that critiques social realities, such as South Park; accordingly, my palette features high saturation and high contrast, and my pictorial language tends toward flatness—shaped by my habitual viewing of cartoons and drawing comics.
At the same time, influenced by Jean Dubuffet’s Art Brut (raw art), I strive to simplify the visual surface, allowing it to become slow, honest, but also muddy and unruly. I have also studied cartoon-based and minimalist artists, including Rose Wylie, Joe Bradley, Mark Rothko, and Stanley Whitney. Early on, my subject matter revolved around the urban landscape; I often photographed street life and roadside signs. I see these reduced signs as eternal microcosms of society and as shadows of my own lived experience. Consequently, my work constitutes an exploration of simplified forms, colours, and signs.
Now I seek to strip away superfluous ornamentation, returning painting to its most elemental state of points, lines, and planes. It is simple yet complex, vulgar yet profound, humorous yet serious, clumsy yet layered, and moves continuously between abstraction and figuration—finding complexity within simplicity.
Each artwork is carefully packaged and shipped directly from the artist’s studio.
Tracking information will be provided once dispatched.
Delivery times may vary depending on destination and customs processing.
International orders may be subject to local import duties or taxes.
Titled: 40.
Artist: ChenXi, Chauncey
Size: 30x40cm
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
About Artist
Chen Xi (b. 2000, Shenzhen, China) is a painter based in Shenzhen. He received a BA in Oil Painting from Sichuan University and an MA in Fine Art Painting from Camberwell College of Arts, University of the Arts London.
Drawing inspiration from cartoons, urban signage, and contemporary visual culture, Chen's practice explores the relationship between image making, social reality, and abstraction. Influenced by Guy Debord's concept of the spectacle, his paintings combine saturated colour, simplified forms, and symbolic imagery to examine how visual culture shapes everyday experience.
His work has been exhibited in China and the United Kingdom and has received several awards, including the Highest Award at the 10th National (Dafen) Chinese and Youth Oil Painting Exhibition in 2021.
Artist Statement
My practice departs from Guy Debord’s The Society of the Spectacle. Given that the social spectacle is to a large extent controlled by a small portion of the population, my aim is to engage in creative and unconventional production within an existing framework. During my studies in the UK, my research direction was closely tied to the notion of cartoonish abstraction. I am particularly drawn to animation that critiques social realities, such as South Park; accordingly, my palette features high saturation and high contrast, and my pictorial language tends toward flatness—shaped by my habitual viewing of cartoons and drawing comics.
At the same time, influenced by Jean Dubuffet’s Art Brut (raw art), I strive to simplify the visual surface, allowing it to become slow, honest, but also muddy and unruly. I have also studied cartoon-based and minimalist artists, including Rose Wylie, Joe Bradley, Mark Rothko, and Stanley Whitney. Early on, my subject matter revolved around the urban landscape; I often photographed street life and roadside signs. I see these reduced signs as eternal microcosms of society and as shadows of my own lived experience. Consequently, my work constitutes an exploration of simplified forms, colours, and signs.
Now I seek to strip away superfluous ornamentation, returning painting to its most elemental state of points, lines, and planes. It is simple yet complex, vulgar yet profound, humorous yet serious, clumsy yet layered, and moves continuously between abstraction and figuration—finding complexity within simplicity.
Each artwork is carefully packaged and shipped directly from the artist’s studio.
Tracking information will be provided once dispatched.
Delivery times may vary depending on destination and customs processing.
International orders may be subject to local import duties or taxes.
