Yang Fudong, Honey, 2003 Video

Two videos by Yang Fudong (Honey (2003) and City Light (2000) ) from the Haudenschild Collection were loaned to the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco for the exhibition Shanghai on view February 12 – September 5, 2010. Click here for more information on the exhibition.

From February 12 through September 5, 2010, the Asian Art Museum presents Shanghai, the first exhibition of its kind to explore the visual culture of one of the world’s most intriguing cities. Spanning the time period from Shanghai’s origins as a modest regional center to the dynamic, cosmopolitan, global powerhouse of today, the exhibition reflects upon the history of the city over the past 160 years using art as its mirror. Drawn mainly from the collections of the Shanghai Museum, the Shanghai History Museum, the Shanghai Art Museum, the Lu Xun Memorial Hall, and the Shanghai Propaganda Poster Art Centre, the more than 130 artworks include trade oil paintings, Shanghai deco furniture and rugs, movie clips, revolutionary posters, and video and contemporary art installations. Shanghai is co-organized by the Shanghai Museum and the Asian Art Museum, with assistance from the Shanghai International Culture Association. The exhibition serves as the cornerstone of the Shanghai Celebration, a year-long festival hosted by a collaboration of San Francisco Bay Area cultural institutions to honor the region’s long-standing relationship with Shanghai. The lead curator was Michael Knight, assisted by Dany Chan. Britta Erickson selected the works for the contemporary section.

Yang Fudong, City Light, 2000 Video

The Shanghai exhibition is divided into four broad sections providing an overview of the major cultural and historical developments in Shanghai: “Beginnings” (1850–1911), “High Times” (1912–1949), “Revolution” (1920–1976), and “Shanghai Today” (1980–present). “Beginnings” traces Shanghai’s rise from a modest regional center to a city of international prominence after its designation as a “Treaty Port” by Britain and China in the 1842 Treaty of Nanjing. “China Trade” oil paintings, Shanghai school paintings, and a series of lithographs present the city as the international economic hub that it became in a short time. “High Times” represents a dynamic era in Shanghai’s history, which many people consider a historic commercial and cultural height. Ink and oil paintings, posters, one-piece dresses called qipao, film clips, and Shanghai Deco furniture together capture the launching of a public romance with the city that continues today. “Revolution” highlights a collection of propaganda posters and woodcuts that document the changing landscape of Shanghai during the Communist reaction against the excesses of the “High Times” period. Other artworks in this section include woodblock prints from the 1930s and 1940s— among the earliest works to express the social criticism that would later lead to the revolution — and ink and oil paintings. “Shanghai Today” presents the visual culture that is emerging as the city reclaims its role as a leading center of global trade and finance. Prints, paintings, and video and installation art demonstrate the assurance with which Shanghai artists have reentered the global art scene with the removal of many of the restrictions of the “Revolution” period.

Because of its scope and scale, the museum has reconfigured its gallery spaces to accommodate the exhibition. Visitors will be directed through South Court to the exhibition’s beginning at the entrance to the Hammond Arcade. In the arcade, visitors will encounter the first work of art, Shadow in the Water, a white porcelain sculpture created between 2002 and 2008 by the Shanghai installation artist Liu Jianhua. The sculpture is a repeating row of landmark skyscrapers found in cities across China, suggesting a sameness in the landscape of China’s metropolises. Shanghai’s Oriental Pearl Tower (one of the tallest towers in the world), Jinmao Tower, and Bank of China Tower are among the buildings depicted.

The first historical and cultural subsection of the exhibition – “Beginnings” – is introduced upon entering the Osher Gallery. “Beginnings” introduces Shanghai as it was transformed from a modest regional center to an internationally prominent locale after its designation as a Treaty Port in 1842. In 1854, the Shanghai International Settlement – combining the British and American foreign concessions – was established, with its own system of self-governance that was effectively independent from China. In this special environment, which continued until 1943, Shanghai rapidly became a center for artistic production, with Chinese artists creating works for foreign, as well as domestic, consumption.

“China Trade” paintings are among the artworks on view in this section. This genre of paintings and drawings served the purpose of documenting the environs of Western traders and functioned as visual mementos of their time in Shanghai. These works were created by Chinese artists for the new market of Western patrons. The world portrayed in these paintings is dominated by Western-style buildings and images of Western lifestyles.

The handscroll entitled Illustrations of the Antique Collection of Kezhai by Lu Hui (1851-1920) and Hu Qinhan (act. late 19th century) is an example of the types of artworks created by and for the Chinese elite in Shanghai during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The artwork depicts the famous scholar and collector Wu Dacheng (whose poetic name was Kezhai) surrounded by his collection of ancient Chinese bronzes. Shanghai was home to a large number of wealthy, well-educated Chinese – including many artists – who fled to the city during the internal strife that besieged most of China during this time period. Such works show Shanghai artists struggling to find a balance between looking back to long-standing artistic traditions and embracing new directions influenced by Western styles.

The intermingling of Chinese and Western cultures in the city figures prominently in a set of large drawings that served as models for lithographs. Many of the drawings depict interiors with women in fashionable Chinese garb (and with bound feet) in a variety of pursuits, many influenced by the West, from playing pool to using sewing machines. Outside their windows are power lines, electric and gas lamps, and other signs of the Western-influenced modernization.

Covering the period from around the fall of the Qing dynasty in 1912 to the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, “High Times” occupies the remainder of Osher Gallery and continues into Hambrecht Gallery. The boundary between “Beginnings” and “High Times” is marked by a bronze tablet originally erected at the boundary of the American Settlement in Shanghai.

“High Times” begins with a series of paintings and calligraphies in traditional Chinese mediums and formats. “Bird and flower blossoms,” a hanging scroll by Xie Zhiliu (1910-1997) is an example of the bright colors and delicate brushwork that marks works by artists of the Shanghai school of painting. Artists associated with the Shanghai school broke from the traditional mode of landscape painting and created expressive and dramatic works that responded directly to the demands of their patrons.

Shanghai’s complex and often ambiguous social structure at the time is evident in a painting that appears to be a straightforward portrait of two men in a traditional Chinese garden. The painting, “Huang Jinrong and Du Yuesheng” by Yu Ming (1884–1935), depicts two legendary bosses of the infamous Green Gang. The Green Gang controlled the criminal activities in Shanghai in the early twentieth century.

The next part of “High Times” presents the arts that bombarded the residents of Shanghai on a daily basis: fashion, film, posters, and other graphic arts. Faces of beautiful Chinese women appeared often in visual products exhibiting Shanghai modernity in the 1920s and 1930s. Two of the many examples on view in the exhibition are posters entitled Moonlight over Huangpu River and A Prosperous City That Never Sleeps, both by Yuan Xiutang (dates unknown). Each of these posters presents a woman, clothed and coiffed in the latest styles, lounging before a backdrop of the city’s skyline. Such a composition exemplifies a successful marketing strategy that linked 1) Shanghai with 2) modernity with 3) the Chinese woman. This triangular association was so prevalent in the city’s visual culture at this time that it compelled the following claim by writer Cao Juren (1900–1972): “Haipai (Shanghai-style) is like a modern girl.”

Also included in this area are five qipao, a version of traditional Chinese women’s dress that was updated in Shanghai after the 1900s to be slender and form fitting. This style was popularized by Shanghai socialites as well as glamorous courtesans. During the 1920s and 1930s Shanghai had one of the leading and most innovative film industries in the world, and clips of films from that era will be shown on a flat-screen monitor in this part of the exhibition to provide a sense of this genre and a context for the other items on view.

Osher Gallery concludes with a series of oil paintings done in modern Western styles. Very few such works have survived the turmoil of the mid and late twentieth century in Shanghai. The eight examples on view are from a private collection in Shanghai. The Bund by Liu Haisu is an example of a strong work by one of China’s most famous artists influenced by Western artistic sensibilities. This painting is a view of Shanghai’s Garden Bridge and its environs. Its twisting, dynamic forms and vibrant colors reveal the artistic influence of Van Gogh, one of Liu’s favorite artists.

“High Times” continues across North Court in Hambrecht Gallery. An installation of Shanghai Deco furniture and carpets are displayed, as well as photographs of the deco interiors and exteriors of famous Shanghai buildings of the 1920s and 1930s. The pair of armchairs is remarkable in that the original fabric has survived largely intact. The bold swirling fabric in tangerine and fuschia complements the curving lines on the hardwood and burl frames. Other art deco furniture presented include a six-piece bedroom suite, a dining room table with four chairs, and a cabinet, among others.

A change in wall color marks the transition between “High Times” and “Revolution.” Shanghai was a leader in many of the social and political movements that swept China in the middle decades of the twentieth century. The first image that greets the visitor upon entering the new section is a 1968 portrait of Mao Zedong by oil painter Yu Yunjie (1917–1992).

The next grouping of works looks backward to the 1930s and 1940s at early expressions of the reformist socialist impulses that eventually led to the revolution. The woodcut print artists of the time asserted that the medium could best serve “the people” as it was reproducible, affordable, and mobile. They increasingly pursued Socialist agendas in their prints, tackling societal ills. A good example is a 1935 woodcut print entitled Roar, China! by Li Hua (1907–1994). The slogan “Roar, China!” had become an international rallying cry for the emancipation of all oppressed people. The phrase was representative of the anti-Imperialist mood gripping many countries in the 1920s and 1930s, and it highlighted China as the focus of this global mobilizing effort. The exhibition also includes a 1946 cartoon of Sanmao, the longest running comic strip in China, which like the woodcut prints was aimed to align visual art with populist concerns.

In print, perhaps the most ubiquitous product of the government’s visual enterprise were the large-format, colorful propaganda posters. The posters on display in the exhibition depict celebrations in Shanghai of the new Communist regime. Many of the posters on display were published by the Shanghai People’s Fine Art Publishing House, a state-owned enterprise. In these and in the others on view, famous landmarks of the Bund and Nanjing Road appeared often as sites of new revolutions and campaigns against all that the city had once symbolized.

The last area of Hambrecht Gallery is dedicated to Shen Fan’s 2007 installation Landscape-Commemorating Huang Binhong-Scroll, an homage to one of China’s great artists of the twentieth century. This installation piece with computer-operated neon lights and music introduces the contemporary section “Shanghai Today.” Like most of the works in this section, it was created in the past few years, while a number of works in this section were actually created for the exhibition.

After exiting Hambrecht Gallery, the exhibition continues in Lee Gallery, which features contemporary photographs, textiles, ink paintings and calligraphy on paper, acrylic paintings, and oil paintings. For the first time North Court is being given over to art, where two large new works by the leading Shanghai installation artists Zhang Jianjun (b. 1955) and Liu Jianhua (b. 1962) are on view.

Zhang Jianjun’s work Vestiges of a Process: Shanghai Garden is situated closest to Lee Gallery on the east side of North Court. It is an installation composed of two silicone rubber Taihu rocks, manufactured from molds of real Taihu rocks which in traditional garden culture are prized for providing city dwellers with a kind of symbolic access to nature. The rocks are accompanied by a silicone rubber vase. Together they are arrayed atop a pavement of gray antique bricks, acquired from the demolition of Shanghai houses constructed between 1923 and 1926. Visitors can walk between the rocks, reflecting on time and process.

Liu Jianhua’s Can You Tell Me? occupies the west end of North Court in the Vinson Nook. The installation is a series of stainless steel books suspended from a vertical wall. Each book presents two questions about Shanghai’s future, one on each page, that are translated into five languages, Chinese, English, French, German, and Japanese. Always changing, propelled by its role as an economic powerhouse, the city suggests endless possibilities some of which Liu asks visitors to contemplate.

The last section of “Shanghai Today” is presented in what is normally used as the Education Resource Room. This space features contemporary video art, one of the mediums in which Shanghai artists are taking a worldwide lead. Three of the five videos are by Yang Fudong (b. 1971): City Light (2000); Liu Lan (2003); and Honey (2003). A celebrated photographer, videographer, and film maker, Yang frequently explores the feelings of longing and displacement. His works often focus on the lives of young urbanites who despite possessing admirable qualities such as education or beauty, may not be well-adjusted to the environment in which they live.

By Michelle McCoy for the Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, December 2007

Yang Fudong, Honey, 2003, video

Introduction

Located in the hills of La Jolla, a seaside resort community near San Diego, California, the residence of Chris and Eloisa Haudenschild is home to a major U.S. collection of contemporary Chinese video art and photography. It includes the work of roughly twenty-eight Chinese artists, including, significantly, Song Tao’s Life is Wonderful (2003), a large floor-top photo installation; Honey 2 (2003), a video by Hugo Boss Prize-nominated Yang Fudong; and Xu Zhen’s 1999 photomontage Sewer. In addition, the Haudenschild collection includes roughly one hundred and twenty holdings by ninety artists from the Americas, Europe, and other parts of Asia. Notable pieces include a triptych from Francis Alÿs’s series of paintings titled The Liar (ca. 1995), a photograph of Kristof Wodiczko’s Tijuana Projection (2002), and a painting from Komar & Melamid’s Most Wanted series dated at 2000 by the collector.(1)

The Haudenschilds began collecting contemporary Chinese video and photography in the late 1990s, when these mediums were beginning to become as widely used and important as they are today, and just before the beginning of the market’s current boom. Since then, prices for paintings by a few Chinese artists have topped two million dollars,(2) and domestic collectors have entered the market in a significant way.(3) In November 2006, for instance, a Chinese collector purchased a Liu Xiaodong painting at a Beijing auction for $2.7 million, the highest price paid at auction for a painting by a Chinese artist who began working after 1979. (4)

The current overall global art market also finds that contemporary art has, for the first time, “truly begun to rival the historically dominant Impressionism and Modern categories” at auction.(5) Evidence to the overall market’s growth, The Financial Times has recently been publishing how-to articles about art collecting in general and at least one art hedge fund has been established. Situated within this historic global market growth, expansion into China and other regions is seen as having contributed significantly overall. In addition to the work having dramatically appreciated, China has a new class of art collectors, with new levels of wealth among them. In fact, expansion into China and other “new” regions is often used in the case against the market’s potential crash.

Xu Zhen, Sewer, 1998, photograph

Within this, the private collector maintains a unique position. On the one hand, as Britta Erickson writes, “Private collections are well suited to capturing the life of a vibrant art movement, driven as they are by passion, unencumbered by institutional impedimenta.”(6) Not necessarily affixed to any institution or gallery, today’s private collector has the flexibility to build a historically complete collection, so long as he or she has the means and access to do so. On the other hand, private collectors are not under any obligation to remain loyal to any particular mission. As Lu Jie, founder and director of the Long March Project, said, “ . . . we’ve observed that many [collectors] started out building a big collection and ended up selling the artwork in auctions . . . . It really takes time to get to know what the real agenda is that a collector has.” (7) However, there are standards and traditions by which collectors are judged, which the late Jonathan Napack, former Asia adviser to Art Basel describes: to be considered a “collector,” one must have a certain amount of commitment and knowledge.(8)

Chris and Eloisa Haudenschild’s level of commitment and knowledge is evidenced by the way they support contemporary art beyond collecting. The Haudenschild Foundation supports exhibitions and sponsors artists’ and scholars’ projects and programs such as symposia and residencies at the haudenschildGarage. Perhaps their most ambitious project yet was an exhibition entitled Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection, which took place from 2003 to 2005 and traveled to venues in San Diego, Shanghai, Tijuana, Singapore, and Beijing.

Cao Fei’s and Pi Li’s presentation at the Political Equator Garage Talk at the haudenschildGarage, June 2006

In her catalogue essay for this exhibition, Erickson addresses the collection’s strengths: “Representing a personal vision, it has not been expected to present a complete or historic view of the field. Nevertheless, it has captured a major slice of Chinese photography and video, representative of a signal moment”(9) in the field’s entrance onto the global stage. Scholar Martina Köppel-Yang recognized it as the first collection of its kind, (10) and Tina Yapelli, Director of the University Gallery at San Diego State University and the exhibition’s organizer, lauded it as “the most important collection of contemporary Chinese video and photography in the world.” (11) Lorenz Helbling, the Haudenschilds’ longstanding dealer, writes, “The collection is a very ‘open’ collection . . .. It doesn’t aim to fix images people should have of China, or to transmit stereotypes of China. It’s not about ‘signature works’ or ‘trophy pieces’—it’s more about a spirit, about involvement.” The Haudenschilds, he writes, are “great collectors.”(12)

The Collection

To date, in addition to work by Yang Fudong, Song Tao, and Xu Zhen, the Haudenschild collection consists of works by Cao Fei, Chen Shaoxiong, Feng Mengbo, Geng Jianyi, Gu Dexin, Hai Bo, Hong Hao, Hu Jieming, Kan Xuan, Liu Wei, Lu Chunsheng, Shi Yong, Tang Maohong, Wang Jin, Wang Youshen, Weng Fen, Xiang Liqing, Yang Yong, Yang Zhenzhong, Yu Youhan, Zhao Bandi, Zhao Nengzhi, Zheng Guogu, Zhou Tiehai, and Zhu Jia. All of the works in the collection are photography, video/animation or computer graphics, or photo-based installations, except for two oil paintings and one print. The photographs are from editions of one hundred or smaller, with the majority of them from editions of ten or fewer. All of the videos are from editions of fewer than ten. (13)

Yang Zhenzhong, 922 Rice Corns, 2000, video

Of these seventy individual works produced by twenty-eight artists, two of the works were produced by women artists: Cao Fei and Kan Xuan. Three of the artists are thirty years old or younger, while ten are between thirty-one and forty, fourteen are between forty-one and fifty, and one artist is over sixty. Most of them are based in Shanghai, with a few based in Beijing, Hangzhou, Shenzhen, Yangjiang, Guangzhou, and Haikou, Hainan. Only Kan Xuan maintains a residence both in Beijing and abroad, in Amsterdam.

Eloisa Haudenschild said she is primarily interested in collecting as a way to assist and connect with emerging artists. She explained that when artists have been recognized and supported by other collectors, she maintains relationships with them, but her interest shifts from collecting their work to assisting them in other ways, such as funding projects. With charismatic ebullience, Haudenschild said she has never sold a work, nor has she bought work by an artist she has not met. She has never attempted to acquire work from an artist directly and has always used an agent or dealer. She said she has never asked the price of an artwork. The works have been acquired through studio visits and meetings with artists, stories she recounts with pleasure. Haudenschild refers to the first trips in which she began to acquire Chinese artwork as “my love affair.” (14)

Background

Eloisa Haudenschild, née Rodriguez-Carbornell, was born into an affluent family in Buenos Aires, Argentina, who were involved in real estate and politics. When asked, she said she probably could be considered a third- or fourth-generation collector, and keeps some of her family’s paintings and antiques in the La Jolla estate. She met Chris Haudenschild, an astrophysicst-entrepreneur and native of Los Angeles, skiing in Portillo in 1973. Chris Haudenschild, who has roots in Iowa and Indiana, is a first generation collector. Together they have two daughters, Rita and Anna, whose artwork is also listed in the collection’s catalogue.

Eloisa Haudenschild, Laura Zhou, and Ma Shulin (Deputy Director, National Art Museum of China) at the opening of Zooming into Focus, November 2005, National Art Museum of China, Beijing

Eloisa Haudenschild’s educational background is in psychology. She was involved in dance and choreography before pursuing her interest in contemporary art. She cut her art-collecting teeth in the early 1990s with contemporary work from Latin America. At that time, she was president of the bi-national board of inSite, a network of contemporary art programs and commissioned projects that map the liminal border area of San Diego and Tijuana.

Haudenschild said, “I traveled with the board and the directors to Mexico City every two months or so, visiting artists and studios, traveling with them and having fun. That afforded me the opportunity of meeting some extraordinary artists like Francis Alÿs, a good friend, who together with other good friends have since become international figures in the art world. There, I really got a firsthand experience of the situation. I saw firsthand their need of support.”

When Chris Haudenschild, founder and president of CliniComp, a healthcare information management system, began expanding his business into China, the couple began making regular trips to Shanghai. As she had done in Latin America, Eloisa Haudenschild sought to investigate the local art scene in Shanghai.

Approach

Participants in the symposium “Distance—A Discussion on Contemporary Chinese Photography and Video” at the China Art Academy, Hangzhou, March 2004. Left to right: Pi Li, Eloisa Haudenschild, Waling Boers, Martina Koppel-Yang, Laura Zhou, Evelyne Jouanno, Hou Hanru, Jonathan Napak, Rudolf Stoert, Anna Haudenschild, Chris Haudenschild, Rita Haudenschild, Gridthiya Gaweewong, Wang Gongxin, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Wang Du, Zhang Peili, and Zheng Shengtian

Fueled by passion and confidence, she says, they acquired twenty works with their first purchase of Chinese art. Her husband was very supportive, encouraging her to take those twenty and, in her words, “double it up—go for forty or fifty.”

Haudenschild recounts the late 1990s as an environment very different from the art world in the large urban centers of today’s China. “I spent a lot of time looking around,” she said of her first trips. “My husband and I went to the Shanghai Art Museum and saw a show of work by the Corsinos, a brother and sister who live in France. I was so moved by the work, and was bummed about not being able to share it with anyone. It was so nice to see something besides calligraphy and ink washes. I thought, ‘Somebody did this, some curator—someone has this sensibility,’ but I didn’t know who it was. So, I saw this guy walking around [the Shanghai Art Museum] who looked a little like Salvador Dali. I thought, ‘I’m going to ask this guy.’ And of course, it was Dadou.”

Dadou, or Davide Quadrio, founded BizArt, a self-supported non-profit gallery, in Shanghai in 1998. Along with ShanghART, it shares billing as one of the oldest contemporary art institutions in the city.

“I said [to Dadou], I’ve been coming here for three years, where is the artwork?’ He said, ‘Go to ShanghART and see Lorenz.’ So, my husband and I immediately caught a cab and went to [the gallery in] Fuxing Park. As you may know, getting around in those days wasn’t as easy as it is now.”

“I walked into [ShanghART]. Then, I met Laura Zhou,” Mr. Helbling’s partner at ShanghART. “It was genius from that moment on with Laura. . . . We are very close. She calls me ‘mommy.’”

Previously, Mr. Helbling had been showing work at the Portman Ritz-Carlton Hotel, a massive hotel, convention centre and residence in Shanghai. “He used to carry paintings around on the back of his motorcycle trying to sell them, because at that time he didn’t have a space,” recounts Haudenschild. Since then, ShanghART has moved from its Fuxing Park location and expanded into three different spaces within Shanghai. A fourth space opened this year in Beijing.

“I loved the continual excitement. The best part was going to studios and apartments to look at the work,” Haudenschild says. Effusive with praise for Mr. Helbling, she said, “[Lorenz] is so good. If I wanted something and he wasn’t working with that artist, he’d get it for me. For instance Cao Fei. He facilitated that…You know, Lorenz wouldn’t sell to just anybody. He’s not as concerned with making a profit. We work together; he really wants to support the artists.”

She said he has never given her explicit advice, saying, “You know how it is with Lorenz, you never know [what he’s really thinking]. He’ll listen, smoking, with his coffee. And then he’ll say, ‘Eloisa, I think it’s time to think.’” Helbling and Zhou did, however, encourage her to look at certain artists.

After that initial trip, Haudenschild says she did a fair amount of research, contacting and meeting with scholars and curators in the field. She went to Paris and met with Hou Hanru, and exchanged emails with Britta Erickson. Perhaps in testament to the perceived need for a studied, serious, aesthetics-based treatment of contemporary Chinese art, Haudenschild said her queries to these noted curators and scholars—“from me, this little collector”—were enthusiastically received. Meantime, she continued collecting on her regular trips to China.

Yang Fudong, City Light, 2000, video

Collecting Video And Photography

In general, photography and video, like other edition-based media, have traditionally sold for less than paintings. Despite their lower value within the market, however, these media, as previously mentioned, are important to contemporary Chinese art and often become vehicles for highly conceptual projects. Critic and scholar Lu Leiping describes photography and video as the “most experimental and pioneering media today,” and “the media that more strongly maintain the Chinese characteristics.” (15) Indeed, many artists represented in the Haudenschild collection work solely in photography and video, and several are now highly sought after in large international exhibitions and biennials.

Haudenschild describes the process of arriving at the collection’s focus on video and photography as a product of following her own instincts. “You have to trust your eye,” she said. “I just get what I like, and the video and photography were what I liked . . .. There’s no one telling me what to do.” “I did not initially intend to collect video and photography,” she said, asserting that certain works she selected, such as Yang Fudong’s The First Intellectual photographs, did not initially appear collectible. When asked why more people don’t collect video, her response was, “I don’t know. Maybe they just haven’t warmed up to it yet.”

Art: The “Alternative Asset Class”

Mainstream media outlets have described the recent growth in art investment in the overall market. “Art has emerged as a serious alternative asset class in the past few years, in spite of the disdain of art lovers and the skepticism of many dealers and collectors,” wrote Deborah Brewster in an article about art collecting that appeared in the July 13, 2007 issue of The Financial Times.(16) She continues:

“Randall Willette, who advises collectors, says: ‘There are increasingly two types of buyer in the market. The idea that you should buy purely because of your passion is becoming less common. More buyers are coming from a financial background and people want to support their buying decisions with financial information. Increasingly, art is part of the balance sheet of private clients.’” (17)

Indeed, much of the current dialogue surrounding contemporary Chinese art, and contemporary art as a whole, is in the language of finance.

Texas-based venture capitalist and wildcatter oil tycoon Robert Chaney speaks in such financial terms about his extensive contemporary Chinese art holdings. On the eve of the current exhibition of his collection at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Red Hot: Asian Art Now, Chaney described his strategy for “acquiring masterpieces,” using a method that is, in his words, a studied adaptation of the Warren Buffet model for investing. In the meantime, Chaney invited art dealers to sit on a panel in conjunction with the exhibition and encouraged Houston galleries to hold concurrent exhibitions of Asian art. Chaney seems determined to establish himself as an important, involved collector who also vocalizes his financial interest in the art world. (18)

Haudenschild, on the other hand, downplays herself as an investor. “I think I am not a good collector,” she joked, pausing in front of I Usually Wait Under the Arch Roof for Sunshine, a 2001 photograph by Hong Hao, who is well known for his photographs of densely accumulated objects. “For instance, the smart collector would’ve gotten [the accumulated object photos]. But me, I liked this one.”

Mrs. Haudenschild stands apart from the object-focused connoisseur as well, giving importance instead to her relationships with artists and members of the community. “For me, the collecting is just a token, a way to support these young guys . . . . The reward is that I have the opportunity to be part of their path.” She affectionately describes the relationships among the artists represented in her collection, noting that they have maintained their integrity and loyalty to one another as friends in spite of experiencing unequal degrees of recognition. “You know, there are many collectors who are buying pieces and then putting them away until they become valuable—they don’t even show the work. And that is such a waste—these people need exposure,” she said.

Eloisa Haudenschild with Chen Shaoxiong, Yang Zhenzhong, Xu Zhen, Shi Yong, Yang Fudong, and Song Tao, February 2003

Future Of The Market

Speculations on a crash or correction in the global and Chinese contemporary art markets circulate. Commenting on the market in general, Los Angeles-based billionaire collector Eli Broad was quoted in The New York Times in August 2007 as saying, “We’ve seen an unprecedented 68 appreciation of contemporary art in the thirty-five years that I’ve been collecting . . . . We’re bound to have a correction. I don’t know if it will happen at the November auctions, or it will happen next May.” (19) Other recent articles have described the Chinese market as “bubbly,” (20) and the overall market as “overblown,” (21) and “showing signs of a bubble.” (22)

Jonathan Napack wrote of a grim future, with a specific focus on China: “The current ‘boom’ in the Chinese economy is all about positioning and manipulating perceptions to help attain certain short-term goals. This infects the art world as much as anybody else.” He wrote, “It will one day crash, when the speculators who are now blindly following their ‘advisors’ realize prices have started to fall and dump their collections on the market.” (23)

Echoing Broad’s sentiments about the overall market, Eloisa Haudenschild commented on the contemporary Chinese art market’s future, saying, “I’m worried about the market. Will there be a crash or a correction? Hopefully it will be a correction. But [regardless, as a collector,] you either have integrity or you don’t.”

Li Xu (Curator), Zhang Peili (Artist and Director, New Media Department of China Art Academy), Eloisa Haudenschild, Li Xiangyang (then Executive Director, Shanghai Art Museum), and Lorenz Helbling (Director, ShanghART), Shanghai Art Museum Press Conference and Opening for Zooming into Focus, February 2004.

Questions Remain

Art collected by individuals from a different country than the origin of the artist is now a common practice. Today, there are numerous galleries dealing exclusively in contemporary Chinese art in cities around the Western hemisphere. The question of what influence the foreign collector of contemporary Chinese art has on the globalized art world is a complex one.

Lu Jie put foreign collectors in a positive light, saying, “[the artists] feel more confident to have their works sent abroad. They respect the international collectors more and believe they are the real collectors. The local collectors very often use the building of a collection as an introduction or entry into the market. The artists feel safer with their work in foreign collections.” (24) There is also the idea that foreign collectors have helped contemporary Chinese art to be seen as valuable within China. Haudenschild said that the most important works in her collection have been shown at the Shanghai Art Museum and the National Museum of China in Beijing because she knows “how important it was for these young artists to get there.”

“Foreign collectors held out [the] olive branch,” according to critic Lu Leiping, in influencing the establishment of serious interest in contemporary Chinese new media art such as that in the Haudenschild Collection. (25) Jonathan Napack wrote: “That is not to say that there is no real basis for the current foreign interest in Chinese art. This huge country, for so long off the map, is producing artists who can draw on a wellspring of images, concepts, and issues that are totally unique to China and produce works that have that elusive ‘local flavour’ increasingly rare in a globalized world.” (26) However, an often-discussed problem is that the possibility for this “local flavour” is diminished once the artwork is brought to market.

A less-discussed question, whose answer remains to be seen, is, as they become part of the global art market, how are China and other “new markets” for contemporary art changing it? Will contemporary Chinese art be subsumed by the same practice seen in the Euro-American art market of limitation and marginalization of different groups, such as women and minority artists? Consistent with Western art, works by male Chinese artists generally sell for more at auction than those of women. Living Han male artists have appeared much more prominently in the exhibitions of important collections. This also fits with the Western art historical tradition of marginalizing, ignoring, and dismissing women artists within Chinese art history. (27) Just as Chinese art, which has not reached the heights that Euro-American art does at auction, is marginalized by art world regionalism, female Chinese artists may be marginalized even more.

Here again, private collections occupy a unique space. Private collections, “driven as they are by passion, unencumbered by institutional impedimenta” (as Erickson was quoted as saying in the introduction to this essay), are truly private in nature, and do not fall under the type of public scrutiny that attempts to address and confront the gender- and ethnicity-based biases about an artwork’s value that is at work in public collections. In addition, through the funding of exhibitions, the establishment of art centers, and the lending of artworks, private collections may indirectly promote the marginalizing practices of the institutional and historical art worlds. On the other hand, private collections also present the possibility of freely challenging and questioning such biases, which, as attested to by Lorenz Helbling, is perhaps what Eloisa Haudenschild has attempted to do.

The impact an individual collector can have on the market is another question. One of the indicators by which to measure the success of an artist is his or her inclusion in important and well-known collections. It follows that the larger and more important the collection, the more influence on the market the collector has. As Napack wrote of the recent inflation, “It prices younger or novice collectors out of the market, leaving many artists vulnerable to the whims of a few deep-pocketed collectors.” (28)

Finally, it remains to be seen how the market’s inflation will affect the artworks themselves. Napack wrote, “The current infusion of cash into the market brings [first-rate galleries] some short-term profits, but it is also destructive in the long run. It inflates the expectations of artists and makes them even more exploitative of their galleries.” (29) Marc Spiegler of New York magazine wrote, “Historically bad markets tend to produce better art—there’s less pressure on artists to produce and fewer temptations to sell out, and they’re dealing only with collectors and galleries willing to ride out the hard times.” (30)

Haudenschild stressed that ultimately what remains important to her is having the ability to support emerging artists and connect people in dialogue. She said, “The inflation of the market is problematic. When I was starting to collect, it was like these guys could really benefit from my collecting their work . . .. A lot of bad work has come to auction recently.”

She said, “You know, Chinese art has become this kind of cliché.” Gesturing around the garage that houses many of the collection’s significant photographs, including Yang Fudong’s The First Intellectual series of photos (2000), Song Tao’s In Loud Crowds I Dream of Hanging Myself (2002), and Lu Chunsheng’s Water photos (2002), she said, “I’m thankful I was able to get these pieces, but I know it’s become a little bit like a fashion show.” Expressing an increased interest in funding projects, she said, “I’m not even sure I want to be a collector anymore. But I have to make a choice that I can live with.”

——
Notes

1 Plates of much of the Chinese collection can be found in the exhibition catalogue, Zooming Into Focus: Contemporary Photography and Video Art from the Haudenschild Collection, Shi Yong and Laura Zhou, eds. (Shanghai: ShanghART, 2005). Images of the Haudenschild’s other holdings may be found at www.haudenschildgarage.com.

2 David Barboza, “In China’s New Revolution, Art Greets Capitalism,” New York Times, January 4, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/04/arts/design/04arti.html

3 “Chinese art is now beginning to be aggressively collected by the Chinese themselves,” said Boriana Song, manager of the Chinese-owned Beijing Art Now Gallery. ”But now Chinese buyers are hungry for culture, and they see contemporary art as fashionable. The market is maturing, tastes are changing, and more than 60% of our clients are local Chinese.” Pallavi Aiyar, “Modern art scene grabbing investors,” Asia Times Online, April 11, 2006, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China_Business/HD11Cb05.html .

4 Barboza, “In China’s New Revolution, Art Greets Capitalism.”

5 Marc Spiegler, “Five Theories On Why the Art Market Can’t Crash (and Why It Will Anyway),” New York, April 3, 2006,
http://nymag.com/arts/art/features/16542/ .

6 Britta Erickson, “Zooming Into Focus, Sliding Into History,” in Zooming Into Focus, 14–15.

7 Lu Jie, “Contemporary Art in Greater China: Under Pressure, A Discussion at the 52nd Venice Biennale,” Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (September 2007), 8–24.

8 Jonathan Napack, “An Art Market With Chinese Characteristics,” Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (March 2006), 16–17.

9 Erickson, “Zooming Into Focus, Sliding Into History,” in Zooming Into Focus, 14–15.

10 Martina Koppel-Yang, “Compelling Images of a Distant Life, Video as Expansion of Reality,” in Zooming Into Focus, 71–72.

11 Erickson, “Zooming Into Focus, Sliding Into History,” in Zooming Into Focus, 14–15.

12 Ibid.

13 Information about the collection provided by the haudenschildGarage.

14 Statements by and biographical information about Mrs. Haudenschild based on a conversation at the haudenschildGarage on September 5, 2007, a telephone conversation on September 12, 2007, and e-mail exchange.

15 Lu Leiping, “When Experiment Encounters Classics,” in Zooming Into Focus, 19–21.

16 Deborh Brewster, “Investing in the art market,” Financial Times, July 13, 2007, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/a531d0d2-3153-11dc-891f-0000779fd2ac.html .

17 Ibid.

18 Kelly Klaasmeyer, “RED HOT: Asian Art From the Chaney Family Collection,” Houston Press, September 13, 2007, http://www.houstonpress.com/2007-09-13/culture/red-hot-business/ .

19 Robin Pogrebin, “Volatile Markets? Art World Takes Stock,” New York Times, August 29, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/29/arts/design/29mark.html, accessed 08/24/07 .

20 Barboza, “In China’s New Revolution, Art Greets Capitalism.”

21 Spiegler, “Five Theories On Why the Art Market Can’t Crash (and Why It Will Anyway).”

22 Sharon Reier, “Contemporary Art: Follow the Money—The Latest Status Investment is Showing Signs of a Bubble,” International Herald Tribune, January 27, 2007, http://w4.stern.nyu.edu/news/news.cfm?doc_id=6894 .

23 Napack, “An Art Market With Chinese Characteristics,” Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (March 2006), 16–17.

24 Lu Jie, “Contemporary Art in Greater China: Under Pressure, A Discussion at the 52nd Venice Biennale,” Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, September/Fall 2007, 8–24.

25 Lu Leiping, “When Experiment Encounters Classics,” in Zooming Into Focus, 19–21.

26 Napack, “An Art Market With Chinese Characteristics,” Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (March 2006), 16–17.

27 Marsha Weidner, preface to Flowering in the Shadows, Women in the History of Chinese and Japanese Painting, ed. Marsha Weidner (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1990), xi–xiv.

28 Napack, “An Art Market With Chinese Characteristics,” Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (March 2006), 16–17.

29 Ibid.

30 Spiegler, “Five Theories on Why the Art Market Can’t Crash (and Why It Will Anyway).”

An International Discourse on New Chinese Video and Photography

January 31, 2004 – San Diego Museum of Art

Organized by Eloisa Haudenschild and Tina Yapelli (Director, UAG, SDSU)

Moderated by Britta Erickson (Independent Scholar and Curator, Palo Alto)

Presenters included:
-Betti-Sue Hertz (Director, YBCA) Performance, Masculinity and Photographic Approaches in East Asian Contemporary Art
-Barbara London (Curator, MOMA) China Now
-Christopher Phillips (Curator, ICP, New York) New Photography in China: Between Past and Culture
-Xu Bing (Artist) Space Between: The Art of Xu Bing

“The exhibition’s lead title, Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photograph and Video from the Haudenschild Collection (2003 – 2005), refers to three major concepts quintessential to the exhibition and the symposium: Chinese artists’ use of photographic and video camera to examine the quick transition in their culture, the incredible pace of growth in China’s urban centers, and the current attention being paid to China by the rest of the industrialized world, especially the West. Most of the artists represented in Zooming into Focus live and work in China’s swiftly expanding southern megalopolises and frequently address those issues that directly affect young urbanites – the social impact of burgeoning consumerism, the meteoric rise of youth culture, the threatening loss of identity amidst the city swirl, the persistent sense of time speeding by. Exploring contemporary Chinese art in light of these concerns, the symposium will provoke a fresh perspective on China’s role in the international milieu.

Zooming into Focus investigated the effects of accelerated change in China through the work of the country’s most talented emerging artists. The swift transformation of Chinese culture is reflected in the work of each of these represented artists who comment on contemporary Chinese urban life with intelligence, wit, foreboding and nostalgia. The works of Cao Fei, Chen Shaoxiong, Feng Mengbo, Geng Jianyi, Hong Hao, Hu Jie Ming, Lui Wei, Lu Chunsheng, Kan Xuan, Shi Yong, Song Tao, Wang Youshen, Weng Fen, Xiang Liqing, Xu Zhen, Yang Fudong, Yang Yong, Yang Zhenzhong, Zhao Bandi, Zheng Gougu and Zhu Jia were included in this exhibition.

Marking many important milestones, Zooming into Focus was the first exhibition and symposium of its kind in San Diego, the West Coast, and Singapore and the first contemporary Chinese photography exhibition at the Centro Cultural Tijuana, Mexico. It was the first time the Shanghai Art Museum exhibited works on contemporary Chinese video and photography from a private collection and most importantly, it was the first retrospective exhibition of Chinese photography and video ever held at the National Art Museum of China, Beijing.

Contemporary art in China reflects the country’s surging influence as an economic, political and cultural force in the global arena. Chinese artists, especially those working in photography and video, are gaining international recognition for their powerful artworks that comment on the consequences of a rapidly changing society.  To encourage awareness and consideration of topics relevant to contemporary Chinese art, An International Discourse on New Chinese Video and Photography brought together world-renowned artists, curators and scholars for a series of presentations and an open discussion.  This symposium provided a new lens through which to better understand China’s transformative development, as expressed especially through the dynamic work of a younger generation of experimental artists. In addition, the symposium enhanced the appreciation of many of the most noteworthy Chinese artist working today. A catalog of the collection, exhibitions and symposia was published.” -Tina Yapelli

About the Participants

Tina Yapelli

Professor Tina Yapelli is the director of the University Art Gallery, a position she has held since 1985. In that role, she has originated more than forty-five exhibitions of contemporary art by regional, national and international artists. Some of the exhibitions have been coorganized in cooperation with other galleries and museums, at which they also were presented. She also has organized a variety of educational programs for the University and off-campus communities, including symposia, lecture series, gallery talks and visiting artists’ residencies. As a professor of art, she offers a course each semester in Gallery Exhibition Design. From 1992 to 1994, during a leave of absence from San Diego State University, Yapelli worked as curator of exhibitions at the Madison Art Center in Madison, Wisconsin. There she originated an additional ten exhibitions. She has appeared on television and radio programs to speak about visual art, and has been a guest speaker, curatorial consultant and exhibition juror at several California art institutions. An advocate for public art, Yapelli has served on numerous public art selection committees in Wisconsin and California. Her writing on contemporary art has appeared in journals in the United States, and in a book published by Telos Art Publishing in England.

Britta Erickson

Britta Erickson is an independent scholar and curator whose work focuses on contemporary Chinese art. She has taught at Stanford University and University of California, Berkley. Her recent projects include a major exhibition of Chinese art at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Washington and the creation of an award-winning Bibliography of Modern Chinese Art website. She is currently the Festival Director of the Denver Film Society.

Betti-Sue Hertz

Betti-Sue Hertz is the Director of Visual Art at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and served as the curator of contemporary art at San Diego Museum of Art from 2000-2008. Prior, she was the director of Longwood Arts Project, Bronx, New York 1992-1998. Her recent major exhibitions and catalogues at SDMA include Eleanor Antin (2008); Animated Painting (2007); Transmission: The Art of Matta and Gorson Matta-Clark (2006); Past in Reverse: Contemporary art of East Asia (2004); She was adjunct curator of Contemporary Links, a series in which contemporary artists respond to works in SDMA’s collection.

Barbara London

London is a curator at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. She’s been there since 1974, when she founded the Museum’s ongoing Video Exhibition Program. She built an essential context for the visionary statements being made internationally in video and media art by multi-cultural voices, emerging talents, and more established artists such as Laurie Anderson, Gary Hill, Mako Idemitsu, Joan Jonas, Shigeko Kubota, Nam June Paik, Bill Viola and Zhang Peili. Her objective has been to link the electronic arts with the more traditional art mediums. To document, preserve, and support this vital art field, she the Video Study Center and assembled its unique collection of more than 1,000 independently produced videotapes and related historical and theoretical publications. She is also an Instructor at the School of Visual Arts, 1994-97. To further her professional development, London took two sabbaticals to investigate new trends in electronic technologies and the effects on the creation and distribution of the arts in Japan.

Christopher Phillips

Christopher Phillips, curator at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York, is the guest curator of the forthcoming exhibition Shanghai Kaleidoscope at Royal Ontario Museum (Canada). Mr. Phillips is actively engaged with many facets of contemporary Chinese culture. With Wu Hung, he co-curated Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, which was originally exhibited at the ICP and the Asia Society in New York. It was also presented to critical acclaim at the Haus der Kulturern der Welt (Berlin) and the Victoria and Albert Museum (London), and is currently at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art until September 2006.

Xu Bing

Xu Bing was born in Chongqing, China in 1955. In 1977 he entered the printmaking department of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing (CAFA) where completed his bachelor’s degree in 1981 and stayed on as an instructor, earning his MFA in 1987. In 1990, on the invitation of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he moved to the United States. Xu currently serves as the Vice President of CAFA. Solo exhibitions of his work have been held at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; the Joan Miro Foundation, Spain; National Gallery of Prague and the Spencer Museum of Art, Kansas, amongst other major institutions. Additionally, Xu Bing has shown at the 45th and 51st Venice Biennales; the Biennale of Sydney and the Johannesburg Biennale amongst other international exhibitions. Over the years, Xu Bing’s work has appeared in high-school and college text-books around the world including Abram’s “Art Past – Art Present,” Gardner’s “Art Through the Ages” and Greg Clunas’s “Chinese Art” a volume in the “Oxford History of Art” series. In 2006, the Princeton University Press published “Persistence/Transformation: Text as Image in the Art of Xu Bing” a multidisciplinary study of Xu Bing’s landmark work “Book from the Sky.” In 2007, Professor Robert Harrist, Chair of Chinese Art at Columbia University, New York, began teaching a graduate seminar entitled “The Art of Xu Bing.” In 1999, Xu Bing was the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship in recognition of his “capacity to contribute importantly to society, particularly in printmaking and calligraphy.” In 2003 Xu Bing was awarded the Fukuoka Asian Culture Prize, and in 2004 he won the first Wales International Visual Art Prize, Artes Mundi. The Southern Graphics Council awarded Xu Bing their lifetime achievement award in recognition of the fact that his, “use of text, language and books has impacted the dialogue of the print and art worlds in significant ways.” “Art in America” listed Xu Bing, along with 15 others, in their annual Year in Review.

“This exhibition explains the importance of re-acknowledging and re-evaluating this hot spot of contemporary art. From the very beginning, contemporary Chinese photography has been closely related to the daily lives of Chinese people. The quickly growing and changing social environment has focused on the created objects of the artists. From these vivid and graphical works, we can witness the exciting poles of this age, experience the active interaction between art and society, and understand the new and unique exploration of these pioneers. Shanghai has always been the essential window to contemporary Western cultural patterns.

From oil painting to photography, from industrial design to video art, Shanghai plays a critical role during this process of communication and incorporation. Therefore, the opening of Zooming into Focus, a preliminary review of Chinese contemporary photography and video, is not only an occasion of chance but a necessary consequence of history. The importance of the exhibition is in no doubt: it showed some truth of Chinese contemporary art to the public and to the cultural circle, and it prodded the Chinese art museum circle to start collecting contemporary video and photography works.” -Li Xu, Curator, Shanghai Art Museum

“Different from traditional art, such as painting and sculpture, photography includes video, together with film and animation. Focusing on photography, this exhibition introduces the history of recent contemporary Chinese art….Furthermore, this collection can be regarded as an objective review on the current situation of Chinese photography. The Shanghai Art Museum is dedicated to the promotion and development of contemporary Chinese art. This exhibition is the first time contemporary photography and Chinese artists are introduced to the public.” -Li Xiangyang, Executive Director, Shanghai Art Museum

Exhibition

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February 18 – March 30, 2004, Shanghai Art Museum

Organized by Li Xu, Laura Zhou, and Eloisa Haudenschild.

Roof Top Performance by Song Tao
February 18, 2004, Shanghai Art Museum

Following the opening of the exhibition Song Tao with other contemporary Chinese artists, presented a multimedia sound and video performance on the roof of the Shanghai Art Museum.

Symposium
Envisioning the Future of Contemporary Art From Different Glocal Positions

March 25 & 26, 2004 – China Art Academy, Hangzhou
Organized by Zhang Peili (Artist and Director of New Media dept., China Art Academy, Hangzhou), Laura Zhou (Director of ShanghART, Shanghai, China) and Eloisa Haudenschild. All participants toured Zooming into Focus at the Shanghai Art Museum and were then transported via bus to Hangzhou.

Moderated by Hou Hanru (Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs, SFAI and Independent Curator) and Pi Li (Independent Curator and Founder, Universal Studio, Beijing) with works shown by Bill Voila (courtesy of Britta Erickson; presented by Eloisa Haudenschild), Wang Gongxin, Qiu Zhijie, Zhang Peili, and Yang Fudong.

Presenters included:
- Fan Di’an (Director, National Art Museum of China) Meeting and Traffic
- Hans Ulrich Obrist (Curator, Paris) The Museum of the Future – Art, Architecture, Science and Technology
- Mami Kataoka (Senior Curator, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo & International Associate Curator, Hayward Gallery, London) New Media as New Experience
- Li Xu (Curator, China) The Relationships Between New Media Art and Museum Systems in China
- Huang Du (Ph.D., China) New Events and Culture Space
- Zhang Zhiyang (Professor, China) Where is the Space for Art in the Era of Technological Globalization?
- Rudolf Stoert (Curator, Germany) Switch Media Project in Thailand
- Gridthiya Gaweewong (Curator, Thailand) Regional Strategies and Global Impacts: A Southeast Asian Perspective
- Hu Fang (Writer, China) Pseudo-Machine of Writing
- Evelyn Jouanno (Curator, France) Under the Earth, There is the Sky
- Martina Koppel-Yang (Art Critic, Germany) The Pingpang Policy of Chinese Contemporary Art
- Zheng Shengtain (Curator & Managing Editor, Yishu Journal, Canada) Non-Local and Non-Mainstream
- Karen Smith (Art Historian, UK) The Future: In Whose Hands?
- Waling Boers (Curator and Founding Director of Buro Friedrich-Berlin and Universal Studios-Beijing) Art Between the State and the Market, A Challenge?

Envisioning the Future of Contemporary Art From Different Glocal Positions

March 25 & 26, 2004 – China Art Academy, Hangzhou

Organized by Zhang Peili (Artist and Director of New Media dept., China Art Academy, Hangzhou), Lorenz Helbling (Founder of ShanghART, Shanghai, China), Laura Zhou (Director of ShanghART, Shanghai, China) and Eloisa Haudenschild. All participants toured Zooming into Focus at the Shanghai Art Museum and were then transported via bus to Hangzhou.

Moderated by Hou Hanru (Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs, SFAI and Independent Curator) and Pi Li (Independent Curator and Founder, Universal Studio, Beijing) with works shown by Bill Voila (courtesy of Britta Erickson; presented by Eloisa Haudenschild), Wang Gongxin, Qiu Zhijie, Zhang Peili, and Yang Fudong.

Presenters included:
- Fan Di’an (Director, National Art Museum of China) Meeting and Traffic
- Hans Ulrich Obrist (Curator, Paris) The Museum of the Future – Art, Architecture, Science and Technology
- Mami Kataoka (Senior Curator, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo & International Associate Curator, Hayward Gallery, London) New Media as New Experience
- Li Xu (Curator, China) The Relationships Between New Media Art and Museum Systems in China
- Huang Du (Ph.D., China) New Events and Culture Space

- Zhang Zhiyang (Professor, China) Where is the Space for Art in the Era of Technological Globalization?
- Rudolf Stoert (Curator, Germany) Switch Media Project in Thailand
- Gridthiya Gaweewong (Curator, Thailand) Regional Strategies and Global Impacts: A Southeast Asian Perspective
- Hu Fang (Writer, China) Pseudo-Machine of Writing
- Evelyn Jouanno (Curator, France) Under the Earth, There is the Sky
- Martina Koppel-Yang (Art Critic, Germany) The Pingpang Policy of Chinese Contemporary Art
- Zheng Shengtain (Curator & Managing Editor, Yishu Journal, Canada) Non-Local and Non-Mainstream
- Karen Smith (Art Historian, UK) The Future: In Whose Hands?
- Waling Boers (Curator and Founding Director of Buro Friedrich-Berlin and Universal Studios-Beijing) Art Between the State and the Market, A Challenge?

The exhibition’s lead title, Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photograph and Video from the Haudenschild Collection (2003 – 2005), refers to three major concepts quintessential to the exhibition and the symposium: Chinese artists’ use of photographic and video camera to examine the quick transition in their culture, the incredible pace of growth in China’s urban centers, and the current attention being paid to China by the rest of the industrialized world, especially the West. Most of the artists represented in Zooming into Focus live and work in China’s swiftly expanding southern megalopolises and frequently address those issues that directly affect young urbanites – the social impact of burgeoning consumerism, the meteoric rise of youth culture, the threatening loss of identity amidst the city swirl, the persistent sense of time speeding by. Exploring contemporary Chinese art in light of these concerns, the symposium will provoke a fresh perspective on China’s role in the international milieu.

About the Organizers & Moderators

Hou Hanru

Hou Hanru is Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs and Chair of the Exhibitions and Museum Studies program at SFAI. He was also the moderator for the 2004 symposium in Hangzhou, China Envisioning the Future of Contemporary Art From Different Glocal Positions organized in collaboration with the exhibition Zooming into Focus: Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection. A prolific writer and curator, Hou received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Central Institute of Fine Arts in Beijing, where he was trained in art history, with additional work in painting, performance, installation, and architectural research. He is a consultant for several cultural institutions internationally including the Global Advisory Committee of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and the Contemporary Art Museum in Kumamoto, Japan. Described as a significant international voice on cultural difference, Hou is the French correspondent for Flash Art International and a regular contributor to several other journals on contemporary art including Frieze, Art Monthly, Third Text, Art and Asia Pacific, Domus, Atlantica, Texte Zur Kunst, and Tema Celeste. Most recently, Hou was appointed Curator of the 10th International Istanbul Biennial, which will take place from September to November 2007. Other recent curatorial projects include the second Guangzhou Triennale where he co-curated Beyond: An Extraordinary Space of Experimentation for Modernization; Go Inside, the 3rd Tirana Biennale (Tirana, Albania, 2005); Out of Sight, organized by the De Appel Foundation (Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2005); Nuit Blanche 2004 (Paris, 2004); and A L’Ouest Du Sud De L’Est / A L’Est Du Sud De L’Ouest (Villa Arson, Nice, 2004). Hou is one of the first curators and thinkers to examine postmodern issues of nomadic identity, hybridity, globalized mobility, what he calls “in-betweeness,” and artists living in the diaspora.

Laura Zhou

Laura Zhou is co-director and co-founder of ShanghART in Shanghai, China. The gallery was initiated in 1996 and it has since grown to become one of China’s most influential contemporary art institutions. ShanghART has established itself as a leading gallery representing established figures whilst continuing to support the work of innovative younger artists. As a gallery, producer, supporter, and point of reference ShanghART contributes as a vital resource to the development of contemporary Chinese art. Being recognized for its importance ShanghART became the initial gallery from China participating in major international art fairs like Art Basel and Fiac, Paris. Since its inauguration the gallery has established more than 70 exhibitions, and it enjoys the great respect of being among the 75 international galleries selected in Thames & Hudson publication international Art Galleries that features 75 of the most acclaimed galleries from post-war to post-millennium (2005). ShanghART represents over 40 of China most talented artists working with different media ranging from painting and sculpture to video art and performance. Since its founding, ShanghART has supported multiple, international programs and projects.

Pi Li

Pi Li, born in 1974, has constantly changed his career direction in recent years. He was once the Art Director for the Chinese Contemporary Art Award sponsored by Uli Sigg. He also showed up in the Cannes International Film Festival as the producer of the Chinese movie Shanghai Dream. After over one year of operation, the U Studio (now named Boers-Li Gallery), founded in 2005 with curator Waling Boers, has also changed its direction. Now Pi Li decides to develop whole-heartedly the studio into a commercial gallery, and he has opened up a 100-square-meter affiliated exhibition area beside the main hall to promote the experimental solo exhibitions. The once mixed-orientated U Studio finally begins to transform into a professional gallery. The gallery represents a selective group of internationally operating artists. The gallery program is not media-specific, and includes installation, sculpture, painting, works on paper, audio work, photography, video, film, performance, and digital art. Each year, approximately six major solo exhibitions are organized, along with an irregular number of smaller solo and group exhibitions. Boers-Li emphasizes its support for the production of new and experimental work, utilizing its unique position both at home and abroad to open new pathways for artistic development. The program focuses on new developments in international art, as well as on the changing contemporary positions of established or older-generation artists. In addition, Boers-Li participates in a selection of both Chinese and international art fairs. The program also includes the publication of catalogs, both to accompany major solo exhibitions and to offer retrospectives on our artists. Click here to visit Boers-Li Gallery’s website.

Zhang Peili

Zhang Peili (b. 1957, China) lives and works in Hangzhou. In 1984 he obtained his BA in oil painting from the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. Today he remains one of China’s foremost video artist and his been shown in galleries throughout the world. He has shown at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and at the Venice Biennale. For a Chinese-born artist who still lives in his hometown, Zhang Peili has been represented in a remarkable number of international exhibitions. In just over two years, his work has been seen in several high-profile Asian-themed group shows–including “Cities on the Move” and “Inside Out: New Chinese Art”–as well as at the Basel art fair and the most recent Sydney and Venice biennials. He also bears the distinction of being the first Chinese artist to have an installation piece collected by MOMA (where he had a project show last summer).

“The exhibition presented an invaluable opportunity to bring to southern California work that would not otherwise be shown in the region. The project was groundbreaking, as it was the first exhibition to feature the current generation of Chinese photographers and videographers.

The artists’ residencies were extremely significant for the University, as they provided students the incredible experience of working with two of the artists, Yang Zhenzhong and Shi Yong. In the case of Yang, students were involved in the creation of a new work commissioned by the haudenschildGarage, which premiered at the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego.

The project was also important because it created a network of collaborations with institutions in San Diego, Tijuana, Shanghai, Beijing and Singapore.” – Tina Yapelli Director of the University Art Gallery

Exhibition
October 25, 2003 – April 21, 2004, University Art Gallery, San Diego State University

Organized by Tina Yapelli and Eloisa Haudenschild.

Symposium
An International Discourse on New Chinese Video and Photography

January 31, 2004 – San Diego Museum of Art
Organized by Eloisa Haudenschild and Tina Yapelli (Director, UAG, SDSU)

Moderated by Britta Erickson (Independent Scholar and Curator, Palo Alto)

Presenters included:
-Betti-Sue Hertz (Director, YBCA) Performance, Masculinity and Photographic Approaches in East Asian Contemporary Art
-Barbara London (Curator, MOMA) China Now
-Christopher Phillips (Curator, ICP, New York) New Photography in China: Between Past and Culture
-Xu Bing (Artist) Space Between: The Art of Xu Bing

Video Screening
Chinese Video and Film NOW!
January 31, 2004, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego

Introduction by Christopher Phillips; Yang Fudong present in cooperation with the Museum of Modern Art, New York. The works screened included Song Dong’s My Motherland Made the Scene for Me, 1999; Wang Gognxin’s Fly, 2000; Yang Zhenzhong’s I Will Die, 2003; Cao Fei’s Rabid Dogs, 2002; and Yang Fudong’s Seven Intellectuals in Bamboo Forest (Part I), 2003.

Video Installation Premiere
“Let’s Pray” by Yang Zhenzhong
January 31, 2004, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego

Let’s Pray was commissioned by the haudenschildGarage and filmed during his residency with the support of Tina Yapelli.

Artists-In-Residence
October and November 2003

Shanghai artists Shi Yong (November 3 – 10, 2003) and Yang Zhenzhong (October 22 – November 12, 2003) were in-residence at the haudenschildGarage; they were commissioned to produce new work.

Yong’s residency concluded with his performance of the interactive piece Super Angel at San Diego State University. Zhenzhong’s residency culminated in the premiere of the commissioned work Let’s Pray at the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego.  The haudenschildGarage supported Zhenzhong in filming the English and Spanish segments of his piece I Will Die (English, Spanish, and Chinese) while in San Diego and Tijuana.  I Will Die was later selected for the 2007 Venice Biennale.

Premiere Performance
“Super Angel” by Shi Yong
November 8, 2003, San Diego State University

Super Angel was commissioned by the haudenschildGarage; he worked with San Diego State University students.

Keynote Lectures
November 8 – 9, 2003 San Diego State University & the Chinese Historical Museum

Hou Hanru, Paris-based writer and curator of Zone of Urgency at the 2003 Venice Biennale, was the keynote lecturer at San Diego State University where he presented Chinese Artists (Digitally) Facing the Globalizing World as well as at the San Diego Chinese Historical Museum.

Video Dialogue: Shanghai/Tijuana
November 1, 2003, Centro Cultural, Tijuana, Mexico

This event was moderated by Norma Iglesias and included presentations by Yang Zhenzhong and Tijuana artists Itzel Martinez (Yonkart), Giancarlo Ruiz, and Salvador Vazquez Ricalde.

Marking many important milestones, Zooming into Focus: Chinese Contemporary Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection (2003 – 2005) was the first exhibition of its kind in San Diego and Singapore and the first contemporary Chinese photography exhibition at the Centro Cultural Tijuana, Mexico. It was the first time the Shanghai Art Museum exhibited works on contemporary Chinese video and photography from a private collection and most importantly, it was the first retrospective exhibition of Chinese photography and video ever held at the National Art Museum of China, Beijing.

Zooming into Focus investigated the effects of accelerated change in China through the work of the country’s most talented emerging artists. The swift transformation of Chinese culture is reflected in the work of each of these represented artists who comment on contemporary Chinese urban life with intelligence, wit, foreboding and nostalgia.

The works of Cao Fei, Chen Shaoxiong, Feng Mengbo, Geng Jianyi, Hong Hao, Hu Jieming, Kan Xuan, Lui Wei, Lu Chunsheng, Shi Yong, Song Tao, Tang Maohong, Wang Youshen, Weng Fen, Xiang Liqing, Xu Zhen, Yang Fudong, Yang Yong, Yang Zhenzhong, Zhao Bandi, Zheng Gougu and Zhu Jia were included in this exhibitions. Other artists in the collection include Gu Dexin, Hai Bo, Wang Jin, Zhou Tiehai, Yu Youhan, and Zhao Nengzhi.

Lorenz Helbling and Laura Zhou supported all exhibitions and organized the Hangzhou symposium at the China Art Academy. Shi Yong was responsible for designing the Zooming into Focus catalog and the installation design of Zooming into Focus at the National Art Museum of China, Beijing.

In addition to the traveling exhibitions, two symposia were held: An International Discourse on New Chinese Video and Photography at the San Diego Museum of Art and Envisioning the Future of Contemporary Art from Different Glocal Positions at the China National Academy of Art in Hangzhou, China. Participants included Xu Bing, Waling Boers, Fan Di’an, Huang Du, Britta Erickson, Hu Fang, Yang Fudong, Gridthiya Gaweewong, Wang Gogxin, Hou Hanru, Betti-Sue Hertz, Xu Jiang, Evelyne Jouanno, Mami Kataoka, Martina Koppel-Yang, Pi Li, Barbara London, Zhang Peili, Christopher Phillips, Zheng Shengtain, Karen Smith, Rudolf Stoert, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Li Xianyang, Li Xu, Mo Zhelan, and Qiu Zhijie.

The haudenschildGarage launched their residency program in 2003 which invited Chinese artists and curators for the first time to the United States. Shi Yong and Yang Zhenzhong were the first artists in residence and Hou Hanru, Cao Fei, Yong Fudong, Laura Zhou, Lorenz Helbling, Evelyn Jouanno, and Victoria Lu were also invited to the Garage. Both Shi Yong and Yang Zhenzhong produced new works commissioned by the haudenschildGarage while in residence.

Born in Buenos Aires and currently residing in San Diego, California, Eloisa Haudenschild, has one of the largest collections for contemporary Chinese photography and video art. “Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Photography and video from the Haudenschild Collection” exhibitions in US, China and Mexico included a schedule of Symposia, artist residency programs, commissioned works and a series of lectures, performance, video dialogues and screenings in US, China and Mexico. A passionate collector and art patron, Eloisa Haudenschild was interviewed after her appearance in Hong Kong in July 2004 for her talk on collecting at Bloomberg’s Hong Kong corporate headquarters. The following interview was conducted via emails.

[EH= Eloisa Haudenschild / PW= Phoebe Wong]

PW:    When and why did you start collecting contemporary Chinese video and photography?

EH:    My husband Chris and I started travelling to China on business five years ago. My experience as a collector of Latin American Art fueled my interest and appreciation for upcoming artists in different parts of the world. I tried to find connections with the art world and young artists. After a couple of years of searching we found in Shanghai the first group of artists that are today part of our collection. It was not my initial goal to have a collection of solely photography and video, but soon I realized that they were the media in which the artists were doing the most interesting work in my opinion.

PW:    What was your first piece in the collection? In what way, if any, does it help or determine your future direction?

EH:    There was not a first piece in the collection; there were a few artists I had collected initially. They included Yang Fudong, Shi Yong, Yang Zhenzhong, Xu Zhen, Xiang Liqing, and Zheng Guogu and I met them personally in Shanghai and Guangzhou.

After my first encounter, I came back home and started doing some more research. That is how I met Hou Hanru, Huang Yongping, Wang Du, Yang Jiechang (he is part of the collection) and Martina Koeppel-Yang in Paris. Later, generous curators and artists, who are dear friends today, supported our first symposium in San Diego, California. They were Christopher Phillips, Barbara London,  Britta Erickson, Xu Bing, and Prof. Wu Hung, who wrote one of the essays for the exhibition catalogue of Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection. More fascinating people participated in our symposium in Hangzhou.

Subsequent trips brought artists Cao Fei, Chen Shaoxiong, Feng Mengbo, Hong Hao, Weng Fen, Yang Yong, Zhao Bandi, and Song Tao into the collection, all artists from Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Haikuo.

PW:    Did you gradually develop a theme in your collection, such as, urbanism?

EH:    Youth and urbanism seem to be very strong issues for these artists in the above-mentioned exhibition. It is expressed in different ways, often with images filled with fantasy and longing.

PW:    Indeed, the collection can be seen through the thread of “constructed visual fictions” as Wu Hung has commented. Also, you mainly collect works from artists who live and work in Shanghai and Guangzhou – two highly commercialised cities and in rapid transition.

EH:    Yes, I enjoy the unique and thoughtful way the artists from the south, they are individuals who operate independently.

PW:    To offer a better understanding of the context of the works (collection), what are the readings you suggest concerning what has given rise to these works?

EH:    Chinese Art at the Crossroads by Prof. Wu Hung and On the Mid-Ground by Hou Hanru are two very important books. Also there are a variety of articles by scholars and curators like Britta Erickson, Martina Koeppel-Yang, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Li Xu, Zheng Shengtian, and others that shed light into this new and exciting moment in contemporary Chinese art.

PW:    Are you among those collectors who also commission new work and offer residencies?

EH:    My interest in collecting extends beyond the acquisition of art works. Collecting allows me to share in the artist’s journey, to participate in the process at a point when I can make a difference in the career of these young artists. My interest extends to the creation of educational programs, residencies (Yang Zhenzhong and Shi Yong at present) and the commissioning of new pieces.

PW:    Using the work of Shi Yong as an example, how did the residency unfold?

EH:    I believe the launching of “Super Angel I” and “Super Angel II” on the internet, Shi Yong’s project in collaboration with the students at San Diego State University, was very interesting and complex. Once the data was gathered for a few months, Shi Yong came to San Diego, interacted with artists on both sides of the US/Mexico border and students. The final phase of the project was an interactive performance.

PW:    Being described as “one of the most important collections of contemporary Chinese art in the world”, indeed, how large is the Haudenschild Collection, to date? And, what is your future direction in collecting?

EH:    The exhibition Zooming into Focus is only one part of the collection. Artists like Yang Jiechang, Gu Dexin, Wang Jin, Wang Youshen, Zhou Tiehai, Hai Bo, Yu Youhan, Zhao Nengzhi are included in the collection as well. The collection, now numbering over 60 pieces, will continue growing; we are constantly in the process of buying new works from new artists and are continuing to buy more works from artists already part of the collection – there is always a long wish list.

My commitment to the artists is to continue exposing their work, having the collection travel, supporting the development of the artists, and opening opportunities to them. Most importantly is my relationship with the artists – I think of them as friends. I only collect works from artists I know personally, I live surrounded by their work, I have never sold a piece of any of our collections, and do not purchase works that I feel exploit the exotic or the oriental. I have supported the participation of many Chinese artists in exhibitions such as the Venice Bienale, “Past and Reverse” at the San Deigo Museum of Art, and as well at Berkeley University in San Francisco.

The collaboration with international institutions was key to our project as was the organisation of lectures, symposia, video screenings, and video premieres – activities that took place in the US, China and Mexico.

PW:    Your being an avid collector, I am able to the feel emotional investment in your collection and in your endeavour to bring educational programmes to it. In hindsight, do you think your collection reflects your sensibility, or, offers you a new understanding of yourself? As for the works shown in the exhibition as well as in your talk, they are edgy works – some rather provocative.

EH:    I imagine the collection reflects my interest in the discovery of new and untapped works and artists. I enjoy participating in the artist’s process and development as much as I can.

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Having studied in design and cultural anthropology, Phoebe Wong is a Hong Kong-based culture worker specialising in art, design and visual media. She is currently a researcher of the Asia Art Archive.

As the opening of Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection at its final venue the National Gallery in Beijing draws near, it is time to pause and reflect on the exhibition’s significance. Since its inaugural showing in 2003, at the University Art Gallery, the San Diego State University (U.S.A.), the exhibition has traveled to the Shanghai Art Museum (China), the Centro Cultural Tijuana (Mexico), the Institute of Contemporary Arts (Singapore) and, now, the National Gallery in Beijing (China). During these two years, interest in contemporary Chinese photography and video has mushroomed. When Eloisa and Chris Haudenschild began collecting, only specialists in the field had heard of the young artists whose works so fascinated the Haudenschilds. Now, many of those same artists are in very high demand for international exhibitions and important collections. The Haudenschilds were prescient in their focus, driven by Eloisa’s enthusiasm, and guided by Lorenz Helbling, director of ShanghART in Shanghai.

Two years ago, Chinese photography and video was poised on the brink, its sheer energy, mass and quality readying it for launch into an international presence. Just last year, the major exhibition, Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China (2004),[i] did much to promote Chinese photography and video, with a touring schedule that includes New York, Chicago, Seattle, Berlin, and Santa Barbara. Yang Fudong’s nomination for a Hugo Boss Prize in 2004 signified that the international art arena was ready to seriously consider new media artists from China. In 2005, Oxford University Press added entries on three Chinese video artists to the online reference work, Grove Art Online.[ii] Clearly, Chinese photography and video has come of age since Zooming into Focus first opened in 2003.

As the exhibition of a private collection, Zooming into Focus has had a certain nimbleness and allure. Representing a personal vision, it has not been expected to present a complete or historic view of the field. Nevertheless, it has captured a major slice of Chinese photography and video, representative of a signal moment. Private collections are well suited to capturing the life of a vibrant art movement, driven as they are by passion, unencumbered by institutional impedimenta. The Haudenschilds’ enthusiasm for the field extends beyond collecting: as part of the overall Zooming into Focus program, they have commissioned new works (not necessarily collectible), have sponsored lectures and video screenings, and have supported two symposia focusing on contemporary Chinese photography and video, in San Diego and Hangzhou.

Because Zooming into Focus has been exhibited in diverse parts of the globe, its significance shifting with place and time, I have asked people close to the collection and to the exhibition for their thoughts on what Zooming into Focus has meant.

On The Collection

Lorenz Helbling, Director of ShanghART
The collection is a very “open” collection. “Open” may be a strange word here; I mean different things. It a collection of works of artists who are themselves very open, exploring new ways, asking more questions than giving answers, artists also who are still developing. It doesn’t aim to fix images people should have of China, or to transmit stereotypes of China. It is not about “signature works” or “trophy pieces” it’s more about a spirit, about involvement. It is an open cooperation between a special collector, artists, curators and a gallery. It is not an overview, it is an entrance.

Eugene Tan, Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore
The Haudenschild collection is, for me, exemplary of good art collecting practices. It is not only impressive for the way the Haudenschilds have built up such a significant and focused collection during a short period of time, it is also exemplary for the attitude they have adopted in their support of the artists whose work they collect. By exhibiting their collection in Singapore, it was also my intention to draw attention to the way the Haudenschilds go about their collecting activities, and raise awareness of the role and responsibilities of collectors.

Tina Yapelli, Director of the University Art Gallery, San Diego State University
The Haudenschild Collection consisted of approximately a dozen pieces when I first proposed the project to Eloisa. In part because of my interest in exhibiting the work at San Diego State University, Eloisa was inspired and encouraged to both broaden and deepen the collection, which is now the most important collection of contemporary Chinese photography and video in the world.

On The Exhibition

Lorenz Helbling, Director of ShanghART
The most important thing is, of course, that this collection could happen. But it is also very important that such prominent museums here in China were ready to show this kind of art.

Eugene Tan, Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore
As the Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore is committed to showcasing significant trends as well as the best examples of contemporary art practice, Zooming into Focus was an ideal exhibition for us to organize at the gallery. Not only does the exhibition highlight a major trend among contemporary Chinese artists towards the use of video and photography, many of the artists in the exhibition are also internationally renowned, thereby providing audiences in Singapore a rare opportunity to see their works. . . . [It] was also a “first” for Singapore to have an exhibition of this kind, a major exhibition of contemporary Chinese photography and video.

It was an important exhibition for highlighting and raising the level of discourse of photography and video in Singapore. Photography and video are still, as yet, relatively new mediums in art practice in Singapore. It was therefore useful for artists and the public to see how widely used these media are and also the interesting and innovative ways in which Chinese artists are using them.

Li Xu, Curator, Shanghai Art Museum
This exhibition was the first time for the Shanghai Art Museum to exhibit a collection of Chinese contemporary art from the United States, and the first time for a special group show of Chinese video and photography in this museum (although some of the artists or works had been shown here in some other exhibitions).

The audience and media were very excited about the exhibition. It seemed as if they had discovered some kind of new cultural environment in one night, but these artists and works had already been in Mainland China for a long time! The importance of the exhibition is in no doubt: it showed some truth of Chinese contemporary art to the public and to the cultural circle, and it prodded the Chinese art museum circle to realize it would be very important to start collecting video and photography works.

Teresa Vicencio Alvarez, General Director of the CECUT
Zooming into Focus was the first contemporary Chinese photography exhibition that took place in the Centro Cultural Tijuana. The fast growth that has characterized our city is also one of the characteristics of the society in which these fourteen Chinese artists have lived, being this a generator of the wide interest from the artistic community, art and design students of the state, as well as an important amount of articles in the local press.

Tina Yapelli, Director of the University Art Gallery, San Diego State University
Working with Eloisa Haudenschild to organize the exhibition allowed me an invaluable opportunity to bring to San Diego (and to southern California) work that would not otherwise be shown in the region. The project was groundbreaking, as it was the first exhibition to feature the current generation of Chinese photographers and videographers, whose work had been featured in Europe and elsewhere, but not in the United States.

The artists’ residencies were extremely significant for the University, as they provided students the incredible experience of working with two of the artists (Yang Zhenzhong and Shi Yong). In the case of Yang, students were involved in the creation of a new work commissioned by the Haudenschild Collection, which premiered at the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego. They also assisted him in the continuation of his ongoing project I Will Die.

Another reason the project was important was because it created a network of collaboration with institutions in San Diego and Tijuana: the San Diego Museum of Art; the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego; the Centro Cultural Tijuana, Mexico; El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, Tijuana, Mexico; and the San Diego Chinese Historical Society and Museum.

There is the general sense that everywhere, the exhibition was breaking new ground, supporting the development of the field, sparking the interest of local artists, and forging new institutional alliances. The San Diego, Tijuana, and Singapore venues had not previously exhibited Chinese art of this kind; in China the museums had not shown a comprehensive exhibition of photography and video. Perhaps in the latter case, the fact that the exhibition was drawn from a foreign collection gave it a certain attraction, even imprimatur. As Lorenz Helbling commented, “It is an entrance.” Zooming into Focus has served as an exemplary entre en matie, with lasting repercussions.

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[i] Co-organized by the Smart Museum, University of Chicago and the International Center of Photography, New York, in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago and the Asia Society, New York; curated by Wu Hung and Christopher Phillips.

[ii] Britta Erickson, Biographical entries on Song Dong, Yang Fudong, Zhang Peili, Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press, September 2005