International travel is an important part of my usual life.
My first international travel is to take part in the 31st Annual Conference of the World Association of Chinese Newspapers, as a delegate of Chinese Financial Newspapers in Malaysia in 1997. Since then, I have had 16 international travels, such as having a vacation in Europe in 2000, visited family in Australia 5 times, and came to the US 10 times for studying, art exhibitions and teachings 2008 to 2020.
If saying the travel in Europe in 2000 is the start point of my cross-cultural and comprehensive art dream seeking, then the travels in the US 2008 to 2020 is the process of my dream seeking with studying, exploration and theory thought...
The travel in Europe has not only given me a chance to touch some of the greatest arts and human civilizations, to touch Bible and Christianity, and laid a foundation for me to become a Christian in American 13 years, but also it has given me a courage to connect with a group of native-English-speaker graduates of Oregon State University from Paris, then in 2 years, we published a series of publications with 4 books and 4 CDs to talk American arts (mainly movie and music) for helping non-Chinese speakers to learn American language, which is the first experiment on my cross-cultural and comprehensive art dream seeking…
Then the travels in the US 2008 to 2020 have endowed me more opportunities and a wider room to work from an opposite angle, to engage in finding, exploring and creating something unique to help non-Chinese speakers to learn Chinese culture and language with a more natural, an artistic, easier style…
It is said “If you want to give someone a drop of water, you must have a bucket of water,” and I never thought an amateur can stand the duties over, therefore, I have studied in two art colleges in Beijing for 10 years, for the purpose to transfer myself from an amateur to be a professional artist, who has many aspects of self-cultivation…very often, I encourage myself very often, I am not the best now yet, but I will certainly be the best suitable one to stand the duty to create a Cross-cultural and Comprehensive Art.
With this idea, I have been keeping the trips between China and US, between Chinese art colleges and American full time schools and art organizations, and try to combine what I have learned in China and what I have seen, practice and felt in the US, write them into my books, practice them into my teaching and creating…
The biggest gains during those international travels, not only have I painted over 1100 paintings, had 6 art exhibitions, taught about 500 hours in 40 American schools and organizations for more than 6300 non-Chinese speakers, published a series of publications with 2 books, 2 DVDs and 2 closed web sites which only open to my readers, but also and more important is that I have found the connecting point between traditional Chinese painting and modern Chinese language, and the relationship of a variety arts on a Chinese painting itself… Base on it, I have created a method to combine them together with a cross-cultural and comprehensive art style.
Anyway, I know very clear that I have just created a simple model which is in its infancy phase now. If I want to improve it on its youth, and adults’ period, it’ll take a longer time and I myself must work harder in the upcoming another decades.
So, I am thinking, since I have majored in Chinese art in two Chinese colleges for 10 years, maybe it is the time to learn western art and cultures in the upcoming 10 years with more international travels?
Do you think so?
Do you enjoy international travels?
Sincerely
Shirley Yiping Zhang
-
A Good News For You-- Shirley's 564th Friendly Greeting Which Is From Sydney, Australia- Oct 18, 2017 Hi,Dear Friends How are you? Now I would like to share a good news with you from Sydney, Australia. My thesis proposal of dissertation for the degree of Master of Fine Arts was approved by a group of 5 professors (Prof. Li Liyang, Prof. Li Yi, Prof. Deng Fuxing, Prof. Ren Ping and Prof. Gao Tianmin) in the conference by the good directions and lead of my Supervisor -- Professor Mu Jiashan(he is on the second photo on the left and the third photo on the right) and the nice help of the tutors of the Fine Arts Department of Graduate School at Chinese National Academy of Arts -- Ms. Jiang Man, Dr. Wang Shuyi, the the monitor - Dr. Lin Xiahan and my classmates -- Mr. Liu Xiaolong and Xiedi. Maybe you are surprised why Shirley I was in the conference for the ...
-
My Europe Travel Diary (001) Dear friends, I haven’t seen you for a long time since my holiday to Europe. I travelled from Shenzhen City, China to Paris, via Hong Kong, Bangkok, Oman and Bahrain. I visited Paris, Luxembourg, Waterloo, Brussels, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Rothenbourg, Munich, Salzburg, Vienna, Klagenfurt, Venice, Florence, Rome and the Vatican. I visited 8 countries and 16 cities travelling on an Intalan touring bus. I then returned to Shenzhen via Abu Dhabi, Bangkok and Hong Kong. No matter whether I was on the plane or on the bus, I tried to keep my computer, camera, pen and notebook with me so that I could take some pictures, write my impressions and record some interesting things. Now I would like to re-write and edit my some of the things that I wrote, and then, I would really like to share them and for you to give your opinions. --Shirley Written in 2000, Edition in Oct., 2004 --Shirley
-
My Europe Travel Diary (003): At the Oman Airport At about 2:30 am Beijing time on the 27th Sept. 2000, I reached Oman Airport. I had to change to another airplane, which would then fly to Paris via Bahrain and Damascus. As soon as our group entered the airport, the guide asked us to put our watches back by 4 hours, to local time which was 10:30 pm. Oman airport isn’t very big, but is quite clean and has an Arabian character. The local people wore scarves on their heads. Most of the men have beards. The white scarves, black beards, brown skin and the high noses make the men look quite handsome. The white, black, or blue scarves, veils and long dresses made the women’s faces and eyes look very beautiful and made them look kind of mysterious to me. I really felt that they looked quite pretty in profile. There was a little boy there who I really ...
-
My European Travel Diary (004):Could you Eat 4 times within 16 hours? Could you eat 4 times within 16 hours? Maybe with the time difference and because we travelled on two different planes, we were offered 4 meals within 16 hours, even in the middle of the night. The first time they came round, I was very interested in the fresh Arabian food. The second time, I could still eat a little. However, I couldn’t touch the third and fourth meal. I felt sick as soon as I saw the food. Anyway, when the air hostesses offered me the menu and woke me up to ask me whether I wanted anything to eat, I could only smile at them and shake my head. I really found it strange as to why people need to eat so many times? Why people have to be woken in the middle of the night to eat? Could you eat 4 times within 16 hours? ...
-
My Europe Travel Diary (005):Sunrise and Arabian Characters At last, I boarded the flight to Paris. Early in the morning, I was woken up by the noise in the plane; someone was shouting how beautiful the view was. I jumped up and ran to the window and I saw a wonderful landscape in the distance, there was a line of orange between the gray and the black sky. That view, with the white stream from the airplane and the bright, deep blue air near it made such a pretty picture. As soon as I saw it, my first thought was to take a picture of it, so I took out my camera as quickly as possible and ran to the back of the plane. How lucky I was to get three pictures of it. After another 40 or 50 minutes, I was woken again by another loud exclamation of admiration. This time it was over the view of the sunrise. ...
