Yan Pei-Ming Le Titien, 2017

In Le Titien (2017), Yan Pei-Ming references Titian’s Self-Portrait from c. 1562, one of only two surviving self-portraits, which is now in the collection of the Museo del Prado, Madrid. The profile stance recalls Roman coins, and by depicting himself with a long beard and skull cap, brush in hand, Titian associated himself with contemporary iconography of the intellectual, derived from ancient busts of Aristotle. In place of the old master’s delicacy and elegance, Yan Pei-Ming’s dynamically expressive brushwork, with dribbles of paint partially obscuring the face and hand, gives the figure a vitality and immediacy that mark it as unmistakably contemporary. His work is also a dramatic departure from Titian’s brown colouration, with the figure instead bathed in a melancholic blue glow. As Reinhard Spieler describes, Yan Pei-Ming ‘thus avoids pandering to Titian’s colouristic mastery and
makes clear from the outset that he’s working on quite a different level.’