From farmers to heroes, every face finds dignity

Dozens of landscapes, portraits and history-themed paintings that Yang created after 2000 are on display at the museum, a building designed by I.M. Pei in which the late architect integrated the warm feelings of his ancestral Suzhou — attractive and elegant — with a modernist temperament.

Such an aesthetic combination of past and present, East and West, is also evident in Yang's work.

According to Hong Mei, the exhibition's curator and an associate professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, Yang's alma mater, the works on show reflect three different inspirations for Yang as a mature artist: "nature, where he explores the strength and nourishment of the Chinese cultural spirit; farmers, from whom he has found divine glories; and luminous personas in history".

"He achieves a painterly balance between the divinity, order and harmony of classicism and the spirituality of Chinese art, revealing the truth of human nature," she says.