The latest issue of Artlink magazine from Australia The China Phenomenon, co-edited by Binghui Huangfu and Stephanie Britton, will be launched at the Asia Art Archive on 15 March 2004.
The China Phenomenon is the latest in Artlink magazine's well-known thematic issues. It was undertaken in response to the emergence of China as a force in contemporary international art. The co-editors Binghui Huangfu and Stephanie Britton sought contributions from experts from Australia, China, the USA and Hong Kong which would provide an up to date picture of the situation both in China and overseas, as well as background to the recent history of this phenomenon.
Sydney academic, Yao Souchou, introduces the issue with an assessment of the residual trauma suffered by the first wave of artists who left China 20 years ago seeking refuge and freedom of expression, such as Xu Bing and Zhang Huan, both still residents in the USA.
Karen Smith sketches in the two decades since Chinese artists began to emerge from the era of control and destruction of culture, with artists being approached to sell and show work in overseas galleries; how the Political or Cynical Pop style was promoted and perceived, playing as it did, often knowingly, on Westerners' fascination with secret, exotic China. She outlines how things have moved on, with the recognition of less market-driven, more adventurous kinds of work.
A crucial factor is the return to China of many of the artists who left during the late seventies and eighties. Britta Erickson explains how it has made possible the production of large scale very ambitious or labour-intensive works designed and supervised by artists who are now able to return permanently or to travel back and forth between China and overseas countries. These include Lin Tianmiao and Wang Gongxin, Ah Xian, Xu Bing, Zhang Huan and Shen Shaomin. Especially for those of 'Star' status, national borders and their place of residence are no longer the vital issue they were only a few years ago.
Sydney has become an important node on the international network of new Chinese art, according to Louisa Teo who examines the activities of the Casula Powerhouse and the Asia-Australia Art Centre (Gallery 4A).
Concurrent with the launch of this publication is an exhibition of modern calligraphy including brushwork as a live performance. Curator Helen Grace describes in Artlink how this group of Chinese artists insist that this is an evolution of traditional calligraphy, while curiously it also echoes the rise in the west of the script/symbol known as the logo and the challenge to phonetic language.
A measure of the acceptance of contemporary art in modern China was the birth of the First Beijing Biennale in September 2003 as a government sponsored event. Thomas Berghuis attended this event and describes how spinning off from the official program was a galaxy of satellite exhibitions in impressive new spaces some of which were set up by foreign galleries, while others are locally funded and owned, including a thriving artists' village in a huge old East German-built factory compound.
The Beijing based curator Huang Du gives a taste of new Chinese photography which despite only very recently being accepted as art, has proliferated into many different genres, including some which invoke in an ironic postmodern manner classical painted scrolls and others which mischievously recreate famous nudes from the history of western painting. Artlink has published these as a quadruple foldout.
Two artists are profiled: Philippa Kelly looks at the Sydney-based emigre painter Guan Wei, whose international career has begun to take off, and the enigmatic multi-media artist Wang Jianwei who despite his political convictions opted to stay and try to pursue these from within China. Writer and curator Binghui Huangfu describes several of his intriguing projects, one involving a year with peasant farmers in remote areas, another with the people of the city of Chengdu cleaning a statue of Chairman Mao, another with ultrasound images of babies in the womb, all part of an unbroken sequence of works which subtly criticize social conditions but not as so often happens from a warm, dry studio, but from ground level where life is harsh and survival is more important than art.
Women artists offer a fascinating case history: on the one hand accorded equality under Communism, yet still exploited and largely ignored by the artworld. Gu Zhenqing and Yang Li address the current situation, documenting works which go beyond the domestic, craft-based genres which had been an earlier preoccupation.
France has played an important part in fostering Chinese emigre artists and the public is well-informed about China and its culture. John Clark reviews the recent landmark exhibition Alors la Chine at the Pompidou Centre in Paris, while Ken Scarlett looks at public sculpture in Changchun, and Chang Tsong-zung provides an update on Hong Kong as a place where new art is experiencing a great upsurge of energy.
GUEST SPEAKERS on the evening:
Mr John Pilbeam, Deputy Consul-General, Australian Consulate General
Johnson Chang Tsong-zung, curator, critic and Asia Art Archive co-founder
Artlink is delighted to acknowledge the following bodies which have provided generous assistance for this project: The Visual Arts/Craft Board of the Australia Council, The Government of South Australia through Arts SA, The NSW Ministry for the Arts and The Australia-China Council and the Hong Kong Arts Development Council.
Copies available for sale from the AAA
The 15th March also marks the first anniversary of the Asia Art Archive's official opening to the public.
