Tag: Chinese art
White Rabbit: Laozi’s Furnace
Monday, October 14th, 2024 Art Column,Transformation is a fundamental goal of art – base materials are transformed into things of beauty, dull objects become receptacles for daring ideas. This process extends from the work to the audience itself. As the poet, Rilke said, the work of art commands us: “You must change your life.” I’m not sure anyone will be […]
White Rabbit: A Blueprint for Ruins
Saturday, March 2nd, 2024 Art Column,On a first visit to Suzhou, years ago, I was looking forward to seeing this city of historic canals and gardens. Arriving at night, I wasn’t prepared for the long approach to the CBD, down a boulevard lined with massive buildings, or the skyscrapers that dominated the skyline. I wasn’t prepared, but I should have […]
In Our Time: Four Decades of Art from China and Beyond. The Geoff Raby Collection
Saturday, February 17th, 2024 Art Column,Many who have lived and worked in China over the past 30 years, have stories about the painting they could have bought for a few hundred dollars that is now worth hundreds of thousands. Geoff Raby, who was Australia’s ambassador to China from 2007-2011, had more opportunities than most, inhabiting a social circle that extended […]
White Rabbit: I Am the People
Saturday, August 12th, 2023 Art Column,In China, art is constantly flirting with politics. It’s a game of approach-and-retreat everywhere in evidence in the new White Rabbit exhibition, I Am the People, which features 27 artists or groups of artists. It’s one of curator, David Williams’s most ambitious, most overtly political shows – perhaps not as attractive or spectacular as some […]
The Return of Hong Kong
Tuesday, April 4th, 2023 Art Column,Roll the clock back four years to 2019. In Hong Kong, Art Basel was consolidating the island’s reputation as the heart of the international art market in Asia. The gargantuan West Kowloon Cultural District was starting to emerge but was still largely a building site. The world’s leading commercial galleries were opening branches, hoping to […]
White Rabbit: Shuo Shu
Tuesday, February 14th, 2023 Art Column,In pre-literate societies the storyteller had everyone’s attention. The role grew in importance as communities became more cultivated, with public recitations being valued as forms of education and entertainment. The ancient Greeks, for instance, had their rhapsodes who would recite Homer to enthusiastic audiences. The Chinese have a long tradition of public storytelling, often accompanied […]
Ultra Unreal
Tuesday, August 9th, 2022 Art Column,Things have been quiet at the Museum of Contemporary Art this year, but Ultra Unreal aims at a reboot. It’s an exhibition that pushes beyond the contemporary, drawing us into virtual realms, both futuristic and animistic. These imaginary worlds have been created by new technology and populated with supernatural beings. It all sounds breathlessly exciting. […]
White Rabbit: I Loved You
Tuesday, July 26th, 2022 Art Column,Anybody who has seen the Marriage Market in Shanghai’s People Park will never imagine the Chinese as a nation of desperate romantics. Every weekend the Market is swarming with parents eager secure an advantageous match for their son or daughter. One gets the impression that marriage is primarily an economic transaction, with love being a […]
White Rabbit: Big in China
Tuesday, February 22nd, 2022 Art Column,It seems that everything is big in China apart from the Olympic flame. In a country in which the number of people and the staggering pace of development are overwhelming, it was surprising that the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Winter Olympics ended with two athletes placing a teensy-weensy flame into a giant-sized snowflake. I […]
The Way We Eat
Tuesday, November 9th, 2021 Art Column,In the western world we greet someone with the words: “How are you?” but in China they say: “Have you eaten?” It testifies to the central importance of food in Chinese culture – and perhaps the difficulties of getting enough of it over the past 5,000 years. The Way We Eat at the Art Gallery […]