Chen Kong Fang was born in 1931 in Tung Cheng, Anhui province, China. As a child, he was inclined to drawing and, as a teenager, he studied watercolor and sumi-ê1 techniques. After the death of his father - a notable figure in local politics - Fang migrated to Brazil with his family in 1951, after a period of hardship in his homeland, where he had experienced the hardships of the Chinese Civil War. In the mid-1950s, in São Paulo, Fang studied occidental painting with Yoshiya Takaoka (1909-1978), a Japanese painter and teacher of some Japanese-Brazilian painters of the Seibi-Kai generation, such as Manabu Mabe (1924-1997). During his apprenticeship, Fang absorbed references from the realist and naturalist styles of occidental painting in his landscapes, portraits and still lifes. However, from the 1960s onwards, he began to produce landscapes of the urban area.
Among group shows, his work has circulated since 1957 in exhibitions such as the 6th Salão Nacional de Arte Moderna, in Rio de Janeiro (1957); different editions of the Salão Paulista de Arte Moderna, at Galeria Prestes Maia; 12th and 13th Salão do Grupo Seibi at Espaço Cultural Bunkyo, in São Paulo (1968 and 1969); 1st Salão Paulista de Arte Contemporânea at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand - MASP (1969); 11th Panorama da Arte Atual Brasileira, at the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo - MAM-SP (1979); 18 contemporâneos, at Dan Galeria in São Paulo (1987); Contemporary Brazilian Nikkei Artists, at the Niigata Prefectural Museum of Art, in Niigata and at the Azabu Art Museum, in Tokyo (Japan, 1995 and 1996); Mínimo, Múltiplo, Comum, at Pina Estação in São Paulo (2018), among others. Solo exhibitions include: Fang, Galeria Cosme Velho, Rio de Janeiro (1978); Fang, Dan Galeria, São Paulo (1981); Fang, The International Museum of the 20th Century Artists, Laguna (USA, 1990); Os Pincéis de Fang, at Centro Cultural Correios, São Paulo (2014), among others. In 2024, Fang's work will be exhibited as part of the Diasporas Asiáticas program at the Instituto Tomie Ohtake, with the solo show Chen Kong Fang - O Refúgio. His work is part of the collections of the Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo, the Museu de Arte Muderna de São Paulo - MAM-SP, the Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Univeridade de São Paulo - MAC-USP, the Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand - MASP and the Art Collection of the Palácio 9 de Julho, in São Paulo.
1 In etymology, sumi-ê means "ink painting". It is a pictorial practice that differs from occidental painting in that it involves drawing and calligraphic elements. It originated in China and was taken to Japan, where it spread widely. "Sumi" is the name of the ink itself, which in turn resembles India ink, and its usual and ideal support in sumi-ê is handmade rice paper. The essential elements are simplicity, symbolism, naturalness, harmony, precision and synthesis.