SEPTEMBER 2003 FALL ISSUE Special Issue: Women Artists Cruel/Loving Bodies Yu Hong’s Witness to Growth:Historic Determination and Individual Contingency Looking Forward from Venice: The Prospects of Contemporary Chinese Art Hans Ulrich Obrist Interviews with Chang Yung Ho, Wang Jianwei, and Yang Fudong US$10.00 NT$350.00 YISHU: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art Volume 2, Number 3, September 2003 Katy Hsiu-chih Chien Ken Lum Zheng Shengtian Julie Grundvig Paloma Campbell Sasha Su-Ling Welland Larisa Broyde Joyce Lin Judy Andrews, Ohio State University John Clark, University of Sydney Lynne Cooke, Dia Art Foundation Okwui Enwezor, Curator, Art Institute of Chicago Britta Erickson, Independent Scholar & Curator Fan Di’an, Central Academy of Fine Arts Fei Dawei, Art Director, Guy & Myriam Ullens Foundation Gao Minglu, New York State University Hou Hanru, Independent Curator & Critic Katie Hill, Research Fellow, University of Westminster Martina Köppel-Yang, Independent Critic & Historian Sebastian Lopez, Gate Foundation and Leiden University Lu Jie, Independent Curator Charles Merewether, Getty Research Institute Ni Tsai Chin, Tunghai University Apinan Poshyananda, Office of Contemporary Art & Culture, Ministry of Culture, Thailand Chia Chi Jason Wang, Art Critic & Curator Wu Hung, University of Chicago Art & Collection Group Ltd. Leap Creative Group Raymond Mah Gavin Chow Jeremy Lee Chong-yuan Image Ltd., Taipei - Yishu is published quarterly in Taipei, Taiwan, and edited in Vancouver, Canada. From 2003, the publishing date of Yishu will be March, June, September, and December. Editorial inquiries and manuscripts may be sent to the Editorial Office: Yishu 1008-808 Nelson Street, Vancouver, B.C. V6Z 2H2 Canada Phone: (1) 604-488-2563, Fax: (1) 604-591-6392 E-mail: [email protected] Subscription inquiries may be sent to: Journals Department University of Hawai’i Press 2840 Kolowalu Street, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA Phone: 1-808-956-8833; Fax: 1-808-988-6052 E-mail: [email protected] or [email protected] The University of Hawai’i Press accepts payment by Visa or Mastercard, cheque or money order (in U.S. dollars). Advertising inquiries may be sent to either Vancouver address or Taiwan: Art & Collection Ltd. 6F, No. 85, Section 1, Chunshan North Road, Taipei, Taiwan. Phone: (886) 2-2560-2220, Fax: (886) 2-2542-0631 E-mail: [email protected] www.yishujournal.com No part of this journal may be published without the written permission from the publisher. Subscription rates: one year: US $48 two years: US $90 We thank Mr. Milton Wong, Mr. Daoping Bao, and Paystone Technologies Corp. for their generous support. Cover: Yu Hong, Liu Wa Five Years Old in Preparation for Belly Dance (detail), 1999, oil on canvas. Contributors Cruel/Loving Bodies Take One: Cruel/Loving Bodies Sasha Su-Ling Welland p. 17 In Anticipation of Men’s Art: Re-reading Women’s Art in Hong Kong Anthony Leung Po Shan Casting the Mold of Female Body and Identity: Reinterpreting Biographies of Exemplary Women Wu Weihe Lift the Cover from Your Head He Chengyao The Body as Site for the Feminine and the Intercultural Lesley Sanderson p. 24 The Stranger: An Artist’s Statement Mayling To Take Two: Cruel/Loving Bodies susan pui san lok Yu Hong’s Witness to Growth: Historic Determination and Individual Contingency Xenia Tetmajer von Przerwa Emerging from Behind the Screen of Female Art Yang Li and Gu Zhenqing p. 41 Looking Forward from Venice: The Prospects of Contemporary Chinese Art Three Men and a Camera: Chang Yung Ho, Wang Jianwei, and Yang Fudong Vivian Rehberg Interviews with Chang Yung Ho, Wang Jianwei, and Yang Fudong p. 85 If It Isn’t Built, It Can’t Be Torn Down: Notes on Wang Wei’s Temporary Space Philip Tinari Long March: A Walking Visual Display On-Site Criticism Meeting Chen Zhen at P.S. 1 Jonathan Goodman Rong Rong’s East Village at Chambers Fine Art Jonathan Goodman Chinese Name Index p. 106 ANTHONY LEUNG PO SHAN’s major works include: Love the Fucking Country (1997, Hong Kong Cultural Festival, Germany, Munich and 2000, Jazz Club, Macau); The Sun Never Goes Down on the British Empire (1999, Perth, Australia); The Devotion (2001, Para/Site Art Space, Hong Kong); and Flower Inscription (2001, Gwanju Biennale, Korea). In 1998, she joined the Para/Site Art Space, where her efforts are focused on gallery publications and art criticism workshops. Her art criticism has been published in the Hong Kong Economic Journal and Ming Pao Daily.Her most recent publication is From Transition to Handover: An Anthology of Seven Visual Critics (co-edited with Edwin Lai Kin Keung). BAI CHONGMIN and WU WEIHE have been exhibiting their collaborative work since 1997. Their work has been included in the following exhibitions: Reflecting China (1997, Chicago); Herstory Solo Show (1997, Beijing); Century-Woman (1998, Beijing); Stage for Two Sexes (1998, Tianjin); Existence of Ancient Records Solo Show (2000, Luxembourg); Strangeness and Smiles (2001, Beijing); solo shows of Herstory and sculptural installation (2001, Luxembourg and France); Terracotta (2002, Brussels); Dialogue with Judy Chicago at Lugu Lake (2002, Lugu Lake); 14+1: Chinese Contemporary Art Invitational (2002, Beijing). NEIL CONROY and LESLEY SANDERSON have been collaborating for a number of years, and have shown their work in EAST International,Norwich;7/5,Leeds Metropolitan Gallery; Blink,The Loading Bay, London; Lines of Desire: An International Drawing Exhibition,which toured to five venues in England. Previous to their collaboration, they showed separately in exhibitions such as The British Art Show,The Hayward, London; New North,The Tate Liverpool; Transforming the Crown,New York, USA; 72 Degrees of Longitude,Yale, Connecticut, USA; Trip Over This, Sheffield; and These Colours Run,a solo exhibition which toured to five venues in Britain. HE CHENGYAO lives and works in Beijing and Chongqing. Recent work, including installations, photographs, and performance art, has appeared in the following group shows: Reality and Possibility,Museum of the Central Art Academy, Beijing; Contemporary Art Group Show,Museum of the Central Art Academy, Beijing; Dialogue-Puzzle: Chinese Contemporary Art,Padua Youth Museum, Italy; The Limits of Bodies, Shangrila Culture and Art Center, Beijing; Psuedo,Museum of the Central Art Academy, Beijing; The 7th NIPAF Asia Performance Art Series and Performance Art Summer Seminar, Shinsyu (Nagano), Japan; Pingyao International Photography Exhibit, Shanxi; and Pusan Biennale 2002, Korea. JONATHAN GOODMAN is a writer specializing in the field of contemporary Asian art. He has written extensively on new Chinese art and has received a grant from the Asian Cultural Council to speak with artists in Mainland China. He lives and works in New York. GU ZHENQING is a curator based in Beijing and Shanghai. He has written extensively on contemporary Chinese art. He curated the Chengdu Biennale in 2001 and Mirage at Suzhou Art Museum in 2002. He is Chief Curator of the Shanghai Duolun Museum of Modern Art. susan pui san lok is an artist and writer based in London. Recent exhibitions include The Translator’s Notes, Café Gallery Projects,London;New Releases, Gallery 4A, Australia; Cities on the Move,Hayward Gallery, London; and solo shows at Stuff and East London Gallery. She has published in Third Text and Parallax. HANS ULRICH OBRIST is a curator for contemporary art at the Musee d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, where he recently co-curated the exhibition Camera: Chang Yung Ho, Wang Jian Wei, Yang Fudong (2003) with Vivian Rehberg. He is Editor-in Chief of the hybrid artist pages Point d’Ironie published by Agnès B and begun in collaboration with her in 1997. Obrist has been a frequent curator for the museum in progress in Vienna and a lecturer at the Facolta dell Arti, IUVA in Venice. He lives and works in Paris. XENIA TETMAJER VON PRZERWA is a freelance writer in the field of contemporary Chinese art based in New York and Beijing. She has an M.A. in Chinese Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London and recently received her M.A. in Art History from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. DR. VIVIAN REHBERG is an art historian and curator at ARC/Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, where she co-curated Camera: Chang Yung Ho, Wang Jian Wei, Yang Fudong (2003) and Ivan Kozaric (2002) with Hans Ulrich Obrist. She writes frequently on contemporary art and is a founding editor of Journal of Visual Culture (UK). She is currently preparing a text on problems of translation in documentary video, a collaborative iconographic atlas of Orlan’s work for an upcoming monograph, and an international conference on the poetics of place in contemporary visual cuture. PHILIP TINARI,who has just returned from two years as a writer and curator in Beijing, was deputy artistic director of the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center. He is now a graduate student in East Asian studies at Harvard University. MAYLING TO lives and works in London and completed her M.F.A. at Goldsmiths’ College in 2001. To has previously shown in solo projects at The Space @ inIVA, London (2002); Anthony Wilkinson Gallery, London (2002); and in Hedah, Netherlands (2001). Group shows include Cities on the Move,Hayward Gallery, London (1999); and From Where To Here,Konsthallen Göteborg, Sweden (1999). SASHA SU-LING WELLAND is coordinator for the Cruel/Loving Bodies project and Ph.D. candidate in cultural anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. From 2000-02 she conducted fieldwork, as an affiliate of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, on contemporary Chinese art worlds and late socialist public culture in Beijing. Her writing has appeared in Chain, Color Lines, Flyway Literary Review, From Beijing to Port Moresby: The Politics of National Cultural Policies, and previous issues of Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art.