Category: Exhibitions

Galleries and Museums and other spaces.

ArtSlant: Mural Painting Project of the New Countryside Laboratory

Mural Painting Project of the New Countryside Laboratory

Lijiang Studio, First Commune of Hainan Jixiang Village, Lashihai, Lijiang, Yunnan 674100, China

2008–2010 (book launch 19 August, 2012)

The unannounced appearance one day of a sign painter covering a Chinese villager’s wall with an advert for the state telco, China Mobile, inspired Lijiang Studio, an arts organisation located in a small farming community in the South West of China, to think about how public space was used in the village and led to the development of their Mural Painting Project as part of their “New Countryside Laboratory.”

The presence of the sign painter was one small realisation of the Chinese central government’s plans for opening new markets in the countryside, a plan that was referred to as creating the “Socialist New Countryside.” Such well-intentioned plans for national development emanating from the corridors of power in Beijing can seem distant and disconnected from the reality on the ground, Lijiang Studio’s series of investigations, of which the Mural Painting Project is part, have been looking into the impact of these governmental proposals on its subjects.

After decades of pushing for city development and encouraging the movement of people from the countryside to urban areas, in the lead-up to the 17th Party Congress in 2008 a new emphasis was placed on the countryside, termed the Socialist New Countryside, for the 11th five-year plan. “One theme in the rhetoric of the Socialist New Countryside is increasing ‘productivity’ and opening the countryside to new markets,” says Jay Brown, founder and director of Lijiang Studio. “Being in the countryside you want to know what the government plans for you – collectivisation, reform, privatisation, etc. We figured laying the rhetoric onto the reality of our village would be a starting point for discussion and action.”

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ArtSlant: Death for Show

Good Luck: Guest solo show

Hemuse Gallery, 3-038, North Area, Pinggod Shequ, 32 Baiziwan Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing 100022

17 July – 4 August, 2012

In some ways there’s really not a lot to say about this show. The elements of the show are seemingly simple, based around a short video loop showing a woman in a hospital bed speaking the words “Good Luck” and the execution of the show is kept restrained with just some medical notes, a contract and a wall text.

The woman in the bed is in fact dying. For the exhibition the artists paid this woman’s family 2000RMB (US$314) to purchase her announcement of the phrase “Good Luck” (or, more literally, “wish you success”). The handwritten contract is a record of this transaction, the woman’s case history notes in metal hospital clipboards record her own state of health, and the wall text provides the context: “On July 5th, 2012, members of guest paid Sheng Mingfeng, a patient on her deathbed at a hospital in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, to say the phrase ‘Good Luck.’”

As with the best conceptual work, where this show becomes effective is in the ramifications of this act by the artists. The effects of this presentation—while uncomfortable—deserve attention, in that we, the audience should be aware of our own assumptions with the subject matter. Good Luck also deserves attention because this piece threatens to slip into a particular way of thinking by artists in general, an aloofness from the sources and consequences of their work that can be problematic at best, and sociopathic at worst.

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ArtSlant: Things Lost and Found

Unclaimed Objects: Yang Jian solo show

Where Where Art Space, No. 319-1, East End Art Zone A, Caochangdi Village, Chaoyang District, Beijing

16 June – 15 July, 2012

In the exhibition text for Unclaimed Objects, artist Yang Jian recounts the story of a parasitic fungus which lives in the stomach of a cow, and spreads by passing out of the cow via it’s dung which in turn infects ants in the vicinity. The fungus then implants an urge in the ants to present themselves to be eaten by the next cow, thus passing into the new cow’s system. This life-cycle is presented very specifically as a “story” by the artist and—while there are reports of such occurrences—this aspect of fiction versus truth forms a background to his collected objects and narratives in currently on display at Where Where Art Space.

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ArtSlant: The “Ah” (ha) Moment

Zhao Yao: You Can’t See Me, You Can’t See Me

Beijing Commune, 798 Art Factory, 4 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing 10015

12 June – 12 August, 2012

Last year’s solo show of the work of Zhao Yao, his first with Beijing Commune, left me with a less than positive feeling. To then have that (rather strong) feeling overturned by this new presentation of what is ostensibly the same work, is somewhat surprising.

The development of Zhao’s two solo shows with Beijing Commune are important starting points for an analysis of this change of heart. In 2011 Zhao’s first solo show, entitled I Am Your Night, collected together a set of works that I disliked for being overly derivative of current stylistic clichés in internationalised contemporary art. Their aggressive shapes, mannerist constructions, and vibrant colours all seemed to smack of a style seen too often elsewhere in the world and possibly revealing a symptom of a globalisation of artworks. One nice touch however were the strings of the Chinese character 啊 (an “ah” of various kinds of interjection) in long, pulsing lines around the room, following the walls and floors to provide a physical thread holding the other objects together.

The current show is pitched as a continuation and manipulated repeat of I Am Your Night, demonstrated by its opening on the same date, and using many of the same works (several borrowed back from collectors for this purpose), in much the same arrangements, or adjusting the originals in scale or material to create new versions of the objects. The title of this show “You can’t see me, you can’t see me” is obscure, but perhaps mirrors this aspect of repetition.

One might think that this second show would only reinforce my original opinions – but while I still do not like the forms of the objects, my understanding of the show and consequently my overall feeling has been transformed. This time I left the show with a sense of déjà vu, an incomplete feeling that opened up further possibilities for an appreciation of the works.

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