Friday, February 29, 2008

Cai Guo-Qiang's Retrospective at the Guggenheim



Cai Guo-Qiang's recent retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum is naturally generating lots of press.
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In response, I post a bit from my Master's thesis Borrowing the Enemy's Arrows: Strategies of Contemporary Chinese Conceptual Artists where I discuss one of Cai's works:
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Globally aware, many Mainland Chinese contemporary artists capitalize on the Oriental stereotype that is projected onto them and reflect it back to the Western art world....
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Cai Guo-Qiang’s installation Borrowing Your Enemy’s Arrows (1998) perfectly illustrates this intelligent strategy. For the Inside Out: New Chinese Art exhibition at P.S. 1 in New York City in 1998, he installed a life-sized boat made of rice straw from his hometown, Quanzhou, an ancient seaport. Suspended from the air, the boat was pierced with a multitude of arrows and a People’s Republic of China flag, attached to the stern, waved frantically in the breeze produced by an electric fan.
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The work is based on a third century Chinese tale. A famous general, in knowing that he did not have enough arrows to win an imminent battle, sent out three hundred boats of straw filled with straw figures. To the enemy, the boats and figures seen through the mist seemed real enough and they attacked, shooting hundreds of arrows that pierced through the straw boats. The general recovered the arrows that were embedded in the boats to defeat his foe (Gao, Inside Out 34).
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Here, Cai uses a traditional Chinese narrative to create multiple layers of meaning: historical, cultural, theoretical and autobiographical. The boat symbolizes the female and the piercing arrows the male gaze. Also, in exoticism, the “other” is seen as female while the “self” is male. This piece is effective because it is normally exhibited in a Western exhibition space where figuratively, Cai, like the general, strategically takes the art world’s arrows to his great advantage. The boat of arrows then becomes a metaphor for Cai’s art practice, as he reflects and deflects the image of Asian artist that is projected upon him by the Western art world.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Július Koller at Musée Rochechouart






An exhibition that opens at the Rochechouart Museum of Contemporary Art on March 1st will feature the work of Slovak artist Július Koller who died last year.
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Koller saw the utopian possibilities inherent in art. In the '70s, he founded the UFO Gallery Ganek on the Ganek Peak of the Upper Tatras Mountains in Slovakia. Koller's gallery was inaccessible to reach, so the gallery became a fictive reality and a shared dream amongst artists. This intrigues me as the Tatras Mountains are where my ancestors come from, so this fabled area is my Avalon.
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Musée départemental d’art contemporain de Rochechouart, http://www.musee-rochechouart.com/

Lars Laumann, 5th Berlin Biennial





Lars Laumann, Still, Berlinmuren, 2008, Video, 32 min, English, loop, color, sound Courtesy: The artist, 5th berlin biennial for contemporary art

The 5th Berlin Biennial curated by Adam Szymczyk and Elena Filipovic opens April 5.

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One of the works to be included is a new film by Lars Laumann titled Berlinmuren and which tells the actual story of Eija-Riita Berliner-Mauer, a Swedish woman who married the Berlin Wall in 1979 and also changed her name.

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A brief internet search only brings up a smattering of articles that discusses this woman's erotic love for this concrete wall. They don't explain if she's ever consummated the wedding (or how). Or if this is a post-modern ironic gesture or a real heart-felt sentiment. It looks like she might have a thing for plastic bags too!

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If you know more about this, please comment.


Monday, February 25, 2008

NY Philharmonic in North Korea


The news services are reporting this latest cultural development.


The NY Philharmonic arrived in North Korea today for a performance scheduled tomorrow.




What do you think? Is this an effective form of cultural diplomacy?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23330636/

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Add Oil


You may be wondering why the title is "add oil" along with a photo of pumping gas. In Chinese, when you are cheering someone to win the race, you'll shout "jia-you, jia-you" which literally means 'add oil.'
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The Taipei Fine Arts Museum which hosts the Taipei Biennial finally did something that I've been bitching about in print for years. See http://www.culture.tw/ and the Opinion section for my previous comments.
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They finally unstuck their head out of the sand! Recently, the TFAM invited the organizers of the Shanghai Biennial and Guangzhou Triennial to work on a cooperation between all the big biennials taking place in Asia in September 2008. So after all these years, I say "Jia you." Way to go!
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This is also a form of soft politics in which a museum in Taiwan is closely collaborating with two museums in China. This really warms my heart, confirming my belief that art can be a way to peace.
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Additionally Taiwan's Council for Cultural Affairs sponsored website http://www.culture.tw/ has recently been denied future funding as the pro-mainland KMT-dominated legislature, which decides on Taiwan's budget, deems that the promotion of "Taiwanese" culture is against their best interests. Although, the KMT is not exactly promoting/funding Chinese art here either.
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And remember, Taiwan's history as a Japanese colony that was never a communist state created a vastly different cultural climate from the mainland. Politics aside, personally I think this culture which is nostalgic and wistful in nature is quite fascinating and should be funded and promoted.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Viva Cuba!


Yesterday, Fidel Castro announced his resignation as Cuba's leader. Now whether you see him as evil incarnate or as revolutionary savior, it's a marvel that he stayed alive in power for 49 years.
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Now, this blog focuses mainly on arts. Cuba has a lot to offer the world with its flourishing culture of fabulous music (Celia Cruz) and art, plus the acclaimed Havana Biennial started in 1984.
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Several provocative artists are showing in international exhibitions. Here's a photo of Carlos Garaicoa's candle installation at Sonsbeek 9, 2001 in which a city (if memory serves correctly, of Rotterdam) slowly burns to the ground. He merges photography, installation and architecture to create works that are relevant to our times.

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Kosovo's art scene



Declaring national independence can detrimentally affect your local art scene.
an exhibition in Kosovo needed to be shut down due to opening night attacks. Glad to see that art still has the power to inflame passions.
Kosovo's declaration of independence was warmly embraced by Taiwan. Local papers are reporting (and personifying) that an angry China is scolding Taiwan and saying Taiwan is ineligible to recognize a sovereign nation.

Relationship Crisis Hotline





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The Relationship Crisis Hotline is a project I started a few years back which was prompted by a devastating breakup that felt like being burnt alive in a fiery plane crash while simultaneously tumbling in a tornado. Since the experience was so acute and long lasting, I wanted to turn it into 'art.' Research showed that on average, it takes women 2 years to overcome a serious breakup - that sure is a lot of wasted time and energy.
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The project deals directly with Taiwan’s society and its alarming suicide rate, which is speculated as one suicide every 2 1/2 hours. I handed out business cards with my actual phone number that told people if they felt like dying from a breakup to call me and I would then go to 'console and comfort' the caller, and even try to prevent their suicide.
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In Relational Aesthetics, the relationship between artist and viewer were rather feel-good entertainments such as eating Rikrit Tiravanija's green curry in a gallery or receiving massages, gifts, etc from other artists. But there was no pain. I wondered, could pain be part of a relational aesthetic experience?
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In addition to my personal counseling services, I exhibited the project 3 times and in 3 vastly different ways.
1. A 2 meter long pillow in a tent outside a gallery. Public airing for private pain.
2. As a counseler's office in a glass encased room with sofas, desk, info and tissues.
3. Only the business card itself installed on top of a plinth in a gallery.

Just as suicide is a very difficult topic to discuss and to understand, so is the dematerialization of art. Here the form matches the content. This action blurs the boundary between real life (and death) and the cultural practice of artmaking. This is an art project about the deepest of emotional pains. But it is also an art project that cannot be seen as there are really no visual elements to it such as video, painting or sculpture. Pain can't really be visualized.

The work also tries to push the boundaries of what an art project can be. Can art be passed around like a business card? Can an art idea pass verbally from one person to another? And ultimately, can art – even art in its most conceptual form – be a lifesaver?

I had also hoped to bring the taboo discussion of suicide into the public domain and under the media spotlight. Knowledge is power.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Cloud Gate's recent fire

Taiwan's living cultural treasure, the Cloud Gate Dance Theater suffered a huge loss with their recent rehearsal studio fire. The fire, perhaps due to faulty electrical wiring, caused the warehouse to disintegrate immediately into ashes.
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Costumes, stage design, props, works created by artist Cai Guo-qiang, and the group's decades-long archive were all destroyed in the blaze.
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As reported in the news Lin Hwai-min, Cloud Gate's director, thanked the assistance that the group received but also criticized government cultural policy, saying that the Council for Cultural Affairs has an annual budget of $100 million NT (www.xe.com) for performing groups. Since there are many high quality performing groups and as performances given abroad acts as cultural diplomacy, the funds are laughable to say the least.
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Lin is quoted in the China Post as, "The phenomenon is astonishing, but the government's investment in culture is only a fraction of what is needed."
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Anyways, the show must go on. The troup is scheduled for 121 performances this year, including a seven week overseas tour with performances at the Guggenheim Museum.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2008/02/12/2003400883

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Eija-Liisa Ahtila; Salla Tykka


Today seems somewhat of a dreamy day which sparked my memory of a video I saw of a rain-soaked girl peeping in a window to spy on an athletic young man jumping with a lasso.
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Here’s the link to Lasso by Salla Tykka. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KS9T8U698No However, this brief youtube snippet makes it seem a trifle silly. The actual video installation made it an emotionally riveting experience bringing to mind certain emotions that emerge during adolescence.
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Another video/film artist from Finland is Eija-Liisa Ahtila. This image is from one of her works. She creates psychologically penetrating works and is currently having her first retrospective in France at the Jeu de Paume. Her new film takes its premise from an event in Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth.
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When art can put us in touch with deep emotional states, we then become better equipped to understand ourselves and the various realities of the world. Probably one thing that will benefit us all - in this world of shallow understanding - is gaining such deep insight.

Saturday, February 9, 2008

Explosions galore


Happy Year of the Rat!
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That transition from the year of the pig to that of the rat made it a bit difficult to blog.
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Today is the second day of the new year and I'm surrounded by practically non-stop firework explosions. These are the type of grand fireworks that are off limits to the personal consumer (if in the US), but here in Hualien are sold commonly in the market.
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After the initial firework explosions on the midnight's eve, it was quickly followed by a steady stream of ambulance sirens. So it's like I've been saying all along: everything is dangerous. Ha!
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So then I started thinking about fireworks in art, which leads to New York-based artist Cai Guo-Qiang who will soon have his retrospective at the Guggenheim open towards the end of this month. Cai is known for using Chinese elements such as dynamite, 'feng shui', Chinese herbs, etc. in his conceptual art.
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