AIKE-DELLARCO started its activity in 2005 in Palermo Italy, exhibiting Italian and international emerging artists. Among the artists represented, since the very beginning, a special attention was given to chinese contemporary art. In 2008 AIKE-DELLARCO opened a branch within the famous district 50 Moganshan Road in Shanghai, to promote the exchange and the dialogue between the chinese artists’ community and the international one. AIKE-DELLARCO currently holds 4 shows a year in its gallery in Shanghai and 4 in its Italian venue. It also runs a residence program, named ‘Revolving boundaries, each year two foreign artists will study in Shanghai and two Chinese artists will be instead guests of the Italian gallery. There they will be requested to produce a site-specific works of art, with strong ties to the territory. At the end of the in-residence-program, the results of their artistic research will be shown in an exhibition. The first foreign artist invited in Shanghai was Domenico Mangano, Italian, a renown presence on the national and international art scene. The first chinese artist invited in Italy was Chow ChunFai (Hong Kong 1980) he had a solo show in italy in 2009.
Jiang Pengyi
Jiang Pengyi, born in Yuanjiang in 1977 a resident of Beijing, whose work is already found in a number of important collections in China and Europe.his images are intriguing, striking , disturbing even in a way, that forces us to reflect on the great urban questions that contemporary society is faced with.
Jiang Pengyi constructs little models of imaginary cities, which are rich in references to real places, installs them in abandoned places and photographs them showing great expertise in the use of light.
In this “Unregistered City n.1”, the ray of light that comes in from the upper window illuminates the landscape and, at the same time, leads the spectator to look beyond the city and understand immediately that they are looking at a studio reconstruction. The cloud of smoke that rises on the left, the pieces of cement that invade the city, and the points of light here and there bring to mind scenes from familiar films like “Blade Runner”, “1997 Escape from New York “, “Brazil”.
The issue of the out-of-control growth of the metropolis and the consequences of it has been addressed by writers, artists, men of letters and the film industry since the early 20th century, but it is clearly a subject of particularly intense interest in the Far East where Jiang Pengyi lives and works. At the same time, the image is striking for its ambiguity, for the quality of the reconstruction which, particularly from a visual perspective, captures our immediate attention.
AIKE-DELLARCO
2/F, Bldg1, 50 Moganshan Road
Shanghai – China
tel +86 021 52527164
Via Siracusa 9
Palermo Italy
tel +39 091 6261234
