Inspiration of subject matter depends on one’s cultural background, education and life experience.
It could be a book you read, a folk story in your culture, or something you observed in life. But there is a lot more to think about after selecting a subject. For example, who is in the painting? What are they doing? When and where is this taking place? Why are the people doing what they are doing? What is the relationship between these people? I think of the artist as the screen writer, director, stage designer, costume designer and make-up artist all in one and that he has to select a scene from the movie or the play to put on the canvas. And selecting that scene is a journey in itself.
A painting I’m currently working on is Battle of Changde. The source of inspiration is from childhood experience. I grew up next to the Battle of Changde Memorial in the city of Changde, Hunan province in Central China. The memorial was built to commemorate the Chinese soldiers who participated in the Battle of Changde in 1943, one of the major campaigns in the Second Sino-Japanese War during the Second World War. According to Bai Congxi‘s memoirs, a total of 160,000 Japanese troops and 210,000 Chinese troops participated in the battle. The battle saw heavy casualties on both sides. The Japanese began their offensive on November 2, 1943. Changde was guarded by the Chinese 57th Division from the 74th Corps. The division’s 8,000 troops, in spite of being overwhelmingly outnumbered by the Japanese invading troops, stubbornly held on to the city for eleven days and nights. When the Chinese reinforcement finally arrived, there were 100 survivors in the 57th division and all were wounded. The city of Changde fell to the Japanese control on December 6 and was retaken by the Chinese on December 13 after intense house-to-house fighting.
