My Mother—The Painter Lifang

When I was a little child, I didn't immediately understand that my parents were both painters and that our family was different. Not only was my mother, Lifang, a painter, but so was my father, Hans Brun.^[1]

They met in Paris in 1961. Her Taiwanese passport was issued on October 17, 1959,^[2] and was valid for only two years, or until October 16, 1961, which was the duration of the scholarship she received from the French Government. She was the first Taiwanese woman to receive such a scholarship. 

Her visa to France was accorded on August 3, 1959, and delivered on October 20, 1959. She arrived in Paris at Orly Airport on October 31, 1959. While in Paris, she visited several areas of France with her class, such as the Lascaux caves. She visited Switzerland by herself in July 1961,^[3] taking the train to Zermatt to see the Gornergrat glacier. She went to Switzerland a second time on February 12, 1962, entering from the train station in Basel.^[4] She was authorized by the Swiss Embassy to go to Switzerland a third time in May 1962, and entered Switzerland from Basel on May 9, 1962. However, this trip was not simply for tourism, but to marry my father, Hans Brun. The wedding was not celebrated in a church, but only in front of the municipal office of Neuenkirch, Canton of Lucerne. There are no photos recording this day, presumably because Lifang was pregnant.^[5]

Her student card at the Ecole nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts was issued on November 14, 1959. On the card, it is mentioned that she was a student of a teacher named Souverbie.^[6] Her student card was renewed and valid until February 15, 1962. In Paris she lived in a studio located at 20 Avenue de Wagram, 8th Arrondissement, near the Arc de Triomphe.

Traveling from Taipei to Paris, Lifang did not bring much luggage, only some clothes, stamps (to sell from time to time), US dollars, and about 30 small pastel drawings that she had made mainly in and around Keelung. Those pastel drawings moved with her from Taipei to Paris, from Paris to Lucerne, and from Lucerne to Castel San Pietro, where I found them in her house in 2017. One, representing the Taipei Presidential Palace in 1957 and 26.5 x 35.5 cm, was donated to TFAM. Another pastel that survived all the moving in her life was titled Paysage de Taiwan, created in 1958, and 25 x 20 cm. It represents a road somewhere in Taiwan with houses along the road, an extremely beautiful violet and red sky, maybe a sunset, and utility poles in the foreground.

My parents' wedding was not planned, as Lifang was supposed to return to Taiwan in October-November 1961, and her family arranged for her to marry the secretary of the Kuomintang party. I think she must have met my father more or less in the same period, fallen in love, and gotten pregnant, so her life changed, and the original plan to stay in France for only two years became a lifetime in Europe. My mother returned to Taipei only once, which was in 1991 shortly before her mother, Chao-Yei, passed away. I was told by Lifang that my grandma Chao-Yei (married to Lee Chun-Ho) wanted to come to Switzerland in 1962 and take us (my mother and me) back to Taiwan, but that never happened, and no one from Taiwan visited when I was born. My mother's oldest sister, Lin Mi-Chu, visited her several times in the early 1980s, for example in July 1982 when they went to Schilthorn-Mürren.

While in Paris from 1959 to 1961, Lifang focused mainly on abstract painting, including her oil Guerre des trois royaumes (37 x 53 cm, 1960),^[1] which was exhibited in 1961 at Galerie Tedesco with works by other recipients of French Government scholarships;^[2] her Dragon and Phoenix (46.5 x 61 cm, 1960), which is now in the collection of the Museum and was exhibited at its 2013 exhibition Women Adventurers: Five Eras of Taiwanese Art, curated by Lei Yi-Ting. Lifang didn't paint much from 1962 to 1963 because she was busy moving from Paris to Switzerland and then gave birth to me in August of 1962. She started painting again in 1964, and until 1970, painted in the abstract style. Two works from this period are currently exhibited at the Kunsthalle Bielefeld: Autumn (1969),^[3] and Untitled (1968).^[4] I will not focus here on this period because much has been written recently about women abstract painters in connection with the exhibition Action, Gesture, Paint: Women Artists and Global Abstraction 1940-1970, which toured Europe from 2023 to 2024, starting at Whitechapel Gallery London in England, then moving to the Van Gogh foundation in Arles, France, and ending its tour at the Kunsthalle Bielefeld in Germany.^[5] The only thing I can say is that I like my mother's abstract paintings because I'm familiar with them. I saw these paintings being created when I was a little child from the ages of two to eight, and still today, we hang many of her abstract paintings in our homes, in particular in my parents' little old house in Castel San Pietro Ticino, Switzerland.^[6] My mother told me that she painted some of her abstract works while holding me in her arms. In the 1960s, she also created some nice ceramics, and her favorite subject was dragons, so I also have a ceramic dragon (approximately 28 x 23 x 23 cm, 1960; see image 7). She also made some small plates and vases, for which she used a kiln in Paris and later one in Riva San Vitale in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland.

From my early childhood until the age of 17, I spent all my summers in Sempach-Station, Canton of Lucerne, at a small farm called Hohforen, where my uncle Rudi and his wife Dorly still live today. My grandma on my father's side, Berta, also lived there and took care of me when I was visiting. I mention this because it is relevant to my parents' artwork. During the three long months of each summer, they were free from family duties and could travel around Switzerland, mainly visiting the Engadin region, including Sils Maria, near St. Moritz, Guarda and Averstal-Cresta-Juf,^[7] the Lötschental valley in the canton of Valais, and the Bernese Alps in Beatenberg,^[8] and Lenk im Simmental, where they hiked and painted watercolors outdoors (see images of the Swiss national parks in the late 1960s). They would visit national parks almost every year, for example in 1978 and 1981, typically walking 1-2 hours to find a scenic spot, painting 3-4 hours with a picnic of rice, vegetables and eggs, and then returning to their local base.^[9] 

Lifang painted in the abstract style until 1969-1970, but already in 1965 and especially in 1968, her style was changing and becoming more figurative. For example, in 1965 we visited Lötschental, a very remote valley in the Canton of Valais, and she painted a very beautiful watercolor representing stones in a grass field in Fafleralp.^[1] The stones reminded me of a Japanese garden, but instead of graves, there was grass. If one looks at the watercolor, one can hardly see this landscape, but being there once is enough for you to know that the landscape is there in the watercolor. Fafleralp, which is at the end of Lötschental, is by the way worth the trip if one travels to Switzerland. It is a good alternative to going only to well known places like Lucerne, Zermatt or St. Moritz.

The watercolor and oil paintings of the 1970's are by far my favorites because I have a clearer memory of them. A few are still family owned, and I know them more intimately than the abstract paintings, of which I have only a vague, dreamlike memory surrounded by fog. In 1971, my parents bought a small piece of land in Castel San Pietro and built a small stone and wood house in a style that could be described as a mixture of Swiss mountain cabin and Japanese wood house. The house was built in the middle of nature and had windows extending down to the floor without curtains. So many of my mother's oil paintings would just represent the surrounding nature out the window, like in a Japanese house. In front of the living room window, many flowers bloomed in spring, and one of her favorite subjects was anemones in bloom,^[2] sometimes with birds or butterflies. The artworks painted at home were mainly oil on canvas or large watercolors, whereas the ones created outdoors or while traveling were medium-sized watercolors (eg. 38 x 50 cm). Another of my favorite paintings was made in 1982 and is also her smallest painting, measuring only 20 cm x 21 cm, an ideal size for taking along on a trip or hanging in a boat or airplane, even though I have never done that, at least so far.^[3] Its title is a short poem called "Autunno erbe riscaldare il cuore" (Autumn herbs warm the heart) and represents a real flower bouquet of various late summer flowers. Lifang was fond of flowers and would write their exact Latin names on the reverse side of these paintings, on a separate sheet of paper, or on stickers. Unfortunately, many of these stickers have been lost.

Another beloved painting, if not my favorite, is Noree by Night, 37 cm x 50 cm, painted in 1971 and representing the landscape (vineyards and a corn field) by night.^[4] It was painted with care over almost 3 months: many leaves are painted one by one in a manner similar to works by the Swiss romantic painter Robert Zünd (1821-1909). A squirrel can even be seen running down a tree in the painting. It was painted over many nights from the house balcony. Unfortunately, this landscape no longer exists due to extensive construction around the house, and the land has been dedicated to single or multi family homes. Lifang's house was all alone from 1971 to 2015, but right now, eight luxury apartment buildings are to be built in front of Lifang's house.^[5] 

My mother's late style, works that she produced around 2000, evolved and became less figurative and larger, usually 80 x 80 cm. Her eyesight had deteriorated, and she was practicing Tai-Chih several times a week, so had less time to spend working on each small painting. Her focus shifted to composition, the use of color, and significance thereof.

These works, mainly in Europe now, are part of what I call her "esoteric period," an example of which is a painting of a yin/yang symbol on a blue sky. Besides art, she was interested in a lot of other subjects, such as astrology, and she visited Stonehenge in 1991 or 1992. Before and after 2000, she painted many trees, in particular chestnut trees in spring, summer and especially in autumn, for which she used watercolors. With oil on canvas, she painted mainly magnolias and blossoming fruit trees, like her 2002 Blossoming Tree.

One of her main influences was her French supporter and collector Andre Kahn - Wolf.^[1] He collected several of my mother's artworks and donated one to a French museum, along with other artists. At some point in the late 1960s, he wrote to Lifang, "You ask me how you shall paint? Why don't you try landscapes in pointilliste style?"^[2] Once settled in Switzerland, my mother and father had to make a living out of art. Her French scholarship ended in late 1961, and probably so was her family's money. Taiwanese currency was not readily convertible, and the family could no longer support her. My father, also a painter, worked once for three months part-time in a factory, but besides that, they wanted and managed to make a living from art without too much compromise. They never worked as art teachers in Switzerland, painted very few portraits on demand, and abandoned abstract painting for figuration, landscapes, and still-lifes to satisfy the tastes of Swiss customers. In the early 1960s, abstract painting was en vogue, in fashion as one would say, but still hard to sell in the countryside in the Canton of Lucerne or Canton Ticino. Only one collector, Jean Pierre Gysel from Zurich Kloten, purchased dozens of abstract paintings.

So my mother turned naturally to Swiss landscapes, flower paintings, and sometimes still-lifes. She also said that the result of abstraction was too random and that it was time to give it up. Personally I do not believe her abstract paintings were random: they weren't always 100% abstract and had a technique. For example, her blue and red abstract painting Untitled, created in 1969 and 39 x 50 cm (image 6), has several layers and one can see that the result is not random.

Besides her French art teacher Jean Souverbie, another influence came from the Chinese painter Chu Teh-Chun, who at that time lived at 11 Rue Sesto Fiorentino, Apt. 101, 93170 Bagnolet, France. He had an influence on her abstract watercolors from the period of 1960 to 1968, in which the colors would merge at random as they were driven by water, an effect also seen in some of Chu Teh-Chun's paintings.

Another source of inspiration was contemporary classical music, like that of Igor Stravinsky, Bela Bartok, and Sergej Rachmaninov, or by jazz musicians, such as the Modern Jazz Quartet. She used to attend the Lugano Estival Jazz and Ascona Jazz Festival every year and make many sketches of the musicians playing while listening to their music.^[3] Her favorites were Miles Davis, Wynton Marsalis, and Oscar Peterson, as well as many others.

Among her teachers in Taiwan, she mentioned Puyi's (the last Qing Dynasty emperor) brother, who was teaching in Taipei. Hans and Lifang had limited contact with other artists, gallerists, and art critics. Lifang disliked the bohemian lifestyle of some other artists, who tended to show up each time with a different girlfriend and want to talk all night long. In the 1960s when she was in Paris, she was offered a part in a movie with the French actor Robert Hossein,^[1] but she turned it down, wanting to stay focused on her art.

My mother and father had a very regular and healthy way of life with regular sleeping hours, regular eating times and no alcohol or cigarettes. She was very attractive and my father kept people away from their home because they would show more interest in her than in him. If a collector would buy art from her, he would say that it was only because they like exotic things. One day, in the 1970s, the director of the Swiss Federal Office of Culture dropped by for a visit (he had no appointment, because they had no telephone),^[2] and my father sent him away. He came back after a few minutes and selected two paintings for the Swiss Confederation. My father was very disappointed and said that this person had no knowledge of art. Lifang was influenced by some artists she couldn't meet like Sonia Delaunay (for her color theories), Hans Memling, Leonardo da Vinci, John Constable, Vincent Van Gogh (for his use of pure color, not mixed), Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, Pablo Picasso and Edvard Munch. To my knowledge, she tried to use the colors as they came out from the Talens tubes and would not mix them like my father did. Certainly many other teachers and friends influenced my mother's art, and I apologize to any person omitted.

Regarding her childhood and early education, she grew up during the Japanese occupation of Taiwan and attended a Japanese school. She was a student of Ms. Zou Yue-Po and the only Taiwanese student in her class. All her life, she kept good relationships with her former Japanese classmates, in particular Ms. Ohura Sue and Ms. Matsumoto. She never traveled to Japan but joined them while on tour in Switzerland. She was very disappointed that her Japanese teachers had to leave Taiwan after World War II and disliked that Taiwanese people were throwing stones at them. During the end of the war, when US Forces were bombing Taipei, she stayed at her grandma's farm outside Taipei (Shilin). She mentioned that they did not have enough food and had to eat roots from the forest. At school, the Japanese would force them to sit all day on a plaza and were only given one bowl of rice. Besides being interested in art, she was a good swimmer and participated at several swimming championships, where she won several races. She also used to swim in the Pacific Ocean near Keelung or on the East coast. One day, she was entirely covered by a large manta ray that swam with her for a while. All her life, she spoke to birds, animals, insects and flowers. When coming back from a stroll in the woods, she would say "I met this bird …." She grew up in old Taipei near Longshan temple in Wanhua District, but unfortunately her family's house was expropriated by the government to create a plaza or enlarge the road. Her artwork is collected in several museums in Europe and Asia, for example TFAM in Taipei, the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, M+ West Kowloon in Hong Kong, Museo etnografico della Valle di Muggio in Switzerland, Musées de la Ville de Strasbourg, Chateau de Rohan (collection Kahn-Wolf),^[1] Kunsthalle Bielefeld in Germany, and the Christian Levett Collection in Mougins France.

Lifang was not a feminist in the strict sense of the word like Simone de Beauvoir or Virginia Woolf and did not complain about the women's position in art or life. For her, it was always evident that all people of any race or sex had equal rights and should be free to choose their lives. In her everyday life, being married and having a son required compromises like stopping painting or writing when it was time for her to prepare lunch or dinner. My father was jealous of her and her art and kept her as much as possible under a glass case almost to the age of 60. In the house, he helped out with cleaning, doing the laundry, and buying groceries, despite the laughs of the ladies in the village. Later Lifang was freer and did not have to justify her absences or travels. After her husband passed away in 2013, she managed to live on her own in the house for only 2 years, until 2015. In many ways she was not such a practical person and would forget to drink or eat, and would buy food for our dog but forget to buy it for herself. She rarely complained about her financial situation. Her brother-in-law used to ask her why she was in such a situation, and she would answer, "Because I'm an idiot," meaning that she married an artist and farmer's son and not a wealthy businessman. When living in the retirement home, she painted small watercolors until about 2017-2018. Later she used to say she was in the international real estate business (which wasn't true at all) and never married. When I showed her husband's picture to her, she would comment, "That annoying guy who wanted to eat all the time." She passed away on December 19, 2020, in Sorengo Switzerland. Her grave is in the cemetery of Castel San Pietro Switzerland. Her art is still alive.

Theobald Tsoe Ziu Brun

Born in 1962 in Lucerne, Switzerland, Theobald Tsoe Ziu Brun is the son of Lifang and Hans Brun. He studied law at Zurich University and the University of San Diego before establishing a law firm in Lugano, Switzerland, where he currently resides with his wife and three children. During his youth, he often assisted his parents with exhibition installation, transportation of artworks, or engaging with visitors at their art exhibits. In 1999, he organized an exhibition for his father and published a catalog of his works. Around 2000, he created websites for his parents, featuring their biographies and artworks. Since 2017, he has curated five exhibitions in his parents' former studio. Brun learned that several of his mother's works from a 1992 solo exhibition held in Taipei were still in Beitou. Recognizing the significance of his mother's homeland, Brun felt it natural that these artworks, along with his mother's diaries and correspondence with friends and family, should be left in Taiwan. For this reason, he donated them to the Taipei Fine Arts Museum in 2022.