March 8th celebrated International Women’s day with an exhibition in the ancient city of Xi’an.

Some of my chrome portraits are showing at this exhibition which runs in Xi’an from March 8^th to March 22. You can see them in the photo here in the distance pink and red canvas to the left of the black panel.

The impressive venue Dahua 1935 in Xi’an used to be an old textile mill and the current show reiterates many textile references by the dispersal of the suspended banners .

 

 

 

Tony , 2010, 50 x50cm oil on canvas

 

 

 

 

Participating artists included ;
Hu Ling, Liu Xiaoshu, Wang Hui, Wang Xiaoshuang, Xiong Lijun, Zhu Keran, Choi-Rye, Denise Keele-bedford, Niamh Cunningham, Xiao Lu, Liu Jingyi, Qian Rongrong, Uchercie Tang，Xiang chengmei , Ai Yun, Racelar Ho, Elaine .Y. Yin, Yayoi Kusama

 

Curated by Ma Yiying, Hai Yin and Racelar

 

 

The multi media exhibition includes painting, video, photography and installation.

An art performance on the opening event by Qiuye Yuan was called “The Face” where the artist poured a basin of red paint and lowered her head inside for a minute and like a paintbrush carefully dragged the pigment marks along the ground before neatly running out when the cloth ends.

The removal of colour seems to have significance in this and I was told it was a form of cleansing from being part of a system that is alien or not representative of the individual concerned.

One of the co curators Racelar from Guangzhou central installation of wood and red mesh of twine. This internal psychological landscape appears to be inspired by the distractions of the external world, a place that is much quieter yet there are traces of spiral movements in the string , everything encased in a blanket red net. It allows the viewer to think differently in this space. A type of silence where everything is reduced to the minimum.

 

This exhibition was supported  by the Art Department of the Ministry of Culture of the P. R. C, China National Academy of Painting, China Abstract Art Promotion Salon.