Organized in cooperation with the CAFA Art Museum, Beijing, and the brand-new art fair Photo Shanghai (which closed on September 7th), the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai is presenting the exhibition Contemporary Photography in China 2009 – 2014.
Exhibition curator Wang Huangsheng selected the work of 50 artists, interpreting trends in contemporary Chinese photography through three thematic sections: “Boundary/Drift,” “Landscape/Everydayness” and “Society/Body.”
If at first glance the themes seem somewhat limiting, the categories aren’t strictly separate. On the contrary, they’ve been conceived as themes in dialogue with each other, adapting to each image. The works grouped under the theme “Boundary/Drift” explore the medium of photography itself, questioning the eternal illusion of truth. “Landscape/Everydayness” offers a look back at history of contemporary Chinese photography through its landscape, deeply disturbed by urbanization and modern social upheaval. Finally, the human figure is central to “Society/Body.” Magnified, mistreated and reinvented, the body remains without question the key to contemporary Chinese art in general.
It’s interesting to note that all the big names make an appearance: Wang Qingsong and his large format images with saturated colors, the famous director Yan Fudong and his portrait series of women “International Hotel,” which evokes advertisements promoting the “modern woman” at the turn of the 20th century, as well as the more documentary work of Lu Guangunveiling the horrific face of pollution in China.
The presence of these leading lights of contemporary photography casts no shadow on the generation of emerging artists, where we (re)discover the talented and young Ju Lanqing, the lucky winner of the Three Shadows Photography Award 2014 for his captivating series, which is part art object, part private diary, The Journey in the Opposite Direction. Then there’s You Li (aka Eris Yo) and his ethereal vision of northern Chinese landscapes. Others, like Weibi, push photograpy to the boundaries of painting and calligraphy.
With artists ranging from masters to rising stars of the art scene, the exhibition Contemporary Photography in China 2009 – 2014 succeeds in showing the technical, conceptual and aesthetic evolution of contemporary Chinese photography over the last ten years.
Artists on view : Liu Bolin, Wang Ningde, Wang Qingsong, Miao Xiaochun, Hu Jieming, Yang Yongliang, Ye Funa, Sun Lue, Liu Xinyi, Liu Zheng, Luo Dan, Jiang Pengyi, Di Jinjun, Shao Wenhuan, Ta Ke, Wei Bi, Qiu, Fu Yu, Chu Chu, Zhang Kechun, Yu Fei, Zheng Chuan, Xian Yunqiang, Ni Weihua, Zheng Zhiyuan, Wang Guofeng, Feng Yan, Li Jun, Dai Jianyong, Zhu Hao, You Li, Yan Ming, Zhang Xiao, Sun Yanchu, Zhu Lanqing, Li Lang, Liu Jin, Xing Danwen, Ren Hang, Qu Yi, Zhang Wei, Yan Cheng, Ma Liang, Yang Fudong, Li Zhengde, Li Yu + Liu Bo, Ou Zhihang, Ducky Tse, Wang Jiuliang, Lu Guang, Yao Jui-chung + LSD, Zhang Dali
EXHIBITION
Contemporary Photography in China 2009 – 2014
Until October 15 2014
Minsheng Art Museum
Bldg.F No.570 Huaihai (W) Rd
Shanghai (China)
