Poster

This world is diversified, and meanwhile chaotic. You cannot grasp this world directly; neither can you be certain about the trueness of it, just like looking at the works of the young artists Cui Jie, Li Chao and Wang Yuanzheng.

Self-preservation: Painting Exhibition of Cui Jie, Li Chao and Wang Yuanzheng is displayed on Magee Art Gallery(Beijing) . And this exhibition will last to June 7.

In the paintings of Wang Yuanzheng, he can directly paint a pile of meat, a banana or a snake. They are the symbolic expression of his state of mind, just like a vent of his daily emotions and pain. Although these images have metaphorical elements, they do not have traditional humanistic reference and have deviated from previous grand narration; they are similes that directly link one’s existence and experience. Cui Jie purposely deconstructs complete images into fragmentary jigsaw puzzles, even juxtaposes them in dislocation. She seems to be discussing the transforming relation between image and painting. Through the process of transformation, she adopts a random and comparatively object way of imitation. In other words, concerning the application of the image resource she favors, she has not made excessive judgments about history and memory, but transplanted the feelings about history objectively, plainly and directly into the picture. In Li Chao’s realistic scenes, you cannot find any realistic plot or clue. What he offers is more like an indescribable event or an unreasonable labyrinth. In his paintings, the seemingly realistic and vivid things are actually too fictional to tell their origins. Li Chao’s effort is just like a kind of struggle in despair and desperation; it is the unwillingness of human beings when facing a changeable life.

In this way, their attitude and visual expression are non-linear and run through from the beginning to the end, but their imagination is abundant and changeable, which offers the audience more space to conjecture. The flowing fragments decide the trueness of narration to a large extent. Freehand brushwork of oil painting enables us to find some new implied meaning and interpretation for self-preservation. Maybe it also leaves more space to judge and consider history, memory and realistic emotions. The choice of themes and the interrupted narration of things and scenes may come from the fragmentary development of internet. Because the flow of feeling, impression, emotion and memory is the basis of expressing oneself, the visual content of these works is just fragmentary things of an individual’s life, such as the doubt on living situation, the sprouting emotion of youth, the impulse of anxiety and the fragments of memory. They are boring and meaningless lyrical fragments for adults, cultural signals and a free application of materials for young people. Art creation has become totally personal for them. The imaginary fragments show a rebellious and longing state of mind of the youth sub-culture and the impact of new urban culture on young people. Individual daily life experience and game-liked emotional experience have absolute meaning and value, but the social mainstream value has seemed unimportant. Those fragmentary and meaningless expressions in the eyes of an adult might have more meaning for young people. In my opinion, the seemingly mediocre expressions in their painting art have reproduced the shapeless distress in China’s modernized life and triggered some indescribable feelings. Therefore, it is hard to define. It has no extremes, no concrete meanings; it is just a status of self-preservation and a response to daily life after usual pursuit of value fails. The self-restrained or self-dissipated art transformation has touched a kind of emotional or psychological trueness, such as isolated feelings and self-respected attitude. Perhaps, what they emphasize is just looking at an indefinite situation in helplessness and searching for a place to rest during the transition period, unlike previous art that only attached importance to the pursuit of a “definite meaning”.