On April 20th, 34 young artists from China and France gathered at the National Art Museum of China to present "Art 8 - Young Artists Group Exhibition", which includes 56 paintings, sculptures, videos and installations, as an art gift on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and France.
The exhibition seems to have entered the historical scene of Sino-French exchanges spanning more than ten years. In 2009, Jia Yue, Ph.D. from the Institut des Hautes Etudes de France, and Xue Yunda, Secretary-General of the Beijing Design Society, co-founded the non-profit art institution Art 8 to fund the creation of young artists and build a bridge between the East and the West. For the past 13 years, it has invited three French artists to Beijing for a few months for solo exhibitions, and one Chinese artist to Paris for a two-month residency.
The history of the artist's residency program dates back to 1663. King Louis XIV of France created the Prize of Rome, and four of its cadets were selected by the Royal French Academy of Painting and Sculpture to live for three years at the Villa Medici in Rome and to be mentored by local masters. Art 8's mission is to create an Oriental Medici villa. Jia Yue defines Art 8 as an artist residency institution and project incubator dedicated to long-term development, "whether French or Chinese, the common experience of these young artists is to travel through another world, through the change of perspective, to challenge imagination, change thinking, change inspiration."
Experience a foreign culture
Wang Enlai, winner of the 2015 Art 8 Young Chinese Artist Award, has been invited to Paris twice for residency.
It is difficult for him to express the changes that the two sojourns have brought to him, but the changes are hidden and profound. In fact, as early as the era of Louis XIV and Kangxi, Sino-French cultural exchanges have already begun. At that time, the barriers of physical space will form a lot of imagination. So we can see a lot of artisans depicting images of France, even if there is a misalignment, which is very interesting. ”
Wang Enlai told Yicai that in the era of globalization, it is convenient to go abroad, and even in the era of highly developed Internet, even if the body is not moving, a large amount of information can bring images and text information far away to the ends of the earth, not to mention the high-definition online exhibitions of museums and art galleries around the world, and cultural exchanges can be described as seamless.
Visiting his residency in Paris, he thought more about the meaning and value of cultural exchange, "The movement of the body is very necessary, when you perceive an unfamiliar environment through the five senses, the physical body can get some real experience, and only then can it truly be internalized into self-experience." Otherwise, no matter how much information the Internet provides, it will still be the kind of estranged imagination of Louis XIV. ”
Artist Elle, born in 1988, winner of the Art 8 France Prize, spent three months in China in 2015. He has visited many places, including the thousand-year-old grottoes of Yungang, the skyscrapers of Hong Kong, the secluded temples of Wutai Mountain, the bizarre city of Shanghai, and the ever-changing city of Beijing.
On the roads of different cities in China, he conjures up a Western aesthetic of the 80s from the clothing, accessories, patterns and colors that can be seen everywhere. After that, he wrote a film script that was vivid and colorful in the style of the images that he felt in the Chinese urban landscape.
In June last year, artist Ying Ping arrived at the Cité d'Art International in Paris for a two-month residency. He has more time to go in and out of the museum freely, and find a correspondence between the classics in the books and the reality - there is no need to worry if he can't tell the direction in the Louvre, you can see the classics everywhere, he is tired of walking in the Musée d'Orsay, he can find a place to sleep and go again, the medieval art gallery often passes by and see it a few times, and the museum of Rodin can stagger the audience gathered in front of the classics. He snooped around the underground garden of the Monet Museum and stayed in the museum in Brancusi until the security guards smiled and drove them away.
Ying Ping's deep memory also includes wandering around the streets and alleys, drinking beer and listening to music by the river. He searched everywhere for Gothic architecture, walked into a church, listened to the people in worship, looked up at the capitals, ribbed arches, domes, and stained glass windows, and listened to melodious chants. He traveled from the old city to the modern city, listening to the motorcycles racing in the streets and the high-headed horses of the traffic police, looking at the mansion compounds on the streets, and seeing the tents of the homeless camped under the bridge.
The freedom and diversity of Paris made him sigh: "Civilization is sometimes like a river that nourishes all things and enlightens people's hearts." Sometimes it is like a mountain range that blocks communication and causes riots. Human beings have come all the way from the barbaric era, and different civilizations have risen and replaced each other, becoming the powerful species of the earth step by step, and at the same time becoming their own worst enemy. Eventually, the artist made a plaster mountain called "The Shadow of the River" made from discarded mineral water bottles as molds during the studio's open day.
To understand is to truly immerse
At the exhibition site, there is a very eye-catching installation by French artist Dai Haiye, with nearly 100 gourds made of sound installation, called "Beijing Pigeon Whistle".
On January 1, 2020, 32-year-old Dai Haiye departed from France, passed through Russia, and arrived in Beijing by train on January 6. The first time he came to China, he encountered an unexpected epidemic, and the original three-month residency program was extended to nine months. Exploring Chinese culture in a special period is a rare opportunity for this young French artist.
He likes to roam around the old town of Beijing on his bicycle, meet the old man who is engrossed in spinning top in the park, and hear the sound of pigeon whistles for the first time in the streets and alleys, thinking that it is a bird he has never seen before. Day after day, he rode his bicycle through the alleys, following the birds, only to discover later that the ethereal and melodious sound of the pigeon whistle came from the pigeon whistle placed on the pigeon by the pigeon keeper.
He studied history and found that the pigeon whistle began in the Northern Song Dynasty, and the sound has never changed for thousands of years, becoming a special memory and echo of the old Beijing hutongs. Inspired by this, he began to make a sound installation, "Peking Pigeon Whistle", which consisted of nearly 100 gourds.
Pigeons swirl around the pigeon coop on the roof of the alley, while Dai Haiye rides a tricycle with a gourd device. As the speed of the vehicle changes, the device is filled with wind and makes a sound. Many people were curious about what a foreigner was doing, and they stopped to watch, and he was happy to stop and communicate with the people in the alley. All the encounters and stories are recorded in the form of images.
Dai Haiye said his performance art is a tribute to the art of Chinese carrier pigeon breeding, and he is grateful for the sound that allows him to explore Beijing in a different way. On the other hand, he also lamented the workers and masters who rode tricycles through the streets and alleys, and the tricycles on the streets of Beijing always carried incredibly huge packages, and he expressed his subtle tribute with his works.
Many French artists come to Beijing and choose to live in the hutongs, where different cultures and environments bring them new inspiration. In 2012, Art 8 award-winning artist Kolai re-examines herself in an unfamiliar city, starting to create self-portraits and insisting on painting one a day, using Chinese ink on rice paper, with flowing brushstrokes to express her personality. The 2019 award-winning artist Ba Libo also experimented with painting on rice paper, where gouache or watercolor was blended on rice paper, showing a new artistic style. The 2017 award-winning artist Leth also incorporated Chinese philosophy and the understanding of time in Eastern culture into his installations.
Recalling his residency time, Dai Haiye said that the unexpected epidemic caused him difficulties, but also allowed him to grow up and learn about Chinese culture in a slow way. When it comes to the influence of Chinese culture on him, he said, "Understanding can only really happen if you throw away all kinds of filters." To understand is to truly integrate a kind of knowledge, but also to accompany it and take care of it. ”
Art 8's long and niche cultural exchange has lasted for more than a decade, gathering sand into a tower, accompanying young artists all the way to grow up, and also witnessing their emergence in the international art circle: the first artist of the Art 8 Prize in 2011, Leo Lai, held a solo exhibition at Château de Chambord, in 2012, the works of the award-winning artist Colai were collected by the Pinault Collection, and in 2019, the award-winning artist He Bilin is holding her solo exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.
More and more Chinese artists are constantly exploring the international market. In 2014, the award-winning artist Peng Yong's works were widely acclaimed in Paris, ushering in the cooperation of well-known ceramic brands and carpet brands, in 2015 the award-winning artist Wang Enlai presented new works at the Fondation Renos Lyon and Galeries Lafayette in Paris, in 2019 the award-winning artist Cai Yaling is in residence at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, and the artist Huang Xiaoliang will also hold a solo exhibition at the Deauville International Photography Festival in the second half of the year.
(Image courtesy of Art8)
(This article is from Yicai)