Christie's Hong Kong Pairs Hockney and Wu Guanzhong

Christie's Hong Kong is staging the first-ever exhibition pairing works by the late British painter David Hockney and the Modern Chinese master Wu Guanzhong. The non-selling show, titled Through the Master’s Eye-David Hockney & Wu Guanzhong, runs from September 22 to 29 alongside the auction house's autumn preview.

Christian Albu, Christie’s deputy chairman for 20th- and 21st-century art in Asia Pacific, says the exhibition aims to place the artists in conversation. "While they come from very different cultural backgrounds, both artists spent their careers exploring how Eastern and Western artistic traditions could inform one another," Albu told The Art Newspaper.

A Trip That Forged a Link

The exhibition concept was inspired by Hockney's three-week visit to China in 1981. An ensuing book, China Diary from 1982, documents that trip. There is no evidence Hockney met Wu Guanzhong during his travels. Wu was a professor in Beijing at the time but was often in his native Jiangnan region.

From that 1981 journey, Hockney absorbed ideas from Chinese traditional landscape painting. He referenced the concept that scroll paintings contain time as well as place. Conversely, Wu Guanzhong spent three years, from 1947 to 1950, studying in France. His career was shaped by exploring how Western traditions could infuse Chinese techniques.

Shared Artistic Concerns

"Both artists looked beyond the conventions of their own traditions and found inspiration in artistic practices from other cultures," Albu says. He notes both were deeply committed to landscape, but not as a straightforward depiction of nature. Instead, they used it to explore perception, memory, movement, and space.

Albu states Wu Guanzhong occupies a unique position in Hong Kong and greater China, recognized across generations as a key figure in modern Chinese art. Hockney is familiar to Hong Kong's international audiences, but his engagement with Chinese painting traditions is less known. One of our goals is to present a different perspective on Hockney by examining these influences, Albu adds.

The Exhibition's Contents

The exhibition features approximately seven works by Hockney and 15 by Wu Guanzhong, all sourced from private collections. For context, it also includes two scroll paintings by the Qing Dynasty artist Wang Hui (1632-1717), who likely influenced both modern artists.

Albu says Wang Hui's work synthesized centuries of Chinese tradition while demonstrating mastery of composition. Hockney, he adds, was drawn to how handscroll paintings unfold gradually over time. This influence is visible in Hockney's later works, such as Nichols Canyon III from 2017.

A Hong Kong Setting for Dialogue

Christie's timed the exhibition for Hong Kong's autumn preview season to present a focused scholarly project. Hong Kong, as a city situated between cultures, provides an ideal setting for this cross-cultural dialogue, Albu says. The exhibition was formulated specifically for Hong Kong.

Albu hopes it will contribute to a broader conversation about cross-cultural artistic exchange. He wants it to encourage further research into the relationship between Eastern and Western art histories. The show creates a meeting point for two artists rarely discussed together.