Arts Roundup: 3 to See
By Frances Arnold, Jul 11th, 2011 | In Art
The weekend saw a flurry of gallery openings around town, showcasing Chinese and international artists all flexing their collective creative muscle. Here's our pick of three to see...
First up is stage候台BACK, making quite the impression with their first show at new home, Moganshan Lu. After the artists of 696 Weihai Lu were forced to abandon their warren of studios, the gallery was left – briefly – homeless until Eastlink stepped in to save the day. They're now effectively time sharing the space with Susanne Junker's stageBACK, taking it in turns to present shows. Whilst on paper it might sound less than ideal, in reality the arrangement affords the German-run gallery a vastly bigger canvas with which to work.
Currently on show, Lost and Found takes full advantage of this newfound roominess, with the main area delving off into smaller corridors, allowing works by six international artists the space their respective creations demand. As the title suggests, the exhibition explores themes of (re)discovery and is in itself is a nod to the fortuitous circumstances behind stageBACK's move, with a particularly awesome installation by Chris Gill underpinning the idea of the gallery's rebirth: a long, neon-lit tunnel tapers down to an Alice in Wonderland-esque mirrored door, through to stageBACK's reincarnation proper. Bright white and disconcerting through its height, the passage is evocative of those fleeting memories recalled by the near death-experienced...
Other highlights include fantastical pencil drawings by Shanghai talent Maleonn, better known for his photography but reinventing his art in this new series to enchanting effect. Also playing with artistic mediums is URBANVIDEOSCAPESHANGHAI by Kathryn Gohmert and Xepo: video installations showing the pair 'tracing' the city onto glass in deft, monochrome strokes surrounded by the chaotic cacophony that is Shanghai. It's a messy, fascinating rediscovery and parring down of painting, all presented midst the literal rubble and detritus of the city. Although far more delicate in her execution, Xiao Wen Tang is also concerned with reviving old memories, her almost photographic negative silk paintings acting as portals of nostalgia to childhoods past. Presented alongside assembled toys, photographs and trinkets, the works are strikingly beautiful.
Sticking with this theme of nostalgia, Latvian Zane Mellupe takes the stage at ifa gallery as both creator and curator in new show, in memory of the perfect wife. It's a highly personal interpretation of the artist's childhood, peppered throughout with mis-remembered and time-distorted anecdotes and stories, the various rooms of the Changde Lu gallery presented as those found in Mellupe's family home. Comprising a variety of media but with photography as its mainstay, the artist herself features in many of the works, weaving herself and her memories back into the house through clever layering of imagery.
As with all of Mellupe's curated shows, this one is ingeniously and thoughtfully presented in ways that effectively add to the feeling of voyeur such a personal exhibition is bound to evoke. That she has a background in stage direction comes as no surprise, rather it's her experimentation that does: the 'Dowry' series features knitted neon cable, for example, whilst downstairs in the kitchen section, photographs of various foodstuffs have been cooked to match the dishes. The negative of an image of a pallid-looking chicken's neck was boiled, for example, whilst the hot charcoal used to treat a fish picture has left blackened edges all around the print. It's a meandering, sometimes baffling exhibition, with few efforts made to give the viewer any concrete, verified history on which to hinge their interpretations - but then that's the whole point: it's literally an open house of Mellupe's own relationships with her childhood home, around which most of us will be able to attach a fair few memories of our own.
Finally, and happily, something much more lighthearted courtesy of Art Labor where an exhibition of new paintings by Japanese artist Mira Kobayashi opened on Saturday. Sometimes textured, sometimes glittered, sometimes seemingly drawn in your common-or-garden highlighter pen, Kobayashi's works are borderline obsessive in their scale and repetition of not patterns, but of actions. One of the smallest works on show, for example, is a piece of character practice paper, not much bigger than A4 in size, each tiny square filled with a different design. Look at it long enough and blurred letters and shapes appear to distinguish themselves as the eye instinctively searches for something to latch on to.
Likewise a huge piece features thousands, possibly millions, of stick people, all drawn in what looks to be a Shanghai stationary store's finest collection of highlighters, felt tips, biros and marker pens. Seen from afar, it looks like a patchwork of fields viewed from a plane; a map charting the movements of invading armies; or perhaps an aerial view of some sprawling music festival, the figures' inconsistency in size and colour making for a disconcerting, crawling mass. Other works see the artist dividing and subdividing the canvas into small squares, each framing drawings or paintings of various degrees of abstraction. These are not only somehow rather satisfying - compartmentalized and contained - they're also gloriously colourful and utterly absorbing.
***
There you have it: stickmen, houses and tunnels, all well worth a gander. Should you be more in the mood for, oooh, let's say snakeskin, bones and cicada shells, may we suggest James Cohan Gallery for two fascinating tributes to the late and great Louise Bourgeois, on display alongside 33 utterly enchanting and little-seen prints by the artist herself. Go see.
'Lost and Found' @ stageBACK
Runs until August 31
First up is stage候台BACK, making quite the impression with their first show at new home, Moganshan Lu. After the artists of 696 Weihai Lu were forced to abandon their warren of studios, the gallery was left – briefly – homeless until Eastlink stepped in to save the day. They're now effectively time sharing the space with Susanne Junker's stageBACK, taking it in turns to present shows. Whilst on paper it might sound less than ideal, in reality the arrangement affords the German-run gallery a vastly bigger canvas with which to work.
Currently on show, Lost and Found takes full advantage of this newfound roominess, with the main area delving off into smaller corridors, allowing works by six international artists the space their respective creations demand. As the title suggests, the exhibition explores themes of (re)discovery and is in itself is a nod to the fortuitous circumstances behind stageBACK's move, with a particularly awesome installation by Chris Gill underpinning the idea of the gallery's rebirth: a long, neon-lit tunnel tapers down to an Alice in Wonderland-esque mirrored door, through to stageBACK's reincarnation proper. Bright white and disconcerting through its height, the passage is evocative of those fleeting memories recalled by the near death-experienced...
Other highlights include fantastical pencil drawings by Shanghai talent Maleonn, better known for his photography but reinventing his art in this new series to enchanting effect. Also playing with artistic mediums is URBANVIDEOSCAPESHANGHAI by Kathryn Gohmert and Xepo: video installations showing the pair 'tracing' the city onto glass in deft, monochrome strokes surrounded by the chaotic cacophony that is Shanghai. It's a messy, fascinating rediscovery and parring down of painting, all presented midst the literal rubble and detritus of the city. Although far more delicate in her execution, Xiao Wen Tang is also concerned with reviving old memories, her almost photographic negative silk paintings acting as portals of nostalgia to childhoods past. Presented alongside assembled toys, photographs and trinkets, the works are strikingly beautiful.
'in memory of the perfect wife' @ ifa Gallery
Runs until August 29
Sticking with this theme of nostalgia, Latvian Zane Mellupe takes the stage at ifa gallery as both creator and curator in new show, in memory of the perfect wife. It's a highly personal interpretation of the artist's childhood, peppered throughout with mis-remembered and time-distorted anecdotes and stories, the various rooms of the Changde Lu gallery presented as those found in Mellupe's family home. Comprising a variety of media but with photography as its mainstay, the artist herself features in many of the works, weaving herself and her memories back into the house through clever layering of imagery.
As with all of Mellupe's curated shows, this one is ingeniously and thoughtfully presented in ways that effectively add to the feeling of voyeur such a personal exhibition is bound to evoke. That she has a background in stage direction comes as no surprise, rather it's her experimentation that does: the 'Dowry' series features knitted neon cable, for example, whilst downstairs in the kitchen section, photographs of various foodstuffs have been cooked to match the dishes. The negative of an image of a pallid-looking chicken's neck was boiled, for example, whilst the hot charcoal used to treat a fish picture has left blackened edges all around the print. It's a meandering, sometimes baffling exhibition, with few efforts made to give the viewer any concrete, verified history on which to hinge their interpretations - but then that's the whole point: it's literally an open house of Mellupe's own relationships with her childhood home, around which most of us will be able to attach a fair few memories of our own.
'Mira Kobayashi' @ Art Labor
Runs until August 3
Finally, and happily, something much more lighthearted courtesy of Art Labor where an exhibition of new paintings by Japanese artist Mira Kobayashi opened on Saturday. Sometimes textured, sometimes glittered, sometimes seemingly drawn in your common-or-garden highlighter pen, Kobayashi's works are borderline obsessive in their scale and repetition of not patterns, but of actions. One of the smallest works on show, for example, is a piece of character practice paper, not much bigger than A4 in size, each tiny square filled with a different design. Look at it long enough and blurred letters and shapes appear to distinguish themselves as the eye instinctively searches for something to latch on to.
Likewise a huge piece features thousands, possibly millions, of stick people, all drawn in what looks to be a Shanghai stationary store's finest collection of highlighters, felt tips, biros and marker pens. Seen from afar, it looks like a patchwork of fields viewed from a plane; a map charting the movements of invading armies; or perhaps an aerial view of some sprawling music festival, the figures' inconsistency in size and colour making for a disconcerting, crawling mass. Other works see the artist dividing and subdividing the canvas into small squares, each framing drawings or paintings of various degrees of abstraction. These are not only somehow rather satisfying - compartmentalized and contained - they're also gloriously colourful and utterly absorbing.
***
There you have it: stickmen, houses and tunnels, all well worth a gander. Should you be more in the mood for, oooh, let's say snakeskin, bones and cicada shells, may we suggest James Cohan Gallery for two fascinating tributes to the late and great Louise Bourgeois, on display alongside 33 utterly enchanting and little-seen prints by the artist herself. Go see.
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konstantin, Sep 20th, 2011
hey members of smartshanghai....i have to say that I like your reviews a lot...but actually there happened a lot during the last weeks...so art and stage should be more on time...all the exhibitions shown here are over...never the less thanks at all for your work...
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