Beijing Beizine

Essay for Michael Lin's "I am the Sun" show

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 08:32:00 +0000

Michael Lin – The Difference of the Same

[copyright] Pauline J. Yao, courtesy of Eslite Gallery, Taipei

The work of artist Michael Lin concerns itself with the experience of limits. More accurately, it articulates a feeling of liminality, of being suspended between the spaces, places and moments of our daily lives. Through his practice, which hovers between painting and installation, and overlaps with fields of relational art, architecture, and design, we experience a fluid interrogation into the social and political dimensions of form. Like other artists working under the rubric of relational aesthetics Lin also engages with relational form—the utilization of the sphere of human relations as artistic medium—yet his engagements are more likely to assert values of difference rather than adhere to that movement’s tendency towards universalizing commonality. Himself a product of several cultures, Lin is especially attuned to the demarcations of such differences, and thus persistently questions not only the understanding of ‘culture’ in its specificity and its very formation, but also the workings of its erasure and undoing.

Historically, Michael Lin’s practice has aimed at transforming the conventions of how modern art functions—namely, the radical separation of art and its public. For Complementary (1998), he hung seven paintings of fabric designs on the wall of a gallery space and in the middle installed a daybed on which visitors were invited to sit, relax and recline among cushions carrying the same fabric designs. Viewers experienced a closing of the gap between the art object expressly made for individual visual consumption and an encounter which was designed to elicit human contact and shared interaction. The work efficiently demonstrated a major precept of contemporary art in our time: art is not simply something to be looked at, it is to be experienced in real time, often through tangible means. The project launched Lin’s ongoing fascination for using large-scale paintings of textile patterns to transform non-descript, transitional architectural spaces into ‘situations’ that introduced a dimension of social interaction and shared conviviality to the typically solitary art viewing experience.

Recently, Lin’s interests have turned away from the dynamics of space and towards an investigation into the contingencies of time and place. An example of this shift might be found in his recent solo show What a Difference a Day Made in 2008, in which the entire contents of a typical daily products store or 杂货店zahuodian were purchased, catalogued, transported and re-arranged in a gallery space. The project prompted considerations of not only the formal qualities of such everyday items as colanders, spoons and fly swatters, but also the stoppage of time, achieved through isolating these objects from their place in history and locality and underscoring their soon-to-be-relic status within Shanghai’s rapidly developing society.

His current solo exhibition “I am the Sun”, however, proceeds from a different locale—the artist’s native place of Taiwan—and embodies a more nuanced set of concerns. The title alone indicates the passage and progression of time but, more importantly, links up the role of time with the formation of individual and cultural identities. One might say the works in the exhibition share a uniformity of difference—the notion of difference is internalized in the object (in this case paintings and photographs) at the same time as it is being expressed through certain visual strategies. “I am the Sun” is notable not only for its subject matter and size but its scope: it contains several series of paintings, wall murals, photographic prints and two “events” coordinated through Eslite’s bookshop—all specially created for this occasion.

However, Lin’s return to a more conventional exhibition form, exhibiting discrete paintings and photographs rather than ‘site-specific’ installation based work is anything but predictable. He continues to mine cultural histories to powerful effect, bringing to light objects and symbols that speak to moments and territories of in-betweeness and thresholds of individual experience. Two examples are Untitled (2006-2008) based on the Tangram, a Chinese puzzle game consisting of seven flat geometrical shapes that are put together in different combinations to form shapes; and Untitled (2009), paintings of Chinese language study notebooks, a common item used in Taiwan’s schools for language instruction. As objects themselves both represent processes of learning by invoking early stages of life when certain culturally encoded systems such as visuality and language are imprinted on our psyche, and yet the depiction of the notebooks in reverse hints at an even further deconstruction. It is the structural breakdown of these systems—of images into objectifiable geometric parts, of language into pronounceable mono-syllabic components—which Lin calls attention to, highlighting the moment of flux and fluidity before these frameworks become solidified and later, internalized.

Lin’s choice of the logo and design of the infamous Taiwanese Sun Bakery is motivated by a similar to explore innate systems of perception, but extends to include the limits of essentialized cultural symbols. The ‘original’ Sun Bakery in Taichung has become somewhat of a myth—whole streets are now lined with Sun Bakeries, one more eager than the next to proclaim its own status as the original. It is the meanings we attach to authenticity and uniqueness which Lin seeks to destabilize here, and the Sun Bakery, for all of its embodiments of ‘Taiwaneseness’ and cultural legitimacy, makes a particularly apt target. With one stroke Lin counteracts this iconic status. I am the Sun (2009) is the Sun Bakery logo stripped of all of its distinguishing trademarks, returning it to a generic, even monotonous, type of graphical form. This is carried through in the gift-giving event in which individual suncakes bearing Lin’s own self-designed logo and packaging are distributed for free to the public. Together with Lin’s time-based book wrapping event (the artist had every book in Eslite’s Fine Art book section wrapped with floral wallpaper for a week-long period) these gestures also revisit the artist’s earlier dabbling in processes of social reciprocity and interaction and point to the potential for art to move beyond the limitations of the gallery context.

“520” (2008) is a series of 12 photographs taken by the artist on May 20, 2008 on his walk home from his studio in Shanghai. The date carries significance for the artist—it was the inauguration day of Taiwan’s new president Ma Yingjeou—and yet the newsstands he passed on the streets bear no evidence of this momentous occasion. For Lin, this lack of a trace becomes a trace itself, an indication of the paramount differences that exist politically even within a context of supposed parity, not to mention physical proximity. A series of photographs entitled Complementary (1998-2009) also evoke an eerie absence, yet here remains a trace, this time of human presence. The trace of time is also apparent, as photographs taken at different intervals over the course of the exhibition period track from light to dark suggesting the movement of the sun across the sky and the slow rotation of the earth. Inherent to this is the concept of repetition and recurrence, evident in Lin’s ‘blue paintings’ which use a form of disordered serial painting to drive home notions of sameness and subtle variation.

Viewing “I am the Sun”, one is confronted with the various ways in which we conceive, understand, and categorize our perceptions of difference and by that token, the limitations of our own self. The purposely rough, imperfect appearance of some of the canvases elicits another question – are these works even finished? – leaving us with the feeling that we have entered truly ambiguous territory, where the ground no longer feels solid beneath our feet. Through these works, Michael Lin continually reveals the elasticity of culture and visual form, inviting us to examine closer the potential of art as it occurs both within and outside the gallery’s walls.

Beijing/Taipei, April 2009

Michael Lin at Eslite - book wrapping project

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 08:20:00 +0000

The Review

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 05:37:00 +0000

got some good news while in Tokyo - Wang Gongxin's show at the Arrow Factory will get reviewed in the upcoming issue of Artforum! right now you can see some additional info in a post on writer Lee Ambrozy's sinopop site.

Arrow Factory update

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 07:02:00 +0000

here is our new website url in case I forgot to link before. We had to change servers and add .cn to the end since the .org ending was making the site inaccessible within China.

Also, we have a new project up by Beijing based video artist Wang Gongxin, see info here (english) and here (Chinese)

more press to come soon!

Frieze Mag Looking Back 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:15:00 +0000

I recently contributed to Frieze Magazine's annual "Looking Back" issue (#120) in which they invite a group of curators and critics to comment on their favorite biennials, group shows, solo shows, and emerging artists of 2008. Click on the individual links to go to each section...since it is alphabetical by author's name I am of course (and as always) at the end - save the best for last!

Critical Horizons - On Art Criticism in China

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 05:35:00 +0000

A text I recently wrote for the Asia Art Archive newsletter:

The most frequently heard refrain around the proverbial water cooler of the Chinese contemporary art world (next to the lament that there are no real curators) is that there are no real art critics. This position has been widely echoed in international art circles where every year we hear the exhortation that criticism is dead and then a panel is quickly thrown together (usually at an art fair) to discuss the ‘crisis in art criticism’. But while in the West people seem to lament the relevance or efficacy of art criticism, we inside Asia seem hard-pressed to locate it in the first place. Leaving the aside the question....
for full text go here

CCAA at UCCA

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 13:32:00 +0000

gave a talk on my book In Production Mode: Contemporary Art in China at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art recently...

Para-Production photos

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 05:09:00 +0000

For those of you not in Beijing who want a peek at the show I just curated by Ni Haifeng, please check out my flickr. There are many 'in-process' photos and finished ones too though the real professional shots of finished work yet to be taken...

Para-Production by Ni Haifeng....in process

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 16:04:00 +0000

some in-process shots of Para-Production, Ni Haifeng's show at Joyart which opens this Saturday, Sept 27.

that is nearly 5 tons of shreds, still awaiting delivery of 10 more

part of the large wall hanging, about 170 square meters so far

Xijing Olympics

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 01:59:00 +0000

This is one of the most excellent shows I have seen in Beijing in awhile. Finally some humor! the three artists in this group - Chen Shaoxiong(China), Gim Hongsok (Korea) and Tsuyoshi Ozawa (Japan) - are known collectively as Xijing Men, and clearly, they are having way too much fun.

A few weeks ago during the real festivities they held their own Olympics of sorts at Boers-Li Gallery, using everyday materials and objects. Shown here: fencing (water calligraphy brushes used for morning exercises), Soccer (kicking watermelons around), three person ping-pong match and basketball. Competitions not shown here: the torch relay (a lit cigarette passed along and culminating in a lit chuanr barbeque), shotput (tossing an egg) and my personal favorite, weightlifting (beer bottlecaps affixed to either end of a chopstick and lifted with one finger)...oh the list goes on.

genius phone design

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 15:40:00 +0000

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 01:31:00 +0000

Family book collection

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 07:46:00 +0000

Some interesting new information just surfaced about my great grandfather's book collection that was donated to UBC (University of British Columbia) library some years ago. Very interesting, now I just wish I had time to get into that family history project I have always wanted to do...

a video show with no electricity

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 15:05:00 +0000

found these photos in my files and forgot that I wanted to post them. Close to a month ago I went to see a show over the new Legation Quarter, a new luxury complex along the lines of Shanghai's Three on the Bund--fancy shops, restaurants and of course, a top notch art gallery. It was their inaugural show called "Where are we?" with an impressive line up of artists so I went to see what the fuss was about. However, the whole complex is still under construction and we arrived to discover that the power was turned off. These spaces meant for video became eerie and a bit haunting, like something had spirited away the images...where are they?

Patty Chang talk at UCCA

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 03:05:00 +0000

I am working on a new project with artist Patty Chang for Arrow Factory, she is in town right now shooting some film segments that will be shown in July. She is also giving a talk at UCCA this Thursday, June 12. if you are in town please come by!

《西部概念里呈现的中国风味》：张怡(Patty Chang)
艺术家讲座本次讲座与北京箭厂空间共同主办
2008年6月12日下午5点
尤伦斯当代艺术中心

纽约艺术家张怡将在尤伦斯当代艺术中心讨论她近期在北京的拍摄项目。

在张怡的行为艺术作品里，影像和摄影创作尤其备受注目。她的作品主要题材来源于艺术家在行为作品里对自身的洞察和考验观众的界限。在近期影像作品里，张怡关注的主题包括传奇的演绎过程，建构同一性，现实生活中和虚构的文化假象。2005年的作品《香格里拉》纪录艺术家在云南中甸县的一次实地考察，在文学虚构里的香格里拉重复塑造一个具有当地代表性标志的雪山。2007年，张怡在长江的宜昌市拍摄她的最新的作品《漂浮物》（与大卫。凯利合作）。作品的背景描述三峡大坝引起的变化，同时应用叙述的手法建立一个围绕环境和同一性的主题。

在这次讲座中，张怡将和观众分享她对艺术创作的概述，和特别介绍她的作品《西部概念里呈现的中国风味》，作品主题来源于1928年瓦尔特·本雅明为美国亚裔女影星黄柳霜写的一片文章。艺术家希望通过一系列短片来反映再现，翻译，误译和跨文化传译的演变。张怡在北京拍摄作品的第一部分，近期将在北京的箭厂空间里播放。

张怡于2008年候选于Hugo Boss Prize, 她的作品《漂流物》（2007）被入选为MOMA举办的新导演系列作品之一。张怡的个展和群展在国际上备受注目。这次讲座是尤伦斯当代艺术中心和北京箭厂空间的首次合作。

*******************************************************************************
A Chinoiserie out of the Old West:
An Artist Talk by Patty Chang
Thursday, June 12
Time 5:00pm
UCCA auditorium

Organized in collaboration with UCCA and the Arrow Factory, Beijing

New York artist Patty Chang comes to Ullens Center to talk about her artistic practice and the project she is currently working on in Beijing.

Patty Chang is perhaps best known for her work as a performance artist and the videos and photographs that derive from these often provoking performances. As the principle subject, Chang's performance work often tested her own physical limits and the limits of the audience. Her more recent film based projects have taken a slightly different course, focusing on processes of mythmaking, constructed identities and the production of real and fictive cultural imaginaries. Shangri-La (2005) documented a real visit to the imaginary place of Shangri-La located in Zhongdian, Yunnan Province and included the repeated sculptural construction and reconstruction of the town's principle icon, Snow Mountain. Her most recent work (in collaboration with David Kelley), Flotsam Jetsam (2007) is a layered narrative addressing themes of landscape and identity against the backdrop of Yichang, a small town along the Yangtze River affected by the Three Gorges Dam project.

In this talk, Chang will give an overview of her artistic practice but will primarily introduce A Chinoiserie out of the Old West, the project she is currently working on here in China. Based on a 1928 text written by Walter Benjamin about the Asian American film starlet Anna May Wong, this work will take the form of several short film pieces that deal with representation, translation, mistranslation, and crossed meanings. Chang is in Beijing to film the first segment, which will be shown in late July at the Arrow Factory, Beijing.

Patty Chang is a 2008 finalist for the Hugo Boss Prize, and was recently featured in the MOMA New Directors series for her work Flotsam Jetsam (2007). Her work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions internationally.

http://www.ullens-center.org

Blue Skies in Beijing

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 11:55:00 +0000

There have been major winds blowing through the city and even though it leaves a layer of dust over every surface, it has the added benefit of clearing away the pollution. Today was a crisp and gorgeous day...the CCTV tower was looking picture perfect. blue skies! white clouds! sadly these things are so rare here...

better late than never - arrow factory new show

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sun, 11 May 2008 00:51:00 +0000

SLICE
Featuring works by

Rania Ho and Wei Weng
April 30– June 3, 2008
Arrow Factory
38 Jianchang Hutong(off Guozijian Jie) Dongcheng District, Beijing

www.arrowfactory.org
www.jianchang.org

Arrow Factory is pleased to announce its inaugural exhibition Slice now on view in its newly opened downtown Beijing location. Designed to be viewed from the street only, Arrow Factory exhibitions represent a unique approach to contemporary art making that is defined by mediating relationships with the local surroundings and the aesthetics of urban space. Slice is the first in a series of site-specific projects intended to respond to factors, patterns, habits and activities characteristic of the immediate environment. Created by Beijing-based artists Rania Ho and Wei Weng, Slice is a collaborative project that seeks to uncover relationships between perception and movement, ephemeral experiences and the concrete materiality of everyday life.

In “Stop-Action” artist Rania Ho has handcrafted a scale reproduction of a familiar everyday object—a ping-pong table—out of low-cost commonly found materials. The inertness of this mundane object is humorously offset with a hint of movement through the form of a constantly levitating ping-pong ball. Echoing the outline of a ping-pong table and alluding to sparks of movement and certain perspectival shifts, painter Wei Weng has created a site-specific wall painting entitled “As Prospects Get out of Range”. This painting and accompanying set of papercuts is part of Weng’s ongoing Anti-mapping series in which the artist seeks to invent idiosyncratic visual narratives in inadvertent urban spaces through the use of diverse media including paintings, cutouts and installations. The acts of cutting, slicing and carving undertaken by these artists yield valuable associations to craft and the handmade, while simultaneously tackling the underlying mechanics that define contemporary life.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Rania Ho (born San Francisco, USA; currently resides in Beijing) received her M.A. from the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University in 1999.

Wei Weng (born Nanning, Guangxi province; currently resides in Beijing)received her M.F.A. California College of Arts in 2005.

侧切
新作品

何颖宜翁维
2008年4月30日−6月3日

箭厂空间
北京东城区箭厂胡同38号
(国子监街内)

www.arrowfactory.org
www.jianchang.org

箭厂空间在此荣幸地宣布展览《侧切》的开幕。箭厂空间位于北京市中心的一条小胡同里，它以橱窗的形式进行当代艺术的展示。《侧切》是箭厂空间的系列现场项目之一，这个项目的出现将致力于推动艺术家在创作中更加关注日常生活的多种模式与元素。

展览《侧切》的两位艺术家通过她们的项目合作，在作品中进一步探讨彼此之间洞察力的变化与感应。何颖宜使用人们熟悉的低成本的材料，按实物的比例手工打造出一台乒乓球桌。作品《静止的运动》试图通过一个异质化的表层衬托出一种世俗的惰性－艺术家在作品中以低科技的手段设置了一个永不休止，悬浮在空气中的乒乓球。翁维的作品《再变迁》仿佛在回应乒乓球桌的轮廓，空间透视的戏剧性改变与创作过程中肢体语言的巧妙借用，既是其作品概念的出发点也成为了连接两件作品的视觉纽带。作品《再变迁》也是翁维一直创作中的Anti-mapping系列的一部分，整个系列用绘画，剪纸和装置的形式在一些被忽略的城市空间里创作异质的图像叙事。这次展览的两位艺术家在作品中共同运用了对于纸质材料的剪裁，切割与粘接，她们试图在证实日常生活里常见的手工制作方式亦能呈现出的视觉动力。

艺术家简介

何颖宜（出生于美国旧金山，现生活工作于中国北京）1999年毕业于纽约大学互动艺术系，获硕士学位.

翁维（生于中国广西南宁，现居住北京）2005年获加利福尼亚艺术学院硕士学位。

walking from art fair

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:09:00 +0000

Arrow Factory 箭厂空间

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 08:29:00 +0000

www.arrowfactory.org

spring is coming....

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 15:04:00 +0000

...can't wait!

Huang Yong Ping opening at Ullens

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 09:31:00 +0000

I recently attended the opening for Huang Yong Ping, a Chinese born French artist based in Paris. His solo retrospective is also his first major exhibition in China. The exhibition, "House of Oracles" is a traveling show organized by the Walker Art Center in Minneaopolis, where the show opened in Oct 2005 (I published an interview with him in Yishu). From there it traveled to MASS MoCA and, eventually here to the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in Beijing. Huang is one of the founding members of Xiamen dada group that was active in the early 80s in Fujian province, and is widely recognized as one of the most innovative artists of his generation. As expected, the opening was a somewhat glamorous affair, though the sit-down dinner for 80 was termed "intimate" by a UCCA staffer (this is in comparison to their UCCA grand opening which featured 600 person dinner).

swank dinner catered by The Peninsula of all places

Releasing the animals in "Theatre of the World" at public opening. "Theatre of the World" houses several different kinds of cold-blooded animals (snakes, lizards, spiders, scorpions, beetles) in an turtle shaped container with a separate compartments and a central arena-like space. The idea is that over the length of the show the animals will fight and eat one another (leaving one victorious), thus mirroring the national struggles for power we witness daily on political and cultural levels.

Installation view

Zhu Jinshi at Arario gallery

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 07:54:00 +0000

Qiu Xiaofei install at Universal Studios, oops I mean Boers-Li

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 01:45:00 +0000

Qiu Xiaofei at Boers-Li Gallery

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 01:44:00 +0000

Michelangelo Pistoletto at Galleria Continua

noreply@blogger.com (Pauline J. Yao) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 01:41:00 +0000