A Summer Afternoon in the plaza of  Tiantan

#06010     102 X 76 cm     oc     2006

Since the Opium War, China suffered enormously under the so – called “Western Capitalist Imperialism.”During this time, around the early 20th century, the sacred Plaza of the Temple of Heaven even became a sort of playground for the foreigners. Dr. Chen depicts this here, in one of his assumptive scenes from his “Temple of Heaven Series.” He brings a French couple from Seurat’s A Summer Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jette (1886) to walk about the Plaza, as well as a European girl from Renoir’s Girl with a Hoop.