Jennifer Cody Epstein's The Painter from Shanghai is the story of one woman's artistic awakening during the tumultuous beginnings of the twentieth century. Epstein's sensuous prose reflects the exoticism of her subject, and her reimagining of the life of Chinese Post-Impressionist painter, Pan Yuliang, is as lush as the paintings Yuliang created. This is a novel best read slowly and savored as it is rich in detail and atmosphere.
The daughter of a talented embroiderer, Xiuqing is orphaned at a young age and raised by her opium-addict uncle. Although he offers her an uneven education, comprised mostly of learning classical poetry, his familial loyalty runs out when he can no longer pay for his habit. Xiuqing believes she's being taken to enter a workshop to become an embroiderer like her mother, instead she's sold into a brothel ironically named The Hall of Eternal Splendor. At only fourteen she must quickly learn to adapt in order to survive. This will be the first of her transformations. Her innocence lost, Xiuqing becomes Yuliang, or Good Jade.
The life of a prostitute is a dire one, made only slightly more bearable by Jinling, the brothel's top girl. Beautiful and optimistic that she can buy her way out, she takes Yuliang under her wing. It's Jinling's beauty that inspires Yuliang to make her first drawing, which is confiscated by the brothel owner. Jinling's image will haunt her long after she leaves the brothel. Few escape, but Yuliang catches the eye of a government official who buys her freedom. Pan Zanhua is a decent man. His interest in the brothel isn't of a lascivious nature, rather his desire is to put a stop to corruption perpetrated by other government officials and the merchant class. Zanhua is progressive in his beliefs, and an ardent follower of revolutionary ideals. He makes Yuliang first his concubine, and then to prevent a scandal takes her as his second wife. She becomes Pan Yuliang and moves to Shanghai, while he remains behind to continue his work. Unlike his first arranged marriage, his relationship with Yuliang is based on love and respect. He teaches her to read and exposes her to revolutionary literature, which is changing the political face of China.
With Panhua's help Yuliang is accepted to the Shanghai Art Academy, one of the few women taken on as a student. Basing their instruction on western methods, female nudes are often the subject of the student's studies, which are considered controversial in China's still conservative society. Controversy, however, will continue to dog Pan Yuliang's long career as she often chooses to paint nudes, sometimes even making studies of herself for lack of willing models, which is considered vulgar and shocking. Her artistic education is continued when she receives a scholarship to study in France. As she adapts her art and way of living towards the modern West, she finds it still clashes with her beloved country despite its progressive revolutionary leanings. Like so many other artists and women especially, she eventually must choose between her love for painting and her love for her country and for Zanhua.
I've given you only the briefest outline of the story, but Yuliang's life spanned three quarters of the twentieth century, so it's impossible to go into any great detail without ruining the plot. I'm also a little shaky on Chinese history and the many reverses politically that occurred during the upheaval of the early part of the century. This is a story you'll want to explore on your own without knowing all the details, as Yuliang lived a full and dramatic life, so this is a story that opens out before you begging for your complete attention. The author notes that while the book is based on Pan Yuliang and her art as described in the few available sources, the rest is based on what she imagined her life to be like. "The characters, events, and places depicted are like the paintings that inspired them--impressionistic portraits." As a work of literary fiction, I thought Epstein created a wonderful story of a woman of great depth and character. Hers was a life not without certain paradoxes, but then how often is life straightforward.
This is a bittersweet story, and it's impossible not to feel sympathetic towards Yuliang in her search to find out who she really is and express herself through her art, and to understand what she had to give up to do what she loved. I think it was not so much as just loving what you do, but feeling empty and lost when you're not doing it and then having to make heartbreaking decisions in order to feel fulfilled. Before reading The Painter from Shanghai, I had never heard of Pan Yuliang. I've yet to find a book of her work, though you can view some of her many paintings here. I'm curious to learn more about her and see where she and her work fits into the scheme of things. I find it amazing how her early life experiences helped shape her artistic life, though it was a past that in the end she could not escape from. Highly recommended.
Be sure to check out Jennifer Cody Epstein's website here.