Wuxi

On Tuesday September 23, our Grade 9–12 Visual Arts students embarked on an inspiring field trip to the West Bund Art Museum to explore two landmark exhibitions—“Reinventing Landscape: Centre Pompidou Collection vol. IV” and “David Hockney: Bigger & Closer.”

Using a grade-differentiated reflection worksheet, they dug deep into observation, analysis and personal response:

Each student chose a landscape work that resonated with them, sketched it on-site, and captured mood and colour in just two adjectives. They also investigated how unconventional materials (collage, found objects) reshape our idea of “landscape.”

Pitting a Pompidou landscape against a Hockney piece, students compared how colour, line and scale influenced their feelings. They reflected on the immersive power of installations versus the intimacy of framed paintings.

Seniors evaluated their strongest emotional responses in light of the artist’s intent and the curator’s design choices (lighting, layout, sequencing). They connected material choices to socio-political and environmental debates, and considered how immersive displays redefine the viewer–artwork relationship.

Back in the classroom, students are buzzing—discovering hidden textures in Hockney’s multi-panel canvases, debating sustainability in contemporary art, and refining their own creative practice. We’ve captured their insights in short video reflections and a photo gallery of sketches and exhibition highlights.

Quotes from students

The immersive video piece ‘The Four Seasons’ in the David Hockney exhibition impacted me the

most. It made me feel like I was walking inside a digital forest. It was evocative because it brought back memories of a park I visited, and innovative because the changing colours and perspectives were like nothing I’ve seen before.

In the past, I always think that perspective is the most important thing in art work. Like a core of our earth so every time before I start art work I very care about the performance of perspective. But in the exhibition David Hockney said chairs don’t have perspective and then he drew a lot of pictures of irregular chairs. After that I clearly understand Art is not a rule or very strict. Art is follow the sense of your heart and directly draw the thing that you want to show to yourself or the audience. And today I change the understanding and view of perspective. Nobody said perspective must be like that. It is just all the things you can see in your whole sight.

The artist’s work is about “perspective.” David Hockney uses photography, painting, and collage to make videos that feel like a play, shown in a room with videos on all four walls. It’s very immersive.

I related to his work because in our current unit of study, A sense of Place we are also exploring our surroundings – school and dorm life similar to the artist. Visiting this show gave me a lot of new ideas and has inspired me to take pictures of one place from many angles and then combine them into a collage.