Background
Yifei Chen was born on April 12, 1946 in Ningbo, China.
695 Park Ave, New York, NY 10065, United States
From 1980 to 1984, Chen studied at Hunter College.
Yifei Chen was born on April 12, 1946 in Ningbo, China.
Initially, Yifei studied at the High School of Art in Shanghai, which he finished in 1964. Then, he attended Shanghai Training School of Art (also called the Shanghai College of Art), graduating in 1965. In 1980, Chen entered Hunter College in New York City and some time later, in 1984, he received his Master of Art degree.
After graduating from Hunter College, Yifei Chen started to produce paintings, often glorifying the agents of the Communist Party, including portraits of Mao Tse-Tung. The grandiose images of the Chairman and his soldiers conformed to the approved aesthetic and soon the painter began to receive state funds to produce more large-scale propaganda pieces.
Having achieved a singular level of fame by his mid-twenties, Chen shifted focus to romantic subject matters towards the 1970's. He started to use oil paints and adopted an increasingly European sensibility, using the compositional elements and perspective characteristic of Western art. Chen immediately came to the notice of a number of American and Continental collectors, including the chairman of America’s Occidental Petroleum Corporation, Armand Hammer, who presented one of his paintings to politician Deng Xiaoping.
In 1980, Chen settled down in New York City, after resigning from his post as the head of the department of oil painting at the Shanghai Painting Academy. The works of that period are characterized by dark, rich colors and Chen's subjects included melancholic women, Chinese musicians, Tibetan villagers and landscapes of the Chinese countryside.
Also, before entering Hunter College, Yifei worked in art restoration domain. During his two-year course at the college, he organized a series of solo exhibitions at the Hammer Galleries, with whom he eventually signed an exclusive contract. Yifei also exhibited extensively at other art galleries around the world, including those in Japan, where he showed his works in 1989 and 1990.
In 1990, the painter returned to Shanghai, where he continued to create oil paintings. Also, Chen focused on commercial work, selling his paintings for record-breaking prices all over the world. In the early 1990's, he became a successful businessman, who invested in a magazine, called the "Shanghai Tatler," his Layefe fashion brand and a restaurant in Xintiandi. In 1993, Yifei set foot in the movie field and completed the autobiographic art film "Old Dream at Sea Personal Recollections on Chen Yifei". In 1995, he completed a story film about Shanghai in the 1930's, entitled "A Date at Dusk", which was shown at the Festival de Cannes and attracted a wide audience.
From 1996 to 1997, the painter's Retrospective Exhibition was held at Shanghai Museum and Beijing China National Museum of Fine Arts. During the same period, he organized his solo exhibition at the Marlborough Fine Art Gallery in London and attended Biennale di Venezia. In 1998, another exhibition of Chen's works was held in France. In 1999, Yifei completed the art film "Escape to Shanghai" and documentary film "Shanghai Ark".
During his last years, Chen acted as a manager for several successful Chinese fashion models. He also served as a fashion designer and decorator and continued focusing on his film productions.
Chen was married twice. Song Meiying was his second wife. Also, Chen had two sons — Chen Ling, from his first marriage and Chen Tian, from his second marriage.