In 2019, at the China Guardian Autumn Auction, Leng Jun's hyper-realistic oil painting "Little Ginger" became the object of heated discussion.
The starting price of the oil painting was 30 million, and after the auction started, ** soared all the way to 50 million, and finally, it was sold at 70.15 million**.
This also became the writer Leng Jun, and finally sold the highest oil painting.
Speaking of Leng Jun, his oil paintings are an outlier in the Chinese painting world.
Normally, every painter has his own ideas, and the paintings he paints are the sustenance of his own emotions.
But Leng Jun's oil paintings are different, they do not carry any emotions, and only present superb painting skills.
Such a work can be auctioned at a sky-high price of 70.15 million, which is completely unprecedented in the history of Chinese painting.
Who is Leng Jun and why can he polish an oil painting to such an extent.
What kind of story is hidden behind the oil painting "Little Ginger", which was sold for 70.15 million yuan?
Today, let's talk about this topic.
Leng Jun was able to embark on the road of painting, and his neighbors contributed a lot.
When Leng Jun was very young, his neighbor gave him a picture album, which accompanied Leng Jun for many years.
Leng Jun has liked to draw since he was a child, and he likes to paint realistic things the most.
Sometimes, he would go to the cinema, look closely at the characters on the posters, and when he got home, he would draw the characters on paper.
Leng Jun likes to observe, every time he looks at the poster, but he can't stick his eyes on it.
It is precisely because of this that Leng Jun's eyesight plummeted.
When he was a teenager, Leng Jun's vision was already blurred.
In art class, the teacher asked the students to draw plaster paintings.
The other students were honestly sketching, and only Leng Jun was alone, lying next to the plaster statue, observing every detail of the model.
At this point, the teacher will bang on the table.
"Draw the outline first!”
Each time, Leng Jun would smile awkwardly, scratch his head, and scribble a few lines on the paper to outline a rough outline.
After the teacher left, he continued to run to the plaster statues, observing every detail of the plaster statues, and then drawing them on paper.
It was this kind of "scattered perspective" painting method that laid a good foundation for Leng Jun to become a hyperrealist painter later.
At this time, Leng Jun did not realize that he was short-sighted.
He thought that all his classmates were like him, and when he looked at things from a distance, things would become blurry.
It wasn't until he sat in the back row that the plaster cast in front of him was ghosted.
After telling his father, Leng Jun's myopia was exposed.
Sent to the hospital for a check-up, good guy, myopia up to 500 degrees. In the eyes of ordinary people, it is no different from being blind.
After wearing glasses, Leng Jun put them on, only to know that the world was so clear, and the plaster in front of him seemed to come to life.
This allowed him to observe more detail, and after that, he drifted away from the path of realism.
After entering the third year of junior high school, Leng Jun's father began to worry.
Painting is a hobby after all, it is impossible to eat for a lifetime, if you want to get ahead, you still have to learn mathematics, physics and chemistry seriously.
His father asked Leng Jun to give up painting and concentrate on Xi.
But how could Leng Jun, who likes to draw, take more thought out of painting and Xi?
Sure enough, at the age of 16, Leng Jun failed to take the high school entrance examination.
His father was very angry and wanted Leng Jun to repeat his studies and retake the exam next year, but a comrade-in-arms persuaded him.
"The army likes to learn Xi, so why waste time, isn't it good to let him draw with peace of mind?Maybe I'll be a painter in the future!”
When Leng Jun's father heard this, his heart went to his heart.
In 1984, Leng Jun graduated from the Art Department of the Hankou Branch of Wuhan Normal University.
In his spare time, Leng Jun often paints.
Influenced by his childhood, Leng Jun loves a realistic style, and most of his paintings develop in this direction.
Because of the pursuit of details, Leng Jun paints very slowly, others can finish painting in a few days, and he has to grind for nearly a month.
In half a year, only seven or eight works have been completed.
But each work has a distinct style, the table, the table lamp, placed there, as delicate as if it had been photographed with a camera.
In painting, Leng Jun's style gradually took shape, and he became well-known in the industry.
In 1991, his first hyper-realistic work "The Story of the Horse Lantern" won the bronze medal of the National Art Exhibition.
In 1993, "About the Design of the Net" won the silver medal of the National Art Award.
Since then, Leng Jun's works have won numerous awards across the country.
At this stage, his oil paintings were mainly objects, rarely touching people, and had a very strong personal thought.
For example, "Landscape of the Century No. 3", before the painting was painted, a building in South Korea collapsed with a bang, and it was finally found that cutting corners.
When Leng Jun found out, he was very shocked, so he painted this picture.
In the painting, a world map made of cement carries all kinds of garbage.
Collapsed buildings, children's toys, baby pacifiers, etc., symbolize the coming of disaster, the crying and helplessness of children.
There is also Leng Jun's oil painting "Palmistry" completed in 1996.
That year, after visiting the Wuhan Iron and Steel Plant, Leng Jun picked up a discarded glove, and after seeing it, he felt very shocked.
An ordinary glove with rust on it and all kinds of cracks and traces of paint.
One can imagine what kind of miracles his master used to create with him.
And this miracle should not be buried.
So, Leng Jun painted this glove into his oil painting.
The former sold a staggering 43.7 million, and the latter also had 6.9 million.
Many people don't understand Leng Jun's painting very much, what is the point of painting it no matter how similar it is, it is better for me to take a picture with a video camera.
Some netizens even ridiculed Leng Jun's "Palmistry".
"Leng Jun should draw two gloves, so that they can be sold for 13.8 million!”
But in fact, Leng Jun's oil paintings are really meaningless?Not really.
*No matter how similar the shot is, it's just**, press the shutter to present it in front of the public.
But oil painting is different, no matter how similar it is, it is not **, but the embodiment of the painter's ability, not everyone can do it.
It is rare to be able to draw a thing like ** in the world.
This is the excellence of Leng Jun's oil paintings.
After 2000, Leng Jun felt that the time was ripe, so he began to experiment with hyper-realistic portraiture.
In 2004, Leng Jun's "Mona Lisa - Design About Smile" was released and amazed the audience at the 10th National Art Exhibition.
In this painting, there is no thought.
Yes, with only super high painting skills, the models are depicted beautifully, almost out of oil painting.
An Academy of Fine Arts student even sighed after stopping and staring for an hour.
"I think I'm already in love with this girl!”
In this way, the cold army's attempt was successful.
In 2005, he officially launched the first work in the "Portrait Phase" series, "Xiao Luo".
Xiao Luo's full name is Luo Min, and he has suffered from autism since he was a child.
It was art that saved her and allowed her to get out of the way and become an elementary school art teacher.
Her school is only one street away from Leng Jun's studio.
Luo Min admires Leng Jun very much, and she feels that a painter should paint what she wants to paint, rather than relying on it to eat.
Therefore, Luo Min often came to the door with his paintings to ask for advice.
While admiring Leng Jun's paintings, Luo Min found that his paintings were difficult to understand.
It's always something I don't know what to say, but it's hard for a realist painter to hide his thoughts in his paintings.
Even if it is hidden, few people can see it, which is why Leng Jun is often ridiculed by netizens.
Therefore, Luo Min gave advice to Leng Jun.
"Why don't you try your hand at portraiting?”
After Leng Jun heard about it, he felt that this suggestion was reliable, so he invited Luo Min to be the model of his first portrait.
In this regard, Luo Min readily agreed.
Painting realistic oil paintings, few people want to be models.
Because the painting time is very long, at least a week, or more than a few months, not to mention the hyper-realistic oil paintings.
This is also the reason why Leng Jun is reluctant to put pen to paper.
But now that there are models, everything falls into place.
In order to help Leng Jun, Luo Min directly quit his original job and became a full-time model for Leng Jun with peace of mind.
Being a model is a very boring thing, and in order to relax Luo Min, Leng Jun often tells her stories from ancient and modern times when creating.
will even put some ** to let Luo Min relax.
In this way, a few months later, the hyper-realistic oil painting "Xiao Luo" was born, and the two people also fell in love because of the painting, and finally came together.
"Xiao Luo", at the 2010 Beijing Autumn Auction, was sold for 31.36 million **, setting a new personal auction record for Leng Jun.
It stands to reason that two people should be able to support each other all the time because of their paintings.
But I didn't expect that the painter's love would be so awkward.
Leng Jun and Luo Min's personalities are completely different.
Leng Jun has an introverted personality and likes to draw, often painting all day.
The wife likes to be lively, likes to wear beautiful clothes, and goes out shopping with Leng Jun, and there are more than oil paintings in her world.
But obviously, Leng Jun couldn't give Luo Min the life he wanted.
The love between two people was originally impulsive, the enthusiasm faded, and all that was left was chicken feathers.
In this way, in 2011, Luo Min was admitted to the ** Academy of Fine Arts as a graduate student in oil painting, and resolutely went to Beijing to study.
And Leng Jun didn't keep her and let Luo Min leave him.
In any case, "Xiao Luo" made the Cold Army famous, and this is only the beginning of "Portrait", not the end.
In 2019, Leng Jun's "Little Ginger" was born, and at the Guardian Autumn Auction, it was priced at a sky-high price of 70.15 million.
This is also the most advanced oil painting of Leng Jun at auction.
The painting "Little Jiang" can be said to have poured all the efforts of Leng Jun.
This year, Leng Jun wanted to find a model for his oil paintings, but after looking for a long time, it was either inappropriate or no one wanted to come.
There is no way, Leng Jun can only go out and try his luck.
When he came to the train station, Leng Jun met Xiao Jiang, a working girl.
At that time, she was introduced by a friend and went to the city to look for a job, and because of a smile, Leng Jun was deeply impressed.
He immediately stepped forward and invited Xiao Jiang to be the model of his oil painting.
Xiao Jiang was startled, thinking that he was **.
But after searching on the Internet, I looked at his studio again, and I was surprised, it turned out that Leng Jun was such a famous painter.
immediately agreed to the invitation and decided to be a model for the cold army.
But when he really started creating, Xiao Jiang realized that he had been fooled.
Being a model is a very boring job, often sitting for hours at a time, not being able to move, which can disrupt the painter's mind.
Leng Jun is known for his slowness in painting, and the painting of "Little Ginger" is very serious, and during Leng Jun's painting, it is torment for Xiao Jiang.
Finally, after five months, Xiao Jiang couldn't take it anymore.
She took advantage of Leng Jun's inattention, quietly packed her luggage, and left the studio without even saying hello to the other party.
By the time Leng Jun knew the news, Xiao Jiang had already disappeared.
At this time, the painting was only half completed, and Leng Jun had poured a lot of effort into it, so it was impossible for him to give up in vain.
So, he found a dummy, put on the same clothes, posed in a similar pose, and continued to create the follow-up content.
Because there are no models, "Little Ginger" draws very slowly.
This painting is the culmination of Leng Jun's creation, which took more than a year.
Although the creation time is long, everyone has seen the final effect, which is amazing, and even has reached the point of being fake.
Many people don't understand why such a good oil painting like ** can be sold for a sky-high price of 70.15 million.
But if you zoom in 10 times on the details of the painting, you can see the secret.
After magnification, every texture of the character** is no different from a real person, and it is completely impossible to see that it is drawn with ink.
The details on the sweater's body, every messy silk thread, and the traces of weaving have reached the point where it is difficult to distinguish between the real and the fake.
Looking at the whole country, there is no second one that can paint the details so delicately, except for Leng Jun.
70.15 million **, it is well deserved.
Now Leng Jun is still on the road of creation, and the controversy against him on the Internet has never stopped.
But Leng Jun himself turned a deaf ear to all this.
As a pure creator, he dedicated his whole to oil painting, and everything else, he simply did not have time to pay attention to.
I'm just drawing, that's all.