Research On The Childhood Complex Expressed In Chinese Modern Local-color Oil Paintings

The life experience gained during childhood,an important stage in the process of a person’s growth,include impressions,emotions,memories,knowledge,dreams,and other subjective psychological feelings,which lays a foundation for the formation of values in the individual growth.Psychological factors with strong subjective emotions in the childhood play a crucial role in the formation of an artist’s personality and the presentation of his artistic works.Complex is a psychological term,first proposed by the Swiss psychologist Jung Carl Gustav who believes that complex is an emotion,thought and memory caused by the conflicts of individual experience in unconsciousness or the prototype(instinct)in the collective unconsciousness.To compensate for the imbalance brought by intrapsychic conflicts is the primary function of this subconscious psychological energy.To put is simply,complex is a psychological emotion from the subconscious where the individual seeks for psychological security and balances psychological conflicts.As a key period for the formation of individual personality,childhood plays a particularly important role in the growth of a person and even his life in the future.The various psychological factors and experiences in childhood will lead to corresponding complexes.The “childhood complex” mentioned in this thesis mainly refers to the expression of artist’s childhood experiences in local-color oil paintings.It can also be understood as the artist’s infinite recollection of the childhood in order to seek a spiritual homeland.From the perspective of psychological aesthetics,the artist has an inclination towards childhood,which enables the artist to obtain a fulfillment,sacredness,comfort,and eternity in the seeking for a spiritual homeland.Therefore,the psychological basis of the artist’s relating the childhood experience with Chinese contemporary local-color oil paintings can be found through Jung’s interpretation of the complex and the explanation of artist’s inclination towards childhood from the psychological aesthetics perspective.In Modern Psychological Aesthetics,Tong Qingbing,a famous literary theorist in China,emphasizes that the artist’s childhood experience has an important influence on his works.According tothe generation and category of experience and the creation motivate,the author of the thesis discusses how the childhood affects the artist’s creation from a psychological aesthetic point of view.With the “childhood complex” as a starting point of the thesis,different forms of expressing childhood experience in the works are analyzed through combining Chinese contemporary local-color oil paintings with representative artists so as to explore how artists incorporate the “childhood complex”into their works.There are four chapters in this thesis.The first chapter mainly explains the related core concepts,and makes definition for Chinese contemporary local-color oil paintings and “childhood complex” from the perspectives of production,development,and influence in order to make a relatively accurate statement of the core concepts related to the thesis.The second chapter mainly analyzes the relationship between the artist’s expression of “childhood complex” and local themes,and further discusses the external factors in artists’ childhood and growth environment,such as the characteristics of the times,the geographical environment,the regional culture(external factors)and the artist’s psychological(internal)inclination towards childhood led by childhood experiences.In Chapter 3,a case study of representative artists born in the 1950 s,60s,and 70 s is carried out to summarize different ways in which they express the “childhood complex.” And artistic values are discussed from the aspects of enriching the spiritual connotation of local-color oil paintings and the unique nationality embodied in the childhood complex.In the fourth chapter,the implications of “childhood complex” for the contemporary local-color oil paintings are summed up and the implications of “childhood complex”for the author according to the author’s actual condition are discussed.Finally,the practical significance of the expression of “childhood complex” in the local-color oil paintings is summarized.The concepts related to psychology,psychological aesthetics,sociology and fine arts are integrated in the thesis’ s exposition.Methods such as image analysis,argument by examples,case studies are adopted to dissect contemporary local-color oil paintings in which artists directly or indirectly express their own childhood experience and find those representative artists to make a comparison and interpretation.The characteristics of their works,expressive ways of the childhood experience and the formal language are summarized respectively and then the reflection of the development of contemporary local-color oil paintings is extended for a revelation of the practical social problem facing the countryside in globalization and urbanization,namely,the homeland carrying memories of childhood fades away,which reflects artists’ contradictions and confusion in the face of this phenomenon.