Nadav Kander, Yangtze - The Long River @Flowers

JTF (just the facts): A total of 13 large scale color photographs, framed in brown wood and unmatted, and hung against white walls in a series of three connected gallery spaces. All of the prints are chromogenic color prints made between 2006 and 2009. The prints are available in three sizes: 38x48 (in editions of 5), 48x59 (in editions of 5), and 59x69 (in editions of 3). A monograph of this body of work was published in 2011 by Hatje Cantz (here). (Installation shots at right.)

 

Comments/Context: China's rapid economic and cultural transformations over the past few decades have provided a rich vein raw material that countless artists and photographers have continued to mine. The most common underlying narrative follows a nearly endless set of clashes and contradictions: West and East, modern and traditional, urban and rural, new and old, uneasy dichotomies and unlikely juxtapositions seemingly everywhere one might look. Nadav Kander's three year exploration of life along the Yangtze River explores this same terrain, centering on the dizzying cycle of destruction and construction that has wholly remade both the physical landscape and the day to day existence of millions of people along the river. But this isn't a Three Gorges Dam story exactly, nor is it a documentary study of displaced families or overlooked individuals; Kander has instead stepped back to take an outsider's wider view, creating images that revel in extreme contrasts of scale and outlook.

 

Printed large and bathed in the glow of a soft, foggy palette, Kander's photographs bring a contemporary sensibility to the grandeur of 19th Romantic painting. The rugged mountains, wide vistas, and turbulent storms of nature have been replaced by massive, often unfinished, man made structures. Soaring bridges, concrete spans, support pillars, and industrial smokestacks anchor many of the pictures, dwarfing everything around them in their sleek newness. Tiny figures are evidence of the immensity of the scale, their insignificance made obvious by the enormous physical size of these infrastructure projects. Paltry human activities like having a drink, washing a motorcycle, fishing with an old style net, or swimming in the river become almost wistfully comic when set against these manifestations of power, a few of these ominous scale mismatches bordering on something out of a science fiction novel.

 

Kander hits the underbelly of this forward looking, aspirational future with images that highlight both the disconnect between old and new and the messy, unfinished nature of the changes taking place. A Vegas-style hotel complete with a pirate lagoon stands like an oversized concrete hulk, while old school bamboo scaffolding holds up an immense flyover and rebar spikes are covered by incoming tidal sand. Rickety, rusted barges still do the work of the river, and entirely new cities explode in chaotic sprawls just across the river from now abandoned wastelands. Once again, tiny people look on, alternately forlorn and awestruck by the metamorphosis - it's impossible not to gawk at the pace and the scale of the activity, even if it means the only world you have ever known is disappearing.

 

I think the success in these pictures is found in their calm balance. They pepper the formally majestic and the atmospherically sublime with undercurrents of intimidated, vulnerable respect. They astonish and amaze with their can-do achievements, while never straying too far from the gritty realities of everyday life. And the emotions of personal anxiety and apprehension are quietly matched by national wonder and pride. It's an impressive photographic mix, smartly charting the complex character of China's modern personality.

 

Collector's POV: The prints in this show are priced in ratcheting editions, starting at $6500 (38x48), $10500 (48x59) or $16000 (59x69) based on size; prices range all the way up to $48000, and many of the images are NFS or sold out in certain sizes. Kander's work has just begun to enter the secondary markets in the past few years. That said, not enough lots have changed hands to generate any kind of auction pricing pattern, so gallery retail likely remains the best option for those collectors interested in following up.

  

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

  

Transit Hub:

• Artist site (here)
• Features/Reviews: NY Times Lens (here), Photograph (here), Conscientious (here), Guardian (here), New Yorker (here)
• Interview: Le Journal de la Photographie (here)
• Prix Pictet, 2009 (here)

Nadav Kander, Yangtze - The Long River

Through November 24th

 

Flowers Gallery

529 West 20th Street

New York, NY 10011

Shen Wei, I Miss You Already @Cooney

JTF (just the facts): A total of 10 large scale color photographs, framed in black and unmatted, and hung in the divided gallery space. All of the works are digital chromogenic prints, made between 2009 and 2012. The prints come in two sizes: 20x30 (in editions of 5) and 30x45 (in editions of 3). The show includes 4 pictures in the smaller size and 6 in the larger size. (Installation shots at right.)

 

Comments/Context: Given that there aren't many male nudes in contemporary Chinese photography, Shen Wei's new self-portraits could certainly be called cultural outliers. His documents of self expression follow the path of the calm and the understated rather than the overtly provocative or the knowingly political, tracing an inward-looking personal exploration with remarkably restrained sensitivity. There is still, of course, tension in these pictures, but it is reserved and quiet, open but uncertain.

Most of Shen's images play with the angles of his body: bent knees on a window sill, an arched back bend, a straight leg interrupting a table top still life, a triangular elbow propping up his head. His graceful stance in a submerged boat, using his outstretched leg to make concentric ripples in the light dappled water reminded me of Thomas Eakins. A few others offer complex, unknowable situations and interactions: a hand on his neck that might be either a caress or a choke, a bedside scene flanked by a nude woman and a sprawled man that offers any number of possible explanations. Shadows engulf many of the photographs, drawing our attention to the central figure in the light and adding a layer of introspective melancholy.

The best of these photographs left me impressed with Shen's growing compositional talents. When the pictures work, he successfully walks the line between realism and lyricism, all within the context of something genuinely personal.

 

Collector's POV: The prints in this exhibit are priced in ratcheting editions, as follows: the 20x30 prints start at $2500 each and the 30x45 prints start at $3500 each (one print in this size had already reached $4500). Shen's work has very little secondary market history, so gallery retail is still likely the best option for those collectors interested in following up.

 

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

 

Transit Hub:

• Artist site (here)
• Review: New Yorker (here)

Shen Wei, I Miss You Already

Through October 27th

 

Daniel Cooney Fine Art

508 West 26th Street (new location)

New York, NY 10001

Liu Bolin: Lost in Art @Klein

JTF (just the facts): A total of 21 large scale color photographs,  unframed and hung in the two main gallery spaces, a small back room, and a portion of the downstairs gallery. All of the works are chromogenic prints, mounted on Sintra and faced with Plexi, and made between 2007 and 2011. The prints come in four sizes: 25x32, 37x47, 47x59, or 58x79, in edition sizes of 6 or 8. There are also two sculptures on display, from 2007 and 2012. A catalog of the exhibit is available from the gallery. The downstairs space includes an unrelated group of 22 diptychs by Zhang Dali. (Installation shots at right.)

 

Comments/Context: The eye-catching works of Chinese artist Liu Bolin are at once "photography" and "performance art", mixing the optical illusion effects of a camera-based image with the physical demands of an artistic performance. His underlying formula is remarkably consistent: find an appropriate location and then paint his entire body in such a way that he can stand in the scene and seem to disappear. The process is painstaking and lengthy, but the camouflage generally works and he becomes remarkably invisible.

 

My initial reaction to this conceptual approach was that it seemed like a gimmick, an overly decorative Where's Waldo kind of game. But when Liu chooses his settings well, the idea of a human becoming invisible starts to gain more power. In front of a wall of stuffed animal pandas or colorful soft drink cans, he's lost in consumerism and China's burgeoning economic power. In front of an outdoor kiosk covered in flyers from job seekers, he's lost in unemployment and the challenges of migration to the big cities. In front of the Ground Zero construction site and a wall of remembrance tiles here in New York, he's lost in the meanings and resonances of that event. The visual trickery is always clever; it's when the symbolism is well chosen that the motif is most successful. The exhibit also includes a selection of images made in collaboration with famous fashion designers. Jean Paul Gaultier and Angelea Missoni disappear into signature fabrics and patterns, while Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Piccioli of Valentino and Alber Elbaz of Lanvin vanish into displays of their work. The metaphorical message is less clear here, but the images are still striking. 

 

In many ways, these photographs are straightforward and easy to like. But the best of these works are more than just a sight gag; they offer layers of additional meanings and readings that go beyond the fun and magic. In my view, these are the images that will ultimately have the most durability, as they add complex cultural questions to the entertainment.

 

Collector's POV: The prints in this show are priced based on size. The 25x32 prints are $9000, the 37x47 prints are $12000, the 47x59 prints are $15000, and the 58x79 prints are $36000. Liu's work has only just begun to find its way into the secondary markets for photography, but there have been too few sales to chart any kind of reliable price history. As such, gallery retail is still likely the best option for interested collectors.

 

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

 

Transit Hub:

• Reviews/Features: Harper's Bazaar (here), Time LightBox (here), Designboom (here), Fashionista (here), Arrested Motion (here)

Liu Bolin: Lost in Art
Through May 11th

Eli Klein Fine Art
462 West Broadway
New York, NY 10012

Rising Dragon: Contemporary Chinese Photography @Katonah Museum

JTF (just the facts): A group show consisting of 75 works (116 total photographs) by 36 different Chinese artists/photographers, variously framed and matted, and hung in the two main gallery spaces and the connecting entry area. All of the works were made between 1994 and 2011. The exhibit was curated by Miles Barth and will travel to the Krannert Art Museum and the San Jose Museum of Art. (Installation shots at right courtesy of the Katonah Museum of Art, photography by Margaret Fox.)

 

The following photographers have been included in the exhibit, with the number of photographs on view and image details in parentheses:

 

Righter Gallery

Adou (2 gelatin silver prints, 2006)

Chen Wei (1 archival inkjet print, 2010)

Jiang Pengyi (1 chromogenic print, 2009)
Li Lang (1 digital pigment print, 2001)

Li Wei (2 digital pigment prints, 2005, 2008)

Liyu + Liubo (6 digital chromogenic prints, 2006, 2007)
Liu Ren (1 digital chromogenic print, 2007)
Lu Guang (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2010)

Lu Hao (1 set of 4 color photographs, 1999)

Peng Rong (1 color photograph, 2008)

Qiu Zhijie (1 color coupler print, 2005)
Rong Rong (1 set of 4 hand tinted gelatin silver prints, 2000)

Wang Qingsong (1 set of 3 chromogenic prints, 2003)
Weng Fen (4 digital chromogenic prints, 2000, 2002, 2009)

Xu Zhen (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2005)

Yang Yi (1 digital pigment print, 2007)
Zhang Lijie (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2010, 2011)

Zhang Xiao (4 digital chromogenic prints, 2006-2008, 2007, 2008, 2009)
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Beitzel Gallery

Cao Fei (1 digital chromogenic print, 2002)
Chen Qiulin (1 color photograph, 2002)

Huang Yan (1 chromogenic print, 2005)

Liu Zheng (12 gelatin silver prints, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1999, 2000, printed in 2006)
Muge (3 gelatin silver prints, 2004, 2006)

O Zhang (17 chromogenic prints installed in greenery, 2006)

O Zhang (3 digital chromogenic prints, 2008)
Sun Ji (1 digital pigment print, 2005)

Tamen (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2007)
Tian Taiquan (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2006)
Wang Jin (1 chromogenic print, 1995)
Wang Wusheng (3 gelatin silver prints, 2007)

Weng Fen (1 set of 10 digital chromogenic prints, 2001-2010)
Yao Lu (2 chromogenic prints, 2007, 2009)

Zhang Huan (1 set of 9 chromogenic prints, 2000)
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Entry Area

Maleonn (3 digital chromogenic prints, 2005, 2006, 2007)
Yu Haibo (1 digital chromogenic print, 2005)

Zhou Hai (2 digital chromogenic prints, 2005)

 

Comments/Context: It's been eight long years since the groundbreaking 2004 ICP/Asia Society show of contemporary Chinese photography, and while the chaotic art scene in China continues to evolve at a blistering pace, from a fixed perch in New York, it's nearly impossible to stay current on what's actually going on. So it was with much anticipation that I made a visit to the Katonah Museum of Art's current group show, with the hopes of getting an update on how things have continued to change over the intervening years. If this tightly edited sampler-style exhibit is any guide to the reality on the ground, the melting pot of interconnected ideas surrounding the country's wholesale economic, social, and cultural transformation has become even more complicated and nuanced than expected, and the resulting art has moved beyond simplistic Chinese cliches intended for Western audiences to more mature investigations of everything from consumerism to environmental destruction.

While the show is not organized thematically, there are certainly a handful of underlying ideas that present themselves again and again in the chosen works. Given China's rich artistic and cultural history, it is inevitable that contemporary artists would be forced to thoughtfully engage with the past, picking through the centuries of excellence for those portions to discard and those to renew. This back and forth dialogue between the traditional arts and those of this moment is captured in a number of memorable pieces. Zhang Huan blackens his face with calligraphy, while Qiu Zhijie draws characters with light. Wang Wusheng makes imposing foggy mountainscapes reminiscent of ancient Chinese painting, while Yao Lu reinterprets these same forms using construction rubble and green netting. Huang Yan paints traditional landscapes on his face, and Wang Qingsong builds classic floral still lifes out of frozen meat and vegetables. Respect and subversion are offered in equal doses, highlighting the challenges of balancing the aesthetics of old and new.

Western style consumerism and the expansion of mega cities are another face of this old/new reconciliation. Cao Fei's dog faced people crawl on all fours dressed head to toe in Burberry plaid, while Li Lang's studio portraits of the traditional Yi people include boom boxes and bright white tennis shoes. Weng Fen has three separate bodies of strong work in this show that all touch on these related themes: a diptych of "family aspirations" which juxtaposes patriotic Mao suits/red dresses with Western suits/briefcases, a pair schoolgirl profiles against expansive modern cityscapes, and a William Christenberry-like series of ten images of the city of Haikou, which is slowly engulfed by massive urban sprawl. Li Wei's portrait of his wife and daughter, precariously seated on the raw girders of a new building while he is lifted feet first into the air, makes the personal uncertainty surrounding such rapid expansion all the more unsettling.

What we haven't seen as much of in the telling of the "new China" story is the rebirth of documentary and photojournalistic efforts. Happily, this show collects a number of examples of unflinching, nuanced reporting. Muge chronicles the societal transformations created by the Three Gorges Dam, while Zhou Hai documents the lives of steel workers. Environmental damage is captured by both Lu Guang and Zhang Xiao. And overlooked stories, from deformed citizens (Zhang Lijie) to mass produced art forgeries (Yu Haibo) finally have a voice. It is a hopeful sign that truth telling is becoming somewhat easier, after decades of suppression and censorship.

Finally, this show gathers together plenty of examples of quirky rule breaking and symbolic eclecticism. A man in a tuxedo marries a mule dressed in pink taffeta to protest his repeated visa denials (Wang Jin), dream-like sheep fill Tiananmen Square (Liu Ren), mechanical ants head toward the futuristic Water Cube (Peng Rong), kids pose in "Chinglish" t-shirts in front of historic landmarks (O Zhang), and groups of kids wrestle with PhotoShopped George Bush and Kofi Annan (Xu Zhen). Creative boundaries are being stretched, not always completely successfully, but at least with genuine freshness and spirit.

What I think I like best about this show is its quiet optimism. Of course, there are many complex perhaps intractable problems facing contemporary China, but this exhibit proves that the burgeoning artistic community is increasingly ready to meet these challenges, using everything from beauty and insight to mockery and satire to bring thoughtful, unvarnished context to these issues. New Yorkers, this is the best short term opportunity that you're likely to get to catch a glimpse of the current state of Chinese photography, so hop the Metro North train to Katonah and don't miss this well-chosen cross section of recent work.
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Collector's POV: Given this is a museum show, there are, of course, no posted prices. While most of the photographers in this show lack New York gallery representation, I have listed below what I could track down for those that do. If there are other representation relationships in other cities in the US, or in China for that matter, please be encouraged to add them to the comments for the benefit of all:

• Adou: Pace/MacGill Gallery (here)
• Cao Fei: Lombard-Freid Projects (here)
• Liu Zheng: Yossi Milo Gallery (here)
• Muge: Anastasia Photo (here)
• O Zhang: CRG Gallery (here)
• Wang Wusheng: Barry Friedman (here)
• Yao Lu: Bruce Silverstein Gallery (here)
• Zhang Huan: Pace Gallery (here)

Similarly, very few of these artists have any secondary market history in the US. Zhang Huan and Wang Qingsong have the most consistent auction activity; for virtually all the rest, gallery retail is likely the only real option for interested collectors at this point, and this assumes being able to find an appropriate representative to contact, either here in New York or elsewhere.
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Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)
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Transit Hub:

• Reviews: Bedford Record Review (here)

Rising Dragon: Contemporary Chinese Photography
Through September 2nd

Katonah Museum of Art
134 Jay Street
Katonah, NY 10536

Cao Fei: Play Time @Lombard-Freid

JTF (just the facts): A total of 12 works, displayed in the main gallery space, the back alcove, and on the outdoor terrace. There are 8 photographic works on view: 2 single image c-prints, framed in blond wood and not matted, each 35x47 in editions of 10, from 2011, and 6 c-print diptychs, framed in blond wood and not matted, each print 24x32, also in editions of 10, from 2011. The show also includes 2 single channel color videos with sound (one on a small flat screen, the other projected on an entire wall), both from 2011, 1 wooden tabletop sculpture, from 2011, and one garden installation. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: In a relatively short span of time, Cao Fei has cemented her artistic position at the nexus of pop and youth culture, expanding how we experience and think about new trends and online communities. In recent projects, she has explored the virtual world of Second Life and documented cosplayers in the context of day-to-day China. This show continues this line of experimentation, remaking recognizable children's TV characters and simple games by playing with the edges of reality and fantasy and adding in layers of subtle social commentary.

All of the photographs in this show come from the PostGarden series, where candy colored characters (the CBeebies from the BBC) have left their idyllic world and now travel through muddy dirt piles, highway underpasses, and smoking wastelands. Her images capture the stuffed figures escaping across an open field, pushing a shopping cart, living in a tent camp, and digging a grave for their dead father. The works are like a fairy tale gone bad, where honest simplicity and trusting innocence unexpectedly meet difficult reality. Many of the images are actually diptychs with an I Spy game built in, where the paired works have a handful of differences the viewer is supposed to try and spot. Even though this feels a little gimmicky, the technique definitely encourages a close inspection of the details, reinforcing just how odd the whole narrative structure really is.

A similar cartoon character device is used in one of the short videos, where the jaunty smile of Thomas the Tank Engine is grafted onto the front of a dusty truck hauling grimy trash and construction debris across town to the city dump; fun childhood adventures have been exchanged for ugly, mind numbing work. A second video uses silhouetted hand puppets to play out clever shadow stories with dark undertones and ominous political undercurrents.

In all of these works, things are not what they seem, and innocent cartoon symbols have been taken out of context, creating an entirely different "play" experience. Depending on your level of jadedness and sarcasm, it's alternately sharply satirical and and sadly dispiriting to see these bouncing happy characters endure the harsh realities life has to dish out. In Cao Fei's works, the soft, warm glow of these fantasy worlds has been drained away, leaving behind something more complicated and much less easily interpreted.

Collector's POV: The photographic works in this show are priced as follows. The 35x47 single images are $13200 each (framed); the diptychs are also $13200 each (framed). Cao Fei's work has only recently begun to enter the secondary markets, mostly in Asian Contemporary Art sales. As such, gallery retail is still likely the best option for interested collectors at this point.

If you don't have an 11 year old boy in your house (like we do), you likely won't have any idea what a Tech Deck is (it's a small hand held replica skateboard that can be manipulated with your fingers). But if you can identify this trendy toy, I can absolutely guarantee that Cao Fei's laminated wood miniature skatepark is the single most kid friendly artwork that you will see in a gallery this year. It combines various architectural features with ramps and rails, coming together in a dense tabletop extravaganza that will make your child's eyes light up; don't enjoy it too much, or you'll be off the lumberyard cursing yourself as you try and recreate it.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• Artist site (here)
• Review: NY Times (here)

Cao Fei: Play Time
Through June 25th

Lombard-Freid Projects
518 West 19th Street
New York, NY 10001

Shen Wei, Chinese Sentiment @Cooney

JTF (just the facts): A total of 19 color photographs, unmatted and framed in black, and hung in the single room gallery space. All of the works are digital c-prints, taken between 2008 and 2010. The prints come in two sizes: 16x20 (in editions of 8) and 24x30 (in editions of 3). The show includes 17 pictures in the smaller size and 2 in the larger size. A monograph of this body of work has recently been published by Charles Lane Press (here). (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: Shen Wei's recent images of China fly in the face of the now familiar energetic, economic boom narrative that dominates the our media-saturated view of the Eastern giant. Whether his subject is a landscape, a still life, or a portrait, his images have a consistent emotional tenor, a formal sense of solitary, introspective reserve. There are no pictures of overcrowded chaotic streets filled with noisy bicycles here; instead Shen provides a sense of melancholy distance, where small moments of uncertain peace occur in the muted tones of a grey morning.
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Shen's portraits capture his sitters alone in their rooms or in fleeting glimpses of thoughtful repose; they are at once intimate and unknowable, buried in private stillness. His landscapes find a similar mood: the enveloping mist of a fountain, the rain splattered surface of an ornamental pond, a single figure watching a red paddle boat disappear under a bridge, or the head of a ticket booth attendant in the dark of the early evening. Even his still lifes have a sense of dull ache: the gooey leftovers of a sugar candy stick, an unopened plastic bag of noodle soup on a window sill, or the box of fancy pears in protective sheaths bought for a special occasion. Seen together, the different compositional forms coalesce into an overall sensitivity to the subtle action on the periphery of life, an awareness of the shifts that happen just outside the norwal sweep of our gaze.
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Overall, I liked the sense of understatement and restraint that Shen shows across this body of work. He successfully holds back from courting the obvious, and instead, dives deeper for something more durable and resonant.

Collector's POV: The prints in this exhibit are priced as follows: the 16x20 prints are $1500 each and the 24x30 prints are $2500 each. Shen's work has effectively no secondary market history, so gallery retail is likely the only option for interested collectors at this point. 20x200 (here) also has some of his work for sale.
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My favorite image in the show was Tingwei, Shangahi, 2010; it's on the far left in the bottom installation shot and is also on the cover of the monograph. I like the quietly innocent, eyes-closed expression on her face and the way her hair spreads out on the long green grass; the image has a calm serenity, like the edge of a dream.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

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Transit Hub:

• Artist site (here) and blog (here)
• Interview: Conscientious (here)

Shen Wei, Chinese Sentiment
Through June 4th

Daniel Cooney Fine Art
511 West 25th Street
New York, NY 10001

Auction: BRIC, April 14 and 15, 2011 @Phillips London

Coming up later this week in London, Phillips has brought back its BRIC themed sale, featuring varied work from the emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India, and China. As you might expect, there are plenty of unfamiliar contemporary names in the mix, and the sale offers Western collectors exposure to work out beyond the edges of the well worn paths we regularly travel. Overall, out of 204 total lots on offer, there are 56 lots of photography available, with a Total High Estimate for photography of £971000.

Here's the statistical breakdown:

Total Low Lots (high estimate up to and including £5000): 18
Total Low Estimate (sum of high estimates of Low lots): £73000

Total Mid Lots (high estimate between £5000 and £25000): 32
Total Mid Estimate: £318000

Total High Lots (high estimate above £25000): 6
Total High Estimate: £580000
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The top lot by High estimate is lot 25, Rashid Rana, Veil IV, 2007, at £250000-300000. (Image at right, bottom, via Phillips.)
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Here is the list of the photographers who are represented by more than one lot in the sale (with the number of lots in parentheses):

Zhang Huan (4)
Boris Mikhailov (3)
Vik Muniz (3)
Wang Qingsong (3)
Cui Xiuwen (2)
Oleg Dou (2)
Gao Brothers (2)
Ma Liuming (2)
Vladislav Mamyshev-Monroe (2)
Qiu Zhijie (2)
Rashid Rana (2)
Marc Riboud (2)
Weng Fen (2)

(Lot 154, Zhang Huan, My Boston 2, 2005, at £6000-8000, image at right, top, and lot 165, Cui Xiuwen, One Day in 2004 No. 4, 2004, at £5000-7000, image at right, middle, both via Phillips.)
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The complete lot by lot catalog can be found here.

BRIC
April 14th/15th
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Phillips De Pury & Company
Howick Place
London SW1P 1BB

Wang Qingsong: When Worlds Collide @ICP

JTF (just the facts): A total of 12 large scale color photographs, unframed and pinned directly to green/grey walls in a series of rooms on the lower level of the museum. The works on view were made between 1997 and 2005; overall dimensions and edition sizes were not available. The exhibit also includes 3 video terminals showing various works and footage from the staging of certain images, as well as a glass case containing 7 books. The show was curated by Christopher Phillips. Since photography is not allowed in the ICP galleries, the installation shots for this show at right come via the Artnet article linked below.

Comments/Context: Over the past decade, Wang Qingsong has solidified his place among the top echelon of Chinese contemporary photographers. A representative sample of his recent work is now on display at the ICP, and should finally introduce him to a much broader slice of the New York art world.

Wang's earliest works satirize the cultural clash between traditional Chinese culture and the influx of Western consumerism by juxtaposing old and new with kitchy excess. A well-known poster from the Cultural Revolution celebrating the power of the ink brush has been updated with books on exam shortcuts. A multi-armed Buddha now holds a cellphone, cigarettes, and beer, perched on a Coca-Cola pedestal. And a 10th century scroll has been reimagined with bored peasant women in tarted-up eye makeup and Jack Daniels bottles strewn across the tables. This strange hybrid culture mixes past and present, where the ideals of the past have been polluted by the onslaught of brands and commerce. Once the jolt of Wang's humor wears off, the effect is surprisingly sad and empty.

His more recent pictures amplify these ideas into monumental scenes with elaborate sets and hundreds of actors, following in the footsteps of Crewdson and Wall, but with a more caustic and cynical point of view. Hundreds of old-style paper political posters now feature hand-drawn Western logos: McDonald's, Citibank, Evian, and Pampers. An English language class now caters to the needs of the nouveau-riche, with handy phrases appropriate for the Olympics or the Venice Biennale. Several of the works chronicle the plight of the migrant workers who have left the countryside and flooded the coastal cities: a massive dormitory made of blue scaffolding, where tenants sit nude often echoing art history favorites, squatter families living in a demolished building, and mobs of injured workers trying to get through a burning checkpoint made of barbed wire and soda cans. The critique is harsh and skeptical, each picture full of numerous smaller dramas and references that support the larger thematic construct.

Overall, Wang's vision of modern Chinese society is a parody of meaning and refinement, where crude and vulgar have replaced cultured and thoughtful, exposing both the crass and unseemly side of the new materialism and its unfortunate downstream effects. His exaggerations and cinematic narratives are powerful and ultimately quite deflating, describing a world (both West and East) that seems headed down the path toward the increasingly inane, unfulfilled, and expressionless.

Collector's POV: Wang's photographs have become consistently available in the secondary markets in recent years. Prices have generally ranged between $6000 and $100000, with a few extremely large tableaux selling for as much as $700000.

My favorite image in the show was Follow Me, 2003; it's the large image on the left in the top installation shot. I like the ridiculous scale of the huge chalkboard and the way English language phrases like "I'd like to make a deposit" or "I'm just hanging out with my friends doing a little bargain hunting" are combined into a dense all-over composition. It's a little like a treasure hunt, with tiny ironies and barbs hiding everywhere.

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• Artist site (here)
• Reviews: NY Times (here), Economist (here)
• Features: Artnet (here), WNYC (here)

Wang Qingsong: When Worlds Collide
Through May 8th

International Center of Photography
1133 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10036

Hai Bo, Recent Work @Pace/MacGill

JTF (just the facts): A total of 9 large scale photographic works, generally framed in black and not matted, and hung against red and putty colored walls in the divided gallery space. The prints are either pigment or LightJet prints mounted to Dibond, available in editions of 5, 8, or 12. Physical dimensions range from roughly 20x62 to 55x110, with each image its own specific size. There are 8 color single images and 1 black and white triptych in the show. All of the works were made between 2007 and 2009. There is no photography allowed in the gallery, so the installation shots at right are via the Pace/MacGill website.

Comments/Context: One of the main criticisms of the recent boom in Chinese contemporary art was that much of the work seemed to have been specifically made for Western audiences and collectors: big, bold images, full of Chinese cliches and Western consumerism, easily reproducible by armies of staff members; in short, the ultimate get-rich-quick luxury commodity. Hai Bo's photographs clearly come from somewhere much more authentic and personal. His recent works examine small contemplative moments of quiet, where the burdens of time weigh heavily, and where the people in his pictures have the chance to consider both their own mortality and their place in the larger span of history.

Most of Hai Bo's subjects are elderly men, perhaps moving a bit more slowly than in their busier younger days. His images capture the rhythms of endless days, where lonely figures walk on desolate roads amid the frozen stubble of winter fields and handfuls of men sit on garden seats, trading stories and taking stock of village life on a rural timescale. One man leans his head against the trunk of a tree, in a gesture of supplication or anguish, while another wrinkled face peers out from the darkness, the plastic ear bud dangling from one ear the only clue to his modern existence. These are the men left behind by the wave of migration to the big cities, born into a world of agriculture and living out their twilight years fatigued and forgotten, some recast as faceless black silhouettes clustered outside a frigid nursing home.

There is a marked sense of poignancy in these pictures, a depressing empty feeling that these men are repeating the age old ritual of being ground up and erased by the tides of collective history. For these individuals, the struggle for meaning against the backdrop of centuries of Chinese history seems palpably real; the hardships are many and insignificance once again knocks ominously on the door. Hai Bo takes an unwavering glance at these lives, and his photographs provide a compassionate, but ultimately heavy-hearted foil to the popular narrative of China's ever-accelerating economic transformation.
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Collector's POV: The prints in this show are priced between $16000 and $40000. Hai Bo's photographs have recently begun to enter the secondary markets, with prices ranging between $5000 and $44000 at auction in the past two years.

To my eyes, Passing Traveller, 2008, is by far the standout image in the show; it's on the left in the top installation picture. It has an iconic feel, depicting a solitary older man walking down a potholed dirt road, surrounded by the expanse of flat land, Chinese history, and time itself, dissolving into the nothingness of the enveloping yellow haze.

Rating: * (one star) GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• Reviews/Features: Daily Beast (here), Wall Street Journal (here), Artslant (here)

Hai Bo, Recent Work

Through February 26th

Pace/MacGill Gallery

32 East 57th Street

New York, NY 10022

Humanism in China: A Contemporary Record of Photography @China Institute

JTF (just the facts): A total of 100 photographs, mostly black and white, framed in blond wood and matted, and hung on grey walls in two separate galleries. The rooms are densely hung with pictures, often in double (or even triple) rows; each room also has a room divider, with images hung on both sides. The images were taken between 1951 and 2003, and while some photographers are represented by more than one image, the vast majority have only one picture included (therefore the number of photographers on view almost equals the number of images on view). The show is a subset of a larger show of approximately 600 works by 270 photographers shown at the Guangdong Museum of Art (here). A thin volume detailing the project (with background essays and a checklist) is available from the Institute bookstore for $15. (The China Institute does not allow photography in the galleries, so no installation shots are available for this show. Individual images have been taken from the China Institute website.)

Comments/Context: Ever since the bold emergence of Chinese contemporary photography in the US art world about five years ago, we have been trying to get our arms around the context for this new work and to understand its origins and influences. And while we have spent some time familiarizing ourselves with some of the bold face names of the current generation (Liu Zheng here, Wang Qingsong here, and Zhang Huan here), coming to grips with the larger historical picture has been elusive (here).

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The broad show of humanist photography now on view at the China Institute does an excellent job of filling in some major gaps. Whether these images came out of photojournalistic or purely artistic traditions doesn't matter much in my view; what I can see for the first time is an obvious tie back to the rest of the history of photography. Most of the images are from the 1980s and 1990s (coincident with the time when China began to open up more widely), and collectively they create a much more diverse picture of China than the usual clichés might suggest. These are not heroic propaganda shots or staged scenes of happy workers; for the most part, the images are small vignettes of ordinary everyday life, caught with documentary precision, artistic attention to composition, and intimate tenderness. There are markets and construction sites, people bathing in the street, crowds of bicycles, farm workers and the repeated clashing of generations. These are the stories of the unidealized masses, full of life, humor, imperfection, and reality.

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A few of the highlights from the show:

• Li Nan's startling images from orphanages, where children have been tied to their chairs, due to lack of staff to care for them.
• Xu Peiwu's images of migrants in urban areas. I enjoyed the twisting arcs of rebar in Large scale demolition of temporary urban housing, 1999 (at right, bottom) and his poignant image of people up in a dark tree watching fireworks over an industrial area.
• Yang Xiaobing's image of students perilously crossing a broken slat bridge to get to school each day.
• Wang Shilong's almost Modernist picture of dark figures sweeping the streets against the backdrop of a bright white wall (Responding to the call for a patriotic hygienic movement, citizens come forth to sweep the streets, 1958, at right, middle).
• Hei Ming's crazy patterns of rice bowls, hung outside a storefront (Iron Rice Bowl Workers' dining hall, 2000, at right, top).
• Liu Yiwei's silhouetted construction worker, walking on the bare spikes of steel of an incomplete overpass, with the traffic rushing by underneath.

Overall, this is a diverse gathering of high quality work, full of juxtapositions of new and old, urban and rural. The dramatic change we have come to associate with China is seen for the first time on the micro level, where anonymous people confront the transformations on a personal basis. While not every image in this show rises to the level of documentary art (and the installation often feels overcrowded), I think this is an important exhibit that merits an investment of time; this is some of the Chinese photography the West has been missing, so make a detour to fill in some gaps in your education.

Collector's POV: Given the way this exhibit was designed and hung, the photographers seem to be pushed to the background; the pictures are in the front, who made them hasn't been highlighted. As such, it is extremely hard to get a feel for the broader artistic differences between the photographers who have been included. While there are certainly images we found memorable (some of which we alluded to above), it seems like this show might best be thought of as an introduction: now at least, we have a list of names to follow up.

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The problem is, of course, how to do this. I have no idea where the work of any of these photographers might be available in the US; perhaps it is only available in China. Please do add information to the comments section if you can provide useful pointers to where interested collectors can potentially follow-up.
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Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here).

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Transit Hub:

• Additional exhibit related resources (here)
• Reviews: WSJ (here)

Humanism in China: A Contemporary Record of Photography

Through December 13th

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China Institute

125 East 65th Street

New York, NY 10065

Course: Short Course on Chinese Contemporary Art @AW Asia

On four Tuesday nights in October, AW Asia (here) is putting on a free Short Course in Chinese Contemporary Art. Information on the course can be found here. The four sessions (an hour and a half each) include:

• From Mao to Now: An Overview of Chinese Contemporary Art
• Evening with Melissa Chiu, Director of the Asia Society and Museum
• Visit with Christopher Phillips, Curator ICP
• 21st Century China & the Global Art World

These look like excellent sessions for those of us who need to get better informed on contemporary photography in China. Registration is required.

Taliesin Thomas
Director, AW Asia
545 West 25th Street, Floor 7
New York, NY 10001
taliesin@awasiany.com

In a related note, Larry Warsh, the collector behind AW Asia, has recently sold groups of Chinese contemporary photography to both MoMA and the Getty. (here)

(via)

Book: Liu Zheng, The Chinese

JTF (just the facts): Jointly published in 2004 by Steidl and ICP. 142 pages, with 130 black and white images. Includes an introduction by Christopher Phillips, essays by Gu Zheng and Liu Zheng, and an artist interview conducted by Meg Maggio.

Comments/Context: In the past few months, we have been doing some further background work on Chinese photography, in the hopes of developing a more nuanced and educated view of the contemporary photography being produced there. A few weeks ago, Ren Yue, a lecturer at Renmin University in Beijing who is spending a year here in New York, was nice enough to answer some of my simplistic questions. (In her spare time, she writes an influential photography blog (in Chinese, here), which is how we got connected.) We had a wide ranging discussion of artists and styles, and about the impact of the Western art market on Chinese photographers.

One topic we covered was the preponderance of Chinese clichés (Chairman Mao, rapid economic expansion etc.) in recent contemporary art from China. Given a smaller base of well established local photography collectors in China, it seems plausible that much of this newer photography is being conceived (to some degree) with Western audiences in mind, and thus the heavier use of forms and symbols that are easily recognizable by Western viewers. Clearly, such a sweeping generalization cannot encompass all of the new photography being made, but this concept resonated for me as a decent hypothesis to explain a proportion of the new work now finding its way to galleries and auctions here in New York.

Which brings us to Liu Zheng and his project, The Chinese, which is a potent example of the exception to this trend. We have owned this book for some time now, but I was reminded again of its importance during this recent discussion. Unlike the airbrushed and cleaned up perfection of the Olympic games, or of the larger body of more propaganda style imagery falling under the Socialist Realism umbrella, Liu set out on a seven year journey to make a more complicated and robust picture of the unofficial realities of the Chinese people and culture. What emerges is a darker alternate history of the past few decades, grittier and more subversive, with its fair share of outcasts and fringe elements, aging, disease, and death. With echoes of August Sander, Robert Frank and Diane Arbus, the body of work has the highly personal and individual feel of a long and arduous journey, a far cry from art produced to meet the fickle demands of the commercial market.

All of the images in the book are square format black and white, nearly all of them straight forward portraits, many taken with a flash, further heightening the contrasts and emotional resonance. Liu’s subjects include rural coal miners, priests and monks, traditional opera performers and actors, beggars and drug dealers, hospital patients and waxworks dioramas (think Sugimoto), transvestites and corpses.

So while there are obvious references to the history of photography buried in these pictures, the images seem to me to be aimed mostly at Chinese viewers, rather than at Western audiences. Each image has a strong sense of narrative, of uncovering a hidden (and often far less than perfect) story worth hearing. While one might conclude that these images are overly judgmental or negative, perhaps they are better considered as a more even handed documentary cross section of the stories (many out on the margins) that have gone underreported for so many decades.

Collector’s POV: Liu Zheng is represented in New York by Yossi Milo (here), and a show of prints from The Chinese was held there in 2005. The entire set of 120 images from the book is currently on display at the Williams College Museum of Art (here) in Williamstown, MA. Meg Maggio’s gallery/consultancy, Pekin Fine Arts, in Beijing (here), has a broader array of Liu’s work on view on her website, including many more recent projects. A small number of Liu’s prints have begun to find their way into the secondary markets here in the US, but the numbers have been so small, it is hard to extrapolate any pricing pattern. While we aren’t portrait collectors, Liu’s excellent work would certainly provide a compelling contrast to works by Diane Arbus, August Sander, Malick Sidibé, Pieter Hugo (the Hyena Men) and Hiroh Kikai, not to mention broader parallels to photographers as diverse as Weegee, Lewis Hine and Nan Goldin.

Huachen Auctions, Beijing

I've gotten quite a bit of good information about Chinese photography via email as a result of some of the posts from the past few weeks.

One email of particular interest included a pointer to the photography auctions being held by Huachen Auctions in Beijing, which were entirely unknown to us. This house is offering twice a year sales of Chinese photography, with lots of images from all periods.

The site is a hybrid of English and Chinese, so you'll have to do a little work to find images that fit your collection (unless you read Mandarin), and I have no idea what might be required to actually be a foreign buyer at one of their sales. That said, the lists of images are great as an educational resource.

The site is here. Go to Auction Results to find the catalogues from the past few sales and dig around.

Huachen Auctions
Flat A 23
North Ring Centre
No.18 Yumin Road
Xicheng District
Beijing 100029

More Chinese Photography Info

Here's a solid group of recommendations for further study of contemporary Chinese photography I received from an expert on recent Chinese art:

Exhibition catalogues
Between Past and Present: New Photography and Video from China (2004 ICP, site here)
Foto Fest China 2008 (site here)
China under Construction (Amazon link here)
Zooming into Focus (UCLA Asia Institute 2004, site here)

Gallery
Three Shadows Photography Art Centre (site here)
Called "the most important place for photography in China". I can't vouch for that, but it is surely a strong endorsement nonetheless. There is a show of Ai Weiwei's photographs from New York in the 1980s and 1990s on display now.

Book publisher

Timezone 8 (site here)

Book: Wang Qingsong

JTF (just the facts): Published in 2006 by Albion and Hatje Cantz, in conjunction with an exhibit at Albion in London. 136 pages, with an essay by Zoe Butt. Includes large plate images, as well as a comprehensive list of works as thumbnails (with sizes and editions). (Cover shot at right.)

Comments/Context: To Western eyes, the high points to the storyline of China's transformation in the past few decades have become predictably well known: unprecedented and explosive economic growth, staggering new construction projects and radical urban change, an increased openness to and embracing of Western culture, and a much larger and more powerful position on the world stage. It is not surprising that amidst these changes, and in concert with a gradual relaxation of central censorship, artists have begun to examine the changes going on all around them and to ask hard questions about how China is being recast.

Wang Qingsong is a contemporary photographer who uses sarcasm, irony, satire and humor to expose some of the undesired consequences and unintended effects of the country's modernization on the collective psyche of the population. Beginning in 1997, Wang has made theatrical images that have centered on the quiet war between traditional Chinese culture and the encroaching Western lifestyle. His early work was dubbed "Gaudy Art", for its garish colors and not-so-subtle surrealistic kitsch. His 1998 work, Prisoner, shows Wang trapped inside prison bars made of Coke cans; Thinker, also from 1998, has him seated on a lotus leaf in Buddhist prayer, with a huge McDonald's logo carved in his chest; Requesting Buddha no. 1, 1999, (at right) has the Buddha's many arms filled with a variety of consumer products. These and other images all parody the materialism of the West and how it has invaded the minds of the Chinese people. Instead of worshiping self denial, fulfilling every desire via consumerism is the new norm.

Unlike the heroic and patriotic battle scenes from propaganda films, Wang's series of images entitled Another Battle highlights the clash going on between the traditional and modern cultures, and shows Wang as a defeated and bloodied commander, lost among the razor wire decorated with soda cans. (Another Battle no.8, 2001 at right.) Other images show the battlefield complete with McDonald's trash cans and road signs. These images have been elaborately staged, and have the feel of film stills.

Wang's more recent output has evolved into elaborate and monumental tableaux, with large numbers of actors and painstaking stage sets, in the end becoming massive, scroll-like photographs, some more than 20 feet wide. While in approach there may be valid comparisons to Gregory Crewdson or Jeff Wall, Wang's images are firmly rooted in typical and traditional Chinese artistic forms and metaphors and make no pretense of their careful manipulation. The image at right, Romantique, 2003, shows both a small detailed section on the top, with a thumbnail version of the entire work below (impossible to see I realize). Here the world is a confusing, fabricated mixture of Chinese and Western allusions and symbols, full of staged snippets from famous paintings by a wide range of recognized masters, from Botticelli and Raphael to Manet and Matisse.

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Wang's exaggerated work brings home many of the subtler challenges posed to China by such rapid modernization. As traditions are exchanged for Western consumerism, his work points to continuing social questions about what lies ahead for this giant nation. This monograph is almost like a catalog raisonne, as it has a complete set of all Wang's images and other detailed print/negative information. As such, it is an excellent reference resource on this innovative Chinese photographer.

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Wang Qingsong's artist website can be found here.

Collector's POV: Wang Qingsong's work has become increasingly available in the secondary market in the past few years. Most of the images come in at least two sizes, and are in editions of 6, 10 or 20. Smaller single images have been priced starting at around $10000, moving upward toward $100000. Only a few of the large tableaux have come to market, and all have sold in the six figure range.

Book: Zhang Huan, Altered States

JTF (just the facts): Published in 2007 by Edizioni Charta and the Asia Society, in conjunction with an exhibition of the same name at the Asia Society. 180 pages, with essays by Melissa Chiu, Kong Bu, Eleanor Heartney, and Zhang Huan. (Cover shot at right.)

Comments/Context: While Zhang Huan's images can routinely be found in photography auctions around the world today, to call him a photographer would be to grossly misunderstand his art. His photographs are merely documents of his performance art - sometimes further labeled as "body art" or "endurance art", as many of his performances involve testing the limits of his body and mind. This book provides a retrospective look at all of his performances and installations, going back to 1993. Each and every performance is an opportunity to watch from the sidelines as Zhang explores the depths of his own history and personality or reacts to his environment.

Not surprisingly, some of Zhang's performances work better as photographs than others. He has sat covered in flies in a public toilet; he has suspended himself in midair and had some of his blood drained; he has lain naked on blocks of ice; he has worn suits of bone and meat. Two of his earlier projects To Add One Meter to an Anonymous Mountain, 1995 (below ltop) and To Raise the Water Level in a Fishpond, 1997 (below bottom) both lend themselves well to being captured as a single moments. Both works document Zhang measuring himself (with the help of others) against the natural world.

In Foam, 1998 (below left) and Family Tree, 2000 (below right), Zhang tackles the issues of his own personal identity. In one, he holds the photographs of family members in his mouth (is our history inside us, or can we swallow it?); in the other, he disappears under the layers of stories written on his face by Chinese calligraphers.

Most of Zhang's works are subtly infused with traditional Chinese values and Buddhist teachings and these ideas provide the framework and backdrop for his autobiographical explorations. His performances seem to find the just the right balance: surprising without being gimmicky, earnest and stoic without being pompous, real and meaningful without being contrived. Overall, Zhang has generated a significant number of highly memorable and thought provoking moments in his short career; this book provides a valuable one-stop summary of his output.

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Zhang Huan's artist website can be found here.

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Collector's POV: Zhang Huan's images have become mainstays of the auction circuit. Most are large chromogenic prints (often 40x60, but generally in various formats), in edition sizes ranging from perhaps a handful to as many as 25. Prices for single images have ranged from $10000 to over $100000, with larger groups of pictures (like Family Tree) selling for $150000 to $250000. Even though his work is often found in photography auctions, it has clearly crossed over to the "contemporary art" price schedule.
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(Aside: Blogger's handling of embedded images is frustratingly quirky, so please excuse any unexpected odd formatting or white spaces you may encounter, especially likely if you are using a reader.)