Exhibition Dates：10.21 – 11.22, 2022
Venue：NO.2 & 5 Hall, Art Museum of Nanjing University of the Arts, Nanjing
Curator：Wang Yamin
Participating Artists： Wen-You Cai , Hu Weiyi, Lin Yan, Tan Tian, Wei Jia, Zhu Sha, Zhao Yinou
When All At Once I Turn My Head, I Find Her There Where Lantern Light Is Brightly Shed.
By Wang Yamin AMNUA
To some extent, art is first always about an image, even if it only presents an extremely abstract and self-referential one. There is always a kind of image with its transformation. Whether it’s a cast of bewildering figures and objects and the absurd landscapes in which they wander, a claustrophobic space; whether it’s from art or history, including people, events, and works from individual and collective memory; whether it’s the short-lived daily revelries surrounding us or boredom or some kind of artist-intervened artificial landscape or abnormal situation; an image and its transformation are always emerging. There is a commonality behind the multitude of images. On the level of pure media quality, they could be the colors of a painting, the human voice being performed, the vibrations of the open air. It could be a general text on how to create contemporary art or a message flow between friends that breaks through and crosses borders.
Of course, there’s also the artist’s body and soul, and thus, the artist’s own image which is brought out. Whether it’s “cautious and conscientious ” or “impenetrable”; in the setting of a family, a system or organization; in the process of delivering a sermon or lesson in work or industry; or in the Metaverse; perhaps in the fray of multitasking or in razor-sharp focus; whether it’s a parent, a friend, a client, or sisters from around the world… What emerges, shines, rehearses, nurtures, innovates and creates is the image of the artist himself.
Image produces image, and according to the conditions of reality, thus the world is produced. We have truly embraced a planetary level of self-administration for the first time, conducting a campaign about the test and measurement of the potential and ability of our bodies. Traditionally, the artist uses the ability and self-mythology of their body to become a pinnacle story of human potential. And yet, in the pervasive overlay of traditional and new administration, what ability is left to explore in one’s own body? Today, within a broader environment where vocational and labor issues have given rise to “quiet quitting” and productivity loss, can those in the art field put forward thoughts on the potential of action that address commonplace vocational issues as well as their own industry-specific problems?
This is the ultimate image problem. It is the emergence, anguish, disillusionment and recreation of a universal image and its transformation.
But they must be embodied in the living work and output of each individual, in that which carries the image, artistic or non-artistic, in common colors, sounds and communication, the implementation of individualized, hard to pursue action. But looking back, the image appears in bright lights.
“When All At Once I Turn My Head, I Find Her There Where Lantern Light Is Brightly Shed. ” is a series of projects starting with this exhibition, taking specific cases from artists’ works to pursue and touch upon a gradual broadening woven into the fabric of collective and individual social bonds, the universal situation and state of artistic continuity and exchange, to inspire a response to our prevailing situation.
