Damian Hirst, Anselm Kiefer, Anthony Gormley, Yayoi Kusama, Takashi Murakami, Lin Fengmian, Qi Baishi, Zhang Daqian, Chang Yu, Wu Guanzhong...
This is not only a series of names that have shone in the century-old history of world art, but also a series of "most expensive" names in the art auction market.
The largest collection exhibition since the establishment of the Powerlong Art Museum in Shanghai, open to visitors today, "Pulse of Modernity: The Great Exhibition of Powerlong Art", brings together these exciting names, connecting the past and the future, and radiating China and the world.
Spanning a century, the exhibition features more than 150 works of art from different countries and regions around the world, tracing the history of the resonance of China's artistic modernization road and the process of Chinese social modernization over the past century.
More than 100 domestic and foreign artists shared the stage, marking the artistic moment of a century-old history
The collection system established by the Powerlong Art Museum in Shanghai has continued from the mid-19th century to the present, while radiating the world from China in a spatial dimension, a trajectory that coincides with China's modernization process. The exhibition unfolds the history of the collection of the Powerlong Museum, and the exhibition selects more than 150 works by domestic and foreign artists from the rich collection, from Qi Baishi's "The End of the World - Landscape Album" created around 1931 to "Peak Circuit Turn" created by KAWS in 2020, spanning nearly 100 years. This century is equally closely related to modern times, and the title of the exhibition " Modern Pulse" means to reveal the historical value and genealogy of the Powerlong Museum's collection – art has not been absent in the course of nearly a hundred years.
The Powerlong Museum in Shanghai is also the birthplace of the modernization of Chinese art, and many of the exhibits on display also reflect shanghai's urban spirit: from China to the world.
On the basis of the previous permanent fine exhibitions, the exhibition combines the recent collections, and through the combing of the Chinese road of visual modernity, outlines the context of China's participation in the process of world modernization, and is divided into six exhibition units: "inner modernity", "universal world", "flowing image", "vortex of time", "paradigm and situation", "self-nature and empathy".
The six clues are like the confluence and return of six great rivers, which is both the action of reviewing the collection and the action of looking back at history. Zhang Zikang, chief curator, said: "From the six clues back to the collection genealogy of Baolong Art Museum, it is not difficult to find its overall characteristics, its local actions and global vision make this art museum a sample of China's modern private art museums, collection is a tribute to art and history, but also full of the museum's reverence for civilization, especially reflects the museum's sense of responsibility for culture, mission." ”
More than 6,000 square meters of exhibition space redefines the way the art museum space is organized
Not only are the many exhibits quite weighty, but the curatorial approach of this exhibition is also worth mentioning, which can be described as a redefinition of the way the art museum space is organized. Different from ordinary art museum exhibitions, through the construction and transmission of spatial morphological imagery, the exhibition combines multiple narratives such as historical context, cultural environment and life situation into the audience's viewing experience.
The exhibition starts with "Inner Modernity". "Looking back in the way" is the spatial imagery that this unit repeatedly suggests. Cai Guoqiang's "The Bund Without Us" becomes the narrative background, providing a dialectical scenery of time, and the Bund has transformed from an imperialist colonial symbol into an everyday landscape of the people's city. In the process of moving forward and looking back repeatedly, the audience placed the Buddha on the cruise ship of the Huangpu River and listened to a dialogue of the times.
"Universal World" breaks the inherent exhibition hall form with a special exhibition design and leads the audience into the center of the city square. From the best way to view the works of art, the exhibition space is tailored, so that the audience can fully mobilize their bodies to better participate in the exhibition and explore the infinite imagination of the art museum space. This exhibition hall is like a colorful kaleidoscope, and the audience can stand in the center of the vision to watch each flower, or they can walk into each flower.
"Flowing Image" brings new possibilities for the interaction between space and portrait, and the flowing exhibition route is also a hint and prelude to the "vortex of time". In the exchange and dialogue of different works of art between China and the West, it brings a unique viewing experience, and at the same time, it can also appreciate the exhibition narrative arranged by the curator in the space.
Space designer Liang Chen pointed out: "The charm of space lies in the relationship with the body. Exhibition spaces want to help visitors connect to everyday spatial experiences and build new spatial experiences. ”
Since its opening in 2017, The Powerlong Art Museum in Shanghai has continuously improved its collection and focused on building an academic system of modern and contemporary art research based on the collection system. From personal collections to corporate collections, to art museum collections, and then to this large-scale art museum collection exhibition based on academic combing and research, people can see how the museum continues to participate in the construction of contemporary visual culture history and use art to promote the improvement of social creativity.
The exhibition will run until May 18, 2022.
Author: Fan Xin
Editor: Xu Yang