A scroll mounter
EXPAND MORE THE DISCUSSION OF SPACE IN THE LAST PARAGRAPH on highlighting/downplaying
Guo Xuehu needed to forge a viable career for himself. He lost his father when he was only two years old and relied on his mother for support. In elementary school, he received his earliest formal art education - in watercolor - from his art instructor Ch'en Ying-sheng. In 1923, he graduated from elementary school and enrolled in Taipei Country College of Industry to study engineering. Yet, he quit school after only one semester to pursue art.
For an aspiring artist in the 1920s Taiwan, becoming an artist entailed studying privately with an art instructor, attending an art school in Japan, or becoming an apprentice in a professional workshop. In 1925, Guo Xuehu entered a four month long apprenticeship with Cai Xuexi. The other two options were out of his financial reach.
Cai Xuexi was a professional painter from Fujian who specialized in traditional Chinese painting. He taught Guo how to mount paintings and encouraged copying as a study method. He also gave Guo his artistic name "Xuehu." Guo learnt at his studio how to paint Daoist and other religious subjects (Kuo 49-50; ex cat. 1989:17, 207). Moreover, the work in Cai's studio provided the young Guo Xuehu an opportunity to view many paintings, contributing to his art education.
By highlighting the library in the essay, Guo Xuehu downplays this apprenticeship. He also fails to mention his many sketching trips around Taipei that helped hone his drawing skills (KUO p. 49-50). From early on, he focused on landscape as his preferred subject matter.