Based between Beijing and Shenzhen, Jiang Zhi (born in 1971 in Yuanjiang, Chine) is a prolific and multidisciplinary artist whose production began in 1997. Videos, paintings, installations and photography, his seemingly incoherent works find a common denominator through their treatment of body language, femininity, light, whiteness, or even theatricality.
Several of his photographic series have already been remarked, notably his rainbows lit with neon publicity lights (Rainbow, 2005). This time Jianh Zhi is confronting the timeless symbols of fire and flowers in his series Love Letters. Presented at the M97 Gallery of Shanghai, the 21 pictures created during 2010 and 2011 are astonishing for their bright colors and presentation.
The artist plays with the codes of otherwise familiar still lifes. He sublimates the flowers, embellishes them, presenting them in delicate vases or in front of flashy backdrops in order to better destroy them with flames. These pictures of flowers in flames reveal a unique moment where extreme beauty and extreme violence come together. Like a play on words, the flame evokes both love and death. In other words, frailty and heartbreak are fundamental elements.
Whether as a reminder of the impermanence of things, of melancholy, of anger, of love, of hope, of beauty or of horror, each will appreciate from a formal point of view the furious vibration of the flame in confrontation with the stability of the flower. As stated by Jiang Zhi, “flower and fire co-exist glamorously together.”
“ Beautiful things and objects themselves will ultimately disappear, but the beauty itself will live on, as well as love. Perhaps this is what I am trying to express. This series of works is actually just that, a series of « Love Letters ». Beauty, pain, transience and eternity, blossoming, and wilting, passion and grace, dedication, giving and sacrifice… These are all about love. “
Jiang Zhi: Love Letters
May 26th – July 8th, 2012
M97 Gallery
97 Moganshan Rd. 2F
Shanghai 200060 China
