Eloisa Haudenschild for "City Limits" Exhibition at CSULB

On November 16, 2006 Eloisa Haudenschild was invited to be in conversation with CSULB Professor Todd Gray as part of the exhibition City Limits: Shanghai - Los Angeles (Nov 7 - Dec 12, 2006).

The Haudenschild Collection was the inspiration for the exhibition City Lights: Shanghai - Los Angeles on view from November 7 - December 17, 2006. The exhibition was organized by Yeonsoo Chee and examined contemporary life in Shanghai and Los Angeles. Chee writes that these cities were "two of the most dynamic and influential urban centers of the 21st century. On the streets—and in the artists' images—of these two great metropolises are played out many of the issues confronting post-modern society: the globalization of markets and cultures, the search for individual identity in the face of homogenization, the proliferation of artifice and spectacle, the excesses of consumer culture, and the endless sprawl of urban development."

In their assuredly Chinese way - that is in the way that they reflect twenty-first century urban life - the Shanghai images are resoundingly pop. They celebration city life: the crush of the crowds reflect the huge population shift from rural areas to the glittering, high-rise Shanghai center, and they hustle to the unheard sounds of the ever present hip hop beat. Parodies of sophisticated advertising and new dilm noir about. And, finally, the uncertainties of life in the immensely contradictory new China are felt as unsettling backdrop throughout the work. In contrast to the Los Angeles images, the Shanghai work is an Eastern, but also knowingly Western, genre sprung from one of the world's oldest cultures. It is work that now participates in a worldwide dialog, which has been at plat in Communist China for a very brief period. 

-Constance W Glenn, Director Emeritus, University Art Museum / Professor Emeritus Museum Studies, Department of Art