Hugs in Hong Kong by mainland artists formerly branded national criminals – interview Gao Brothers

CHINESE PERFORMANCE ART

Take a walk down a public Hong Kong street these days and you might find yourself bumping into some portable – and surprisingly intimate - art.

While Hong Kong artist Tim Li’s private bed has been erected all over Hong Kong from Pedestrian Street in Mong Kok to the center of Times Square, last month the Gao Brothers from the mainland brought their special brand of peace-promoting intimate performance art into the hustle and bustle of the city. Bring on the hugging! 

Gao Zhen and Gao Qiang, a pair of prominent artists born in Jinan and based in the Beijing 798 Art Zone were invited by Para/Site Art Space to spread an hour of love and hugs outside the Hong Kong Arts Centre on July 29 2009. The Gao Brothers share with Wendy Ma how their ideals are reflected in their installation, performance, sculpture, photography works and writing, and how these beliefs were shaped by their unusual experiences.

Q: What inspired you to create artwork such as Miss Mao, etc.? Did it create any controversy in China at the time?

Miss Mao by Gao Brothers. Painted fiberglass. 85 x 55 x 59 in.

Miss Mao is mainly inspired by Chinese people’s “mao” bing (毛病*), ignorance, and immaturity. The artwork is only permitted to be displayed in overseas galleries and museums, it still forbidden in mainland China.  We can only find information regarding the exhibition of this artwork on the internet. The reactions from the audience are a mix of praises and criticism.

*Note: Mao bing means “problem” or “syndrome”. In Chinese it is the same “mao” in “Mao Zedong”. 

Q: What inspired you to initiate the World Hug Day*?

Utopia of Hugging for 20 minutes. Performance by Gao Brothers in 2000..

There are too many conflicts in this world. The hatred and blood-shedding tensions among humans, among ethnicities, among nations have never ceased. In 2000 we believed that the human civilization should enter a millennium of compromises. So we began to promote the act of hugging among strangers.

At that time we were forbidden to leave China, which left us unable to promote hugging overseas. By proposing the “World Hugging Day” on the internet, we earned corresponding support from various parts of the world. Among the advocates there were non-artists, artists, as well as the organizer of the Venice Biennale, Harald Szeemann.

*Note: “Gao Brothers carried out their first group hug performance, “The Utopia Of Hugging For Twenty Minutes” on September 10, 2000 by inviting one hundred and fifty volunteers, who were previously strangers to each other, to take part in the event. They asked all participants to choose a person at random for a hug of fifteen minutes duration. Afterwards, all participants huddled together for an additional five minutes.

Since 2000, Gao Brothers have hugged hundreds of strangers and organised group hugging performances with strangers at many public locations in different ways and have taken a lot of interesting photographs.

The Gao Brothers are proposing an ongoing series of World Hug Day events around the globe via the internet, and so far have got enormous feedback and support.”

Q: In your view what is the most meaningful artwork you’ve created? Why?

 

 

Point of View Chair by Gao Brothers (2007). Mixed Media

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In our eyes, our artworks are all different and irreplaceable. It’s difficult to decide which one carries the most meaning.

Q: How long have you been involved in art and how has your art evolved over time?

We have been working for 20 years. Regarding the transformation of our artwork, there’s a lot of articles written by art critics, but it’s hard for us to say.

Q: Were your parents supportive of your decision to pursue art as a career? Would you encourage your children (if you have any) to pursue art? Did you think you would become this successful?

My father passed away a long time ago during the Cultural Revolution. My mother was skillful at paper-cutting but she became ill and died in 1999. She gave us plenty of support for creating art. Our children are interested in art, too, so we definitely support their decision to pursue their interests. Initially we became involved in art purely from the heart and never considered whether or not we would succeed. Even now we don’t consider ourselves too successful.

Q: Any obstacles in your art career?

Too many unforgettable obstacles. The most memorable took place in 1989 during which we participated in the Contemporary Chinese Art Exposition in Beijing. By coincidence we took part in the “Pub Petition Incident” in which the intellectual circle demanded that the government release the political criminal Wei Jing Sheng*.

After Wei Jing Sheng was released from the prison and before his second imprisonment, we paid him a visit. As matter of a fact, we weren’t acquainted with Wei Jing Sheng. He simply wanted to invite us to participate in the China-Japan-Korea Contemporary Art Show organized by him and Huang Rui. However, due to the petition and the correspondence with Wei, we were placed on the government’s infamous black list as “national criminals”. For ten years we couldn’t obtain our visa, which had a profound impact on our participation in international art activities.

In 2001,  the organizer of the 49^th Venice Biennale, Harald Szeemann invited us to the  Opening Ceremony to demonstrate our “hugging”. Unfortunately we failed to obtain a visa. We were even prepared to smuggle ourselves out but eventually we decided not to go. It wasn’t until 2003 when we were invited to attend the Second Rome International Photography Festival that we were taken off the black list and given the visa.

*Note: Wei Jing Sheng was “an activist in the Chinese democracy movement, most prominent for authoring the document Fifth Modernization on the “Democracy Wall” in Beijing in 1978.”

Q: What message do you want to convey through your art?

Liberty, peace and compromises, human love, and many more related yet ineffable messages.

Q: What are the characteristics of your artwork?

This is rather difficult for us to discuss too…

 Q: You’ve done so many “world hugging” events in various cities (which ones?). Which have made the biggest impression on you and why? What did you think of the one in Hong Kong?

 

Final round of embrace on a hot July day in Hong Kong.

Gao (in black) giving a participant an enthusiastic hug.

Ever since 2000, we have been “hugging” in Jinan, Beijing, London, Nottingham, Marseilles, Arles, Berlin, Tokyo, and many more cities. Each “hugging” left a deep impression on us. Despite the fact that the fewest number of people showed up for “hugging” in Hong Kong, it was still memorable. The number of attendees at the hugging event carries more or less some sort of implications. Actually, we don’t really think it’s that Hong Kong doesn’t embrace hugging. It was so scorching hot that having some hugging enthusiasts was enough to move us deeply.

Q: You just went to Macau today. Was it for the “world hugging” event again? What are the differences between their attitudes and Hong Kong people’s?

Gao Brothers' demonstration of hugging outside the Hong Kong Arts Center, late-July 2009.

We were invited by Para/Site to do the hugging in Hong Kong. Macau didn’t invite us. We only went as tourists and didn’t make any hugging plan.

Q: Your next stop is Israel. What do you expect?

Last year we already received the “hugging” invitation from Israel. It would be nice to have an Israeli and a Palestinian hug each other.

Q: Have there been any changes in mainland contemporary art? How is the freedom of expression? Have you encountered any difficulties or objections?

Every artist is different. We’ve always been busy with our own work, so we haven’t paid sufficient attention to other artists. With a lack of comprehensive understanding, it’s difficult to say about the changes in mainland Chinese contemporary art. To us, it’s not bad, even though the art examination regulations in China do not permit public exhibition of certain pieces of our artwork.

Q: Can you perceive any differences between Hong Kong and mainland contemporary art?

We don’t have an adequate understanding of contemporary Hong Kong art to discuss it. 

Q: Which other artists inspire you?

Are there not enough ridiculous, not enough stimulating events happening in the world every day? Why would we need to excavate inspiration from the salt of other artists?

Q: Among photography, sculptures, and performance art, which one do you prefer?

About the same. A bit bored with all of them.

Q: What would you like to do next artistically?

Film. We’re in the process of revising a script to make a film.

Spice up with Perspectives

                                     – on the Hugging Scene in Hong Kong

 

Gao (in white) hugging a participant outside the Hong Kong Arts Center in late July, 2009.

As the Gao Brothers observed, the number of  participants who turned up for the hugging event organised by Para/Site in Hong Kong  was scanty and many of those who did participate were not even from Hong Kong. So what did the organizers and the spectators think about their World Hug Performance in Hong Kong? Art Radar explores behind the scene:

Alvaro Rodriguez Fominaya, Curator of Para/Site Art Space:

Q: Why did you invite the Gao Brothers to do this performance (hugging)? 

I wanted to test the use of public space in Hong Kong. The Gao Brothers performance is very much connected to the Chinese physique, but also the public dimension of it is quite fundamental to this work of art. In practice, the project has proved how many burdens and restrictions exist in preparing this type of event that engages the public sphere in Hong Kong.

Q: What did you think of the performance?  

The performance has a degree of improvisation that I love. As it adapts to each new situation, it is quite fluid and dynamic, and it blends and connects with the social, cultural and political framework of the location in which it takes place. This time it was specifically connected to Hong Kong. With the greater involvement of the artists in the performance, this probably highlighted some relational issues, as it took a turn more towards the sculptural and the theatrical.

Q: How is it similar or different from other artists’ performance or exhibitions? 

Every time they stage this performance it has a different meaning and a different result. I find this work meaningful in relation to the other works, but on a superficial level it might seem unrelated to their work, specifically their sculpture, painting and photography. However the notion of the outer boundaries of the body and its political inferences are  themes that run through their art practice.

Beth Smits, an art collector and a professional in the banking sector:

I only wish more people in Hong Kong had participated in the hug day. I was watching from the side at the start, and people came up to me to ask “what is going on?” They were genuinely curious and when I explained it to them, they were very interested and supportive. Later, I did actually get involved and hugged the two artists and others there. While I admittedly felt awkward at first, I appreciate the powerful symbolism of this act amongst strangers. I am now a huge fan of their work – beyond the world hug days, too, and look forward to seeing what they do next.

Contributed by Wendy Ma

Related Links:

• Gao Brothers on Art Net
• Gao Brothers on Art Zine China

Related Posts:

• Embedding the Bed in Public Space – interview Hong Kong artist and ParaSite director Tim Li - Aug 09
• Wallpaper’s guide to Beijing art districts – Jul 09
• Young Chinese Artists The Next Generation – book review – Jun 09
• Experimental art in Shanghai challenges recession – Carry On Items show review - Jun 09
• Chinese artist-run spaces rise up again? – May 09
• Is ink the next thing? Evidence mounts of growing interest in Chinese ink painting – Redbox – Apr 09

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Renowned African contemporary artist El Anatsui says African art now receiving attention again – Art Interview

AFRICAN ARTIST INTERVIEW

For the past 30 years, El Anatsui has been known within Africa as one of the continent’s most influential sculptors and today he is now also recognized as one of the foremost contemporary artists of his generation.Description of his work

Up to 20 assistants help Anatsui flatten aluminum seals taken from thousands of liquor bottles. They then fold them into strips that are woven together with copper wire, resulting in draping cloth-like pieces that often reach sizes of 30 feet or more. Anatsui’s sculptures not only transform common materials and impart new meaning to them, they also continuously evolve undergoing transformations themselves each time they are shown.

About El Anatsui

El Anatsui was born in 1944 in Anyako, Ghana. He earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Sculpture and a Postgraduate Diploma in Art Education from the University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. Much of Anatsui’s early work made use of scorching wood with fire. Before venturing into his current “cloth series” he worked with the concept of fragility through ceramics and created sculptures with a chainsaw and wood.

Exhibitions

Many major institutions throughout the world have exhibited Anatsui’s work. He received an honorable mention at the 44th Venice Biennale. In 2007 El Anatsui exhibited at the 52nd Venice Biennale with a site-specific installation, transforming one of Venice’s most celebrated Gothic landmarks by wrapping the façade of the Palazzo Fortuny in a vast metal cloth.

El Anatsui collectors

Works by Anatsui can be seen in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY; The Museum of Modern Art, NY; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; The British Museum, London and the Pompidou Center, Paris, France, as well as many other institutions.

Anatsui lives and works in Nigeria where he is a Professor of Sculpture at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. October Gallery, London and David Krut Fine Art, New York represents El Anatsui. This is an extract from Art Interview’s talk with El Anatsui:

El Anatsui Dusasa II Venice Biennale 2007

Art Interview: You are renowned as one of the most influential African artists in the world. Does this surprise you? El Anatsui: Yes, it does surprise me. (Laughs) I live in a very simple village, nothing glamorous or extraordinary. I think that probably makes for little distraction, so I can concentrate on my work more than if I were living in a busy metropolitan setting. When my works are shown in cities like New York I am surprised to see people are able to deeply relate to them but at the same time it is gratifying to see that others in different circumstances and locations are able to connect and make meaning of one’s little efforts.

Art Interview: Would you say that African art is making an impact on the international contemporary art market?

El Anatsui: Yes, I should say it’s receiving attention again. I’ve been watching the trends over the years. There was an interest in the 1970’s in contemporary art from Africa but it subsided in the 80’s. It was resurrected again in the 1990’s. Now cultural production is receiving more critical attention in Africa as well as abroad. I think its impact on the international art scene and eventually, the market is accumulating.

Art Interview: Where do you originally come from?

El Anatsui: I was born in the colonial Gold Coast in 1944, which became Ghana. I saw a transition period between the end of the Colonial era and the beginning of independence. I can remember that with our independence came feelings of nationalism. People proclaimed they were citizens of a country, not of a colony. We were trying to review what existed before colonialism in order to see what could still be used to foster a whole new society.

Art Interview: What were your parents doing at that time?

El Anatsui: I lost my mother when I was a baby and grew up with an uncle who was a protestant church reverend. My father was a head fisherman as well as a master weaver. I remember he presented one of the Kente he wove to me when I was going to the university.

 Art Interview: Did your family teach you how to weave?El Anatsui: Because I did not live with my father, I was not exposed to it. But most of my brothers who grew up at home are able to weave. I consider my current sculptural work to have several attributes of fabric, but I am not interested in textiles. Even when we were introduced to them in art school textiles did not attract me at all.

Art Interview: How did the opportunity for you to attend a university arise?

El Anatsui: In those days universities would go around looking for prospective students by sending out teams to the secondary schools, to talk about the courses they offer and their prospects. In secondary school I did well in several subjects, but the most consistent one was art, so when the team visited our school several of us completed the admission forms. I chose fine art, which the school’s guidance team thought was apt. At that time being an artist wasn’t an attractive choice because there were no visible role models like you have in architecture, engineering, pharmacy, etc. I didn’t know anyone who was a professional artist or exactly what it meant to be one. So, it was a really risky decision for me to choose this field based on the feeling it was something I would truly enjoy doing.

 Art Interview: Which University did you attend?El Anatsui: I worked for a bachelor’s degree in sculpture and a postgraduate diploma in art education at the University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana. After that I taught for about five years at the Specialist Training College, (now the University of Education) Winneba, which is about an hour ‘s drive from Accra westwards on the coast of Ghana.

Art Interview: While you were attending college were there any professors who influenced the building of your career?

El Anatsui: In sculpture, we started with Von Stokar, who is German, and finished with the Ghanaian, Azii Akator. They would give us a challenge at a time and leave us to grapple with it, which with hindsight I think was very helpful. It was good because we had to search for our own paths. Because we had to discover what to do ourselves, the solution became a part of us.In drawing, I took courses from a British professor named Armistead, whose approach was almost scientific. He methodically took us through exercises in how to make visual judgments. He taught us how to see. The two approaches do come in here and there in the way I work.

Art Interview: You left Ghana to teach at the University of Nigeria. What made you decide to move to another country?El Anatsui: Well, a lot of things, among them I wouldn’t leave out adventure. I was very young then and I wanted to explore, to broaden my horizon. So I took the opportunity to apply at the University of Nigeria and after a year I received an appointment with them. Luckily when I got there I met one of the prominent African artists that I had read about in the few books on modern art in Africa that exited at that time. His name is Uche Okeke and he happened to be heading the department of fine arts. We had a great time getting to know each other and we learned from each other; probably more of me from him than him from me… (Laughs) We would talk about art until 2 or 3 in the morning. There were very talented and inspiring faculty in the department as well, like Obiora Udechukwu a painter and poet with whom one shared ideas and Chike Aniakor, an art historian and painter. The company was one that made for growth.

Art Interview: At what point were you able to survive financially as an artist?

 El Anatsui: About two years after finishing art school in Ghana. While teaching at Winneba, I began to work with wooden trays that are used in the markets to display wares. I would burn graphic signs onto each of them that had a saying or message associated. I tried to locate each within a border designed to enhance the meaning and message. People could relate to both the trays and the signs so they were eagerly collected at our exhibitions. That was the first point that I saw my work having the capacity to generate financial rewards. Ironically, I was generating more income this way than with my regular employment, which occupied most of my time. My students were assisting me on weekends and during holidays I would have several young relatives, boys in secondary school, work with me. Their efforts helped generate enough funds that I was easily able to pay for their school fees and also give them good pocket money to go back with!

El Anatsui Installation of Sasa Pompidou

Art Interview: Were you exhibiting in commercial galleries at that point?

El Anatsui: I appeared in group-shows in Ghana at venues like the National Art Centre until 1975. Afterwards I exhibited in Nigeria at cultural centers. The British, Italian and French cultural institutes were outfits that provided opportunities for artist to exhibit at in the 1970’s and 1980’s.

Art Interview: Did you ever have to approach commercial galleries? 

 El Anatsui: During my earlier visits to New York in the 1980’s, I did go to a couple of galleries, which mostly told me they were scheduled for next two to three years. Ordinarily they kept my slides for future attention but I guess at the time they did not see any commercial prospect in the works. I then decided to just focus on the practice and forget about galleries. I began showing in museums and other non-commercial spaces and I traveled to participate in projects and residencies in Germany, the UK and the USA. In the mid 1990’s, a gallery that had seen a documentary film in which I was featured approached me for a show in the UK.

ArtInterview for more questions and images

Angaza Africa: African Art Now click to buy book

Books to buy: 

• El Anatsui: A Sculpted History of Africa 
• Contemporary African Artists: Changing Tradition by El Anatsui

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Royal Academy announces Anish Kapoor retrospective London 2009

 

INDIAN SCULPTURE

Anish Kapoor is having a busy year. His work commanded one of the top 10 prices achieved at Sotheby’s Contemporary Day Sale at Bond Street London on July 2 2008. His summer survey in ICA Boston ended September 2008 but now Royal Insitute of British Architects holds an exhibition of his models and the British Royal Academy of Arts announces it will hold a major retrospective of his work in September 2009. For details and reviews of the RIBA show and links to information about the Royal Academy retrospective see below.

Place/No Place: Anish Kapoor in Architecture
to 08 November 2008
From an early stage in his career Anish Kapoor has worked closely with architects and engineers on a number of major works. Get a rare and fascinating insight into many of these key projects with an exhibition of his architectural models, many of which have never been displayed to the public before.

Included in the exhibition are models for projects such as Taratantara at the Baltic with Neil Thomas of Atelier One (1999), the Salvation Army Visitor Centre with John McAslan and Partners (unbuilt, 2001), the entrances for the Naples Subway with Jan Kaplicky and Future Systems (2008) and an as yet unrealized project with Cecil Balmond.

 

Mon-Sat 10am-5pm except Tues 10am-9pm
Venue: Gallery 1, RIBA, 66 Portland Place, London

Review – Independent, UK

Anish Kapoor is extremely keen on vaginas. In his new exhibition, they’re everywhere. Here a chasm, there a crack, over there an abyss that takes you plunging into a void. This, clearly, is a man who’s read his Freud. But what goes down must come up and he’s extremely keen on giant structures too. Taratantara, his “building turned inside out” project at Gateshead’s Baltic Flour Mills, was 35 metres tall. Marsyas, his massive PVC earphone, filled the Tate Modern Turbine Hall. Temenos, an installation in the Tees Valley, announced this summer, will, at almost 50m high, be part of the biggest public art initiative in the world. Who said size doesn’t matter?
The exhibition, in fact, is tiny. It’s like a little Legoland version of Anish world, a world in which giant mirrors sit in city squares, reflecting skyscrapers and sky, or on beaches, reflecting the crashing waves of the sea, and in which massive structures on hillsides overshadow tiny pathways beckoning you into the dark womb inside. Some are “real”, out there, on real hillsides and in real cities all over the world, some are planned, and some, so far, are just a twinkle in the really quite twinkly Kapoor eye. Read more

Read:

• Tour of Kapoor’s home in London – Guardian 
• more about Royal Academy retrospective - Guardian

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World first show of Japanese sculpture in bamboo, New York

 

 

Nagakura Ken’ichi (b. 1952), Woman, 2004. Bamboo, lacquer, and powdered polishing stone and clay, H. 32 1/2 in. Collection of Diane and Arthur Abbey.

 

MUSEUM SURVEY BAMBOO SCULPTURE to January 11 2009

“Over the past few years, Japanese bamboo artists have reached beyond the established boundaries of their craft” says the Japan Society in New York. “New Bamboo: Contemporary Japanese Masters is the world’s first exhibition devoted exclusively to Japanese bamboo as a sculptural medium, featuring 23 innovators, old and young, who explore to the full the tension between traditional skill and new expressive opportunities”.

 

Morigami Jin (b. 1955) Harmony II, 2006. Bamboo, 16 1/2 x 17 1/2 x 10 1/2 in. Harmony III, 2006. Bamboo, 9 1/2 x 18 x 11 in. Collection of Stanley and Mary Ann Snider.

 

 

“Ranging from ethereal, computer-designed filigrees, through dramatic wall pieces to angry-looking, dirt-encrusted tangles and anthropomorphic, sexually charged sculptures, the more than 90 works on display demonstrate awesome technique, meticulous attention to detail and extraordinary creativity.”

Artists: Matsumoto Hafu (1952), Honma Kazuaki (1930), Honma Hideaki (1959), Yako Hodo (1940), Torii Ippo (1930), Fujitsuka Shosei (1949), Yamaguchi Ryuun (1940), Shono Tokuzo (1942), Tanabe Mitsuko (1944), Tanabe Shochiku 111 (1973), Ikeda Iwao (1940), Uematsu Chikuyu (1947), Kawashima Shigeo (1958), Ueno Maso (1949), Nagakura Ken’ichi (1952), Yonezawa Jiro (1956), Honda Shoryu (1951), Mimura Chikuho (1973), Morigami Jin (1955), Nakatome Hajime (1974), Okie Toshie (1976), Kawana Testsunori (1945), Stephen Talasnik (1954), 

See (in new window)

• more news on contemporary sculpture
• more on Japanese art
• Japan Society site for more images, catalogue, information

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Anish Kapoor plans largest public artwork in the world in north of England

 

 

 

 

 

INDIAN MONUMENTAL SCULPTURE PROJECT UK

It began with a pair of tights and two rings. It will become the world’s largest public art project: five huge sculptures dotted around a region attempting to rejuvenate itself.
The Tees Valley Giants, unveiled today, are the work of Turner prize-winning artist Anish Kapoor and one of the world’s leading structural engineers, Cecil Balmond. The pieces will be placed, over the next ten years, in Middlesbrough, Stockton, Redcar, Hartlepool and Darlington.

The project, more than four years in the planning, was announced today with artist’s impressions of the first work, Temenos. The sculpture will fill what is currently a rather bleak landscape between Middlesbrough’s Transporter bridge and the Riverside stadium and, appropriately, at 110m will be as long as a football pitch. The 50m-high steel structure consists of a pole, a circular ring and an oval ring, all held together by a kind of cat’s cradle of steel wire.
Balmond knows how he wants people to react when they see it. “It will be a kind of awe, I think. It will be a new landscape.”

That said, the design will remind some of Marsyas, the Kapoor-Balmond work that filled Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall six years ago and is now – “sadly,” they say – rolled up and stored in a box in Norfolk.

The artist was brought on board in 2004 and says he was bowled over by how grand the thinking was. He told the Guardian: “This is without doubt the biggest art project in the world, in terms of ambition and scale – everything. It’s massive.”

Kapoor and Balmond said they worked together because of a shared interest in interrogating form.

“In many ways scale is a deep, mysterious and wonderful thing, and yet at some levels it gets a bad name. To reinvigorate and re-initiate scale is one of the things we’re about,” said Kapoor.

“There are all the arguments about public art – couldn’t we have spent money on a hospital, say – and all the arguments are correct. But what happens after a while is that these things have the possibility of infiltrating people’s consciousness. You can’t say it’s going to happen, but you can hope it does.”

Temenos will cost around £2.7m, while the whole project will involve a spend of some £15m.

Funding is coming from both public and private sources as well as a welcome meeting of football and conceptual art: Middlesbrough FC will stump up about £350,000. Subject to planning permission, work is due to start in the autumn and be completed by next summer.

The whole project was the idea of Joe Docherty, chief executive of Tees Valley Regeneration. He said it was a declaration that the area had changed, that it was prepared to take risks. “This isn’t something we need in the Tees valley. It’s something we deserve. This is a calling card that the area is on the turn.”

The Tees Valley Giants were announced on the same day that another monumental piece of public art, Antony Gormley’s Angel of the North, celebrated its tenth birthday; it is now one of the most recognised artworks in the UK.

Source: guardian.co.uk Full article here

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• more posts on Indian art here
• more posts on Anish Kapoor here

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Guggenheim shows copy of Cai Guo Qiang sculpture

CHINESE NEW YORK EVENT “Unbeknownst to the casual viewer, Cai’s spectacle, “Inopportune: Stage One,” isn’t the real thing. It’s a copy. The original is 3,000 miles away at the Seattle Art Museum” says Newsweek.

A small army of assistants and a team of rock climbers under the artist’s direction transformed the Guggenheim’s famous rotunda into the site of an explosive tumble of nine cars decked out in blinking lights—an installation that Guggenheim director Thomas Krens says “may be the best artistic transformation of the Frank Lloyd Wright space we’ve ever seen.”

But unbeknownst to the casual viewer, Cai’s spectacle, “Inopportune: Stage One,” isn’t the real thing. It’s a copy. The original is 3,000 miles away at the Seattle Art Museum. It’s made of more or less the same parts—white automobiles and LED light rods—but it’s oriented horizontally rather than vertically. The only clue for Guggenheim visitors that they weren’t seeing the “original” was the small print on a wall label that labeled the piece an “exhibition copy.”

But what exactly is an exhibition copy? If the artist oversaw its creation, why isn’t it an original? The Cai exhibit, which drew huge crowds to the Guggenheim, raises questions that many museum goers have probably never considered. And when we’re talking about contemporary art made from common or mass-produced materials, how do we know when a work of art is the “real thing”?

Cai’s car piece may be the single most extravagant exhibition copy ever made. It came about because its owner, the Seattle Art Museum, didn’t want to loan the flashy artwork, which is its lobby centerpiece. At that point, according to Guggenheim curator Alexandra Munroe, Cai came up with the solution of creating the copy.

There is very little consensus in the museum community about who has the authority to copy a work of art and what constitutes “good” reasons for doing so. Last October, the Tate Modern in London held a conference called “Inherent Vice: The Replica and its Implications in Modern Sculpture,” which raised heated debates about just these issues.

Most commonly the question comes up when a work of art degrades, and if the artist is alive, he or she gets the final say on what to do. (Think Damien Hirst’s decaying shark in a tank of formaldehyde, which after a time needs a fresh carcass.)

But if an artist has died and an artwork has deteriorated beyond recognition, is it better to repair it, re-create it entirely or let it die? If it’s re-created from scratch, should the replica and the deteriorated version be exhibited together, as co-representatives that add up to the most authentic possible whole?

Part of the reason for the endless nuance has to do with sculpture’s historically complex relationship with replication. A painting has no mold, but a sculpture can be recast. In the 19th century, all the great American museums proudly displayed plaster casts of classical sculptures, thinking they’d never be able to get their hands on the originals and that copies were better than nothing. When originals became all-important, museums destroyed or stuffed away entire collections of copies.

Of course, artists are always ahead of the curve…..for full story http://www.newsweek.com/id/140167/page/1

Source Newsweek   http://www.newsweek.com/id/140167/
Image details Cai Guo Qiang: Inopportune Stage One

For more on

• installation art http://artradarasia.wordpress.com/category/medium/installation-medium/
• books on Cai Guo Qiang at artradarstore

 

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Buying frenzy lights up Iranian art market

Source: Middle East Times

 

 

 

IRANIAN ART MARKET The prices have soared by a factor of 20 within two years, the galleries are packed with prospective buyers and the works are both modern and daring, but this is not a description of the art scene in New York, Paris or London, but Tehran. Far removed from the increasingly tense standoff over the country’s nuclear programme and domestic frustration because of rising inflation, Iran’s best known artists are enjoying a huge rise in demand for their work.

 

Interest in buying art increased in last 2 years

“For 30 years no one was interested in us. Today everyone wants to buy,” Parviz Tanavoli, 72, Iran’s best known sculptor, told AFP. “People have money. They used to invest it in property. Today they see there are other places to put it.”

A 1975 sculpture by Tanavoli, “The Wall (Oh Persepolis),” sold in late April for 2.84 million dollars at a Christie’s auction in Dubai — the highest figure ever reached for a contemporary Iranian work.The 1.8-metre-high (6-feet) bronze block was typical of Tanavoli’s intricate style, partly inspired by the ancient art of the Achaemenian empire, and praised by experts as being more than worth its stratospheric price.

The younger artist Farhad Moshiri, known for his bright three-dimensional paintings of jars emblazoned in calligraphic Persian script, has seen his canvases sell for up to 750,000 dollars.Lesser known artists have seen their work sell at the numerous galleries in upmarket northern Tehran for between 20,000 and 30,000 dollars. Just two years ago the asking price would have been more like 2,000.

 

More buyers for investment

The boom is another example of the striking gulf between wealth and poverty in Tehran, where the rich can afford imported cars and luxury apartments while the worst off struggle to make ends meet. Despite the rise in prices there are more buyers than before. Many people want to make investments,” said Shahnaz Kansari, who heads the Moon art gallery in Tehran.

Amir Hossein Etemad, of the Negarkhaneh Etemad gallery, warned: “I’m worried that this will prove to be nothing more than a speculative bubble that will explode. “But it’s true that the prices were very low before.”

Abstract tendencies have long appeared the most popular in modern Iranian art, possibly because of the strict rules governing the portrayal of the human form in an Islamic state. Iranian visual art also crosses genres in unusual ways: Cannes prize-winning Iranian film director Abbas Kiarostami is also a renowned artist whose stark photography is a major draw at Tehran galleries.

 

Iranian art crosses genre boundaries

One of the fathers of Iranian modernist painting was the poet Sohrab Sepheri, considered one of the greatest of all Iranian modern writers, whose abstract landscapes are true collector’s items.”We are at the beginning of the road. More and more there are individual exhibitions by Iranian artists abroad,” said the painter Farideh Lashaie.”Iranian culture used to be known abroad from the names of ancient poets like Hafez, Ferdowsi and Rumi. But painting and contemporary sculpture also have something to say.”As with cinema, people did not expect to see paintings and sculptures like this coming from Iran. Perhaps this explains their success.”

© 2008 Agence France-Presse

Image details: Iranians visit an exhibition by female artist Golnaz Afruz at the Mah Gallery in Tehran AFP

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http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article4051429.ece