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CAS CONTEMPORARY CHINESE ART 1 EXECUTIVE EDUCATION Franz Kraehenbuehl ON GLOBALBarbara Preisig Michael Schindhelm CULTURE Zurich University of the Arts Institute for Contemporary Art Research Zürcher Hochschule der Künste Zurich University of the Arts Prof. Elisabeth Danuser Head of Center Further Education Toni-Areal, Pfingstweidstrasse 96 Postfach, CH-8031 Zurich Telefon 043 446 51 78 [email protected] CAS Contemporary Chinese Art 1 Executive Education on Global Culture Executive Education in Global Culture Executive Education in Global Culture is a new format of the Advanced Studies Programmes initiated by the office of Further Education at Zurich University of the Arts. It is dedicated to new and internationally significant processes within the field of contemporary art. The program addresses curators, artists, journalists, cultural producers, gallery owners, collectors, researchers, and teaching faculty in the fields of Swiss and international contemporary art. Chinese contemporary art serves as starting point for the first CAS in Global Culture. Under the direction of Michael Schindhelm and Christoph Schenker, Barbara Preisig and Franz Kraehenbuehl investigate the contexts and processes of development around the Chinese Contemporary Art Award (CCAA) founded by Uli Sigg in 1998. As a result this reader, including essays, interviews, and network diagrams, offers new and exclusive insights in the social and artistic develpoment of Chinese contemporary art. The CAS “Contemporary Chinese Art I” offers an attractive mixture of theory and practice. Its exclusive approach to CCAA actors will include the opportunity for professional exchange and networking within those contexts. The CAS Contemporary Chinese Art The Certificate of Advanced Studies (CAS) in “Contemporary Chinese Art I” offers creative artists, cultural producers, and members of the general public exclusive insights into contemporary Chinese art, first-hand information about the art scene in China, and a wide range of contacts with relevant local and international institutions and actors. Sessions build specialist knowledge and skills based on an approach to teaching and research developed especially for this program. The research undertaken at the Institute for Contemporary Art Research (IFCAR), together with practical case studies on the development of Chinese con- temporary art since the 1980s, ensure that this further education opportunity provides a completely new approach to its subject. The context The research developed especially for this programme and the CAS “Contemporary Chinese Art I” are closely linked to “Connecting Spaces Hong Kong – Zurich”, an initiative by Zurich University of the Arts with its two principle objectives, to explore perspectives and opportunities for cooperation between Hong Kong and Zurich and to consider the future of arts universities in the globalized twenty-first century. Connecting Spaces is a hub and an exploratory platform for collaborative projects between Zurich University of the Arts and various institutions in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia. Starting point The Contemporary Chinese Art Award (CCAA) looks back on a fifteen-year history. The CCCA is awarded in the following categories (the first three prizes are conferred on an alternating basis to the last one): Life’s Work – Best Artist – Best Young Artist – Best Art Critic. The list of award-winners reads like a “Who is Who?” in the current contemporary scene in China. The CAS in “Contemporary Chinese Art I” offers an exclusive approach to CCAA actors, The Sigg Collection, and Hong Kong’s M+ Museum (currently under construction) to explore the development of contemporary Chinese Art through this particular “case”, not only close up but also with the broadest possible knowledge and experience. Course objectives The CAS in “Contemporary Chinese Art I” aims to: – advance knowledge and professional practice in the field of contemporary Chinese art – define collection strategies and their dynamics since the 1990s and for the near future – develop criteria for the critical engagement with contemporary Chinese art – provide insights into the establishment of an exemplary museum in Asia on the scale of the Centre Pompidou or the Tate Modern using the example of Hong Kong’s M+ – clarify strategies for the siting of art institutions in Hong Kong as an example of the emergence of a cultural landscape in Asian metropolises The programme The CAS offers a set of lectures, seminars, interactive workshops and a visit to the Sigg collection’s art storage in Bueron, Switzerland. The list of speakers and contributors includes (see faculty and speaker’s bios under Appendix): Michael Schindhelm, Course director Barbara Preisig, Research associate Franz Kraehenbuehl, Research associate Elisabeth Danuser, Coordinator Christoph Schenker, Head of Institute for Contemporary Art Research ZHdK Uli Sigg, Collector and founder of the CCAA Lars Nittve, Executive Director Museum M+ Hong Kong Pi Li, Curator Sigg Collection, Museum M+ Hong Kong / Sigg Collection Anna Li Liu, Director Contemporary Chinese Art Award Desmond Hui, Non-executive director at Hong Kong Urban Renewal Li Zhenhua, Curator, writer, artist Annette Schönholzer, Former director of Art Basel The CAS will for the first time take place in Zurich between March 28–30 and May 20 – June 1 2015. It will take place a second time in Hong Kong by the end of 2015 / beginning of 2016 and a third time in Zurich as part the ZHdK Summer School in 2016. Further CAS focusing on new global cases and topics will follow. Prof. Elisabeth Danuser, Head of Center Further Education, Zurich, March 2015 7 53 PREFACE INTERVIEWS 55 11 ULI SIGG 66 FOCUS: CHINESE ANNA LI LIU CONTEMPORARY 69 ART AWARD PI LI 13 71 MR. CHINA: THE MAKING OF LI ZHENHUA THE SIGG COLLECTION 73 17 WANG HUANGSHENG THE WEST DISCOVERS CONTEMPORARY CHINESE ART (AND SO DOES CHINA) 74 LARS NITTVE 26 HISTORIES OF THE UNKNOWN 78 CHINESE ARTIST TOBIAS BERGER AND PAULINE YAO 28 81 THE CCAA CUBE – VIVIAN TING WING YAN REFLECTION AFTER EXPANSION 84 33 ALVIN YIP 15 YEARS OF THE CCAA – TO WHOM DOES CONTEMPORARY 86 CHINESE ART BELONG? DAVID TUNG 36 88 ONE CHINA, TWO ARTISTS: JINGPENG MU HUANG YONG PING AND YAN XING 89 39 COMMENTED SOCIAL NETWORKS BIBLIOGRAPHY AROUND THE SIGG COLLECTION 95 41 DIAGRAMS CCAA 1998/2008/2012 APPENDIX 97 45 COLLECTED TEXTS ACTOR’S INDEX 125 BIOGRAPHIES OF SPEAKERS PREFACE PREFACE Cultural workers as a rule start a new project by brought a piece of capitalism to the Middle King - researching their prospective field of inquiry. In re - dom. He became closely acquainted with the coun - cent years, cultural globalisation itself has become try, its people, its society, and its upheavals perhaps a project, for cultural researchers as well as for art more than any other Westerner at the time. By the collectors, writers, and filmmakers. Many descrip - end of the 1980s, Sigg probably knew China better tive accounts and diverse perspectives are needed than the majority of the Chinese population. In to better fathom this field and its manifold processes. 1995, Fabio Cotti, Switzerland’s Foreign Minister at Precisely this is the aim of the lectures on global the time, appointed Sigg Swiss Ambassador to Chi- culture and the Executive Education on Global Cul- na, a post involving four exciting years in unconven - ture offered at Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK). tional diplomacy. The current situation of artists and At that time, Sigg also began taking an cultural researchers recalls that of cinema-goers interest in modern Chinese art, probably as the only watching the same film for the nth time. They know foreigner. He met artists in their informal studios the characters, the key scenes, the outcome. Except and visited secret exhibitions. Gradually, he became that this film suddenly starts running faster and a mentor for many artists. In 1998, he founded the 9 faster. We lose our bearings. We see familiar se - Chinese Contemporary Art Award (CCAA). The CCAA quences, but also unfamiliar ones. We realise that became a unique instrument for making contact with the film is narrating something new. But we don’t artists as well as for establishing an informal academy know what. Memory doesn’t serve us. We leave the of intercultural exchange, especially thanks to the top- cinema – irritated or fascinated, or indeed both – and class juries assembled by Sigg (including Harald realise that the film continues beyond the screen. Szeemann in the early days, and later many curators No one is giving directions. We must discover our from China and many important Western museums own roles and develop a dramaturgy for ourselves. and biennales). Over the past twenty years, the Swiss art collector Uli Sigg may justifi - CCAA has proven to be a crucial platform for track - ably be seen as a pioneer of cultural globalisation. ing developments within Chinese art as they un - Today, the sixty-nine-year-old owns the largest and folded. The award has also established criteria for most important collection of contemporary Chinese guiding Sigg’s activities and thinking as a collector. art in the world. Over the past thirty years, Sigg has What has emerged is a collection that promoted Chinese artists and art like no one else, corresponds not to its owner’s and his advisors’ disseminating it across the world as well as in China. taste but – as Sigg observes – a document of art his- Thus, a Swiss collector has studied and through his tory. Sigg, who lives in Castle Mauenstein near Lu - collection documented the largest cultural area in cerne, has always felt that one day his collection the field of contemporary art in a manner both un - should return to China. This vision has now become precedented and unrivalled to this day. a reality through his donation in June 2012 to Hong In 1979, aged 33, Sigg travelled to Kong’s M+ Museum for Visual Culture. Following the Middle Kingdom as member of a business dele- the completion of the museum, designed by Swiss gation of Schindler AG at the invitation of the Chinese architects Herzog & deMeuron, in 2018, around 1600 government.

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