Emotion No. 1
Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1 Emotion No. 1

Established

Emotion No. 1

Artist Ding Hui
Creation Date 2008
Material Oil on canvas
Size 80 x 60 cm
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Current total $7,205.00

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  • Free shipping Included worldwide.
  • Secure checkout Encrypted payment.
  • Unique original Only one available.
  • Certificate Authenticity document.
  • 14-day returns After delivery.

Artwork details

Analysis and context

Artwork Notes

Painting analysis

A woman holds a cat against her in a field of red so saturated it becomes the dominant presence in the room before the figures do. Her head is tilted, her purple-grey hair catching the same heat, and her face is painted softly — half-real, half-dissolving into the red — as though the emotion of the moment has overtaken the likeness. The cat rests against her without performing for anyone, and the two bodies form one compressed shape where arms, fur, and fabric merge.

What makes the painting unusual is not the subject but the way it is painted. The colour is extreme: red fills the entire surface with an intensity that turns companionship into confrontation, warmth into pressure. The brushwork is restless — short, directional strokes push the fur and clothing forward, while harder dark lines cut across the softer passages and stop the image from settling into anything decorative. Where the two figures overlap, the paint is densest, layering strokes until the boundary between person and animal nearly disappears. Where the red opens up, the surface thins and breathes, but only briefly — the density always returns.

There is humour in the cat's expression — a kind of stubborn indifference that contrasts with everything else the painting throws at the viewer. The work holds tenderness and unease at the same time, which is why it feels honest rather than staged. Oil on canvas, 80 × 60 cm.

Theme

Style and context

This painting belongs to a contemporary figurative mode where the relationship between humans and animals becomes a vehicle for emotional expression. The woman and her cat share a single field of saturated colour, and the intimacy of their physical closeness — arms wrapped, bodies overlapping — is treated with directness rather than sentimentality. The red field is not decorative background; it is the emotional temperature of the painting, pressing the figures together and turning their companionship into something more psychologically charged.

The approach connects to a lineage of Expressionist portraiture where colour and distortion carry inner feeling rather than external description. In the context of contemporary Chinese oil painting, the work stands apart from polite realism. Its compressed space, the woman's half-dissolved face, and the unexplained coexistence of tenderness and tension push the image toward a more personal language — one that is less about documenting a scene than about capturing the temperature of a moment between two living beings.

Artist Profile

Artist introduction

Ding Hui is a contemporary oil painter born in Xi'an, Shaanxi, to a family of Manchu, Han, and Russian heritage. She moved to Shenzhen in 1989. She entered the Oil Painting Department of Xi'an Peihua Women's University at the age of sixteen, later studied at Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts in 1991, traveled through Europe for artistic research, and graduated from Hong Kong Fashion Design Academy in 1998.

Her practice centers on contemporary figurative expression, often using animals, red wine, and everyday objects to speak about emotion, life, and desire. Her paintings are known for dense colour, free brushwork, and a strong sense of psychological tension, combining a female perspective with contemporary conceptual awareness.

In 2006, all works she submitted to her Shenzhen Yihai Auction House debut were collected. She joined the 2007 Shenzhen Contemporary Art Presentation Exhibition at Guanshan Yue Art Museum, held the solo exhibition Great Love Across Species in Shenzhen in 2010, and was selected for the 5th China Youth Contemporary Art Exhibition in 2012.

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