Artists: Chun Kwang Young, Jigger Cruz, Wu Wei, Yin Zhaoyang, Yue Minjun, Zhao Zhao, Zhu Jinshi
Vernissage: 13 July 2022
Exhibition Dates: 14–16 July 2022
Location: Grimaldi Forum Monaco
Themed Sonorous Strokes, Tang Contemporary Art proposes works by seven celebrated contemporary artists through their latest works, including Chun Kwang Young, Jigger Cruz, Yue Minjun, Yin Zhaoyang, Zhao Zhao, Zhu Jinshi, and Wu Wei.
As one of the leading figures of Chinese contemporary art, Yue Minjun (b. 1962, Daqing, China) utilises symbolism to portray the sense of confusion and agony in society, incorporating parody and satire to present personal reflections of the times. In the pictorial spaces he created, diverse motifs such as grinning figures and blooming flowers are applied and lead the trails to the neoteric political and societal ideology, inviting viewers to reflect on the fixated social hierarchies. Sharing the same notion, Yin Zhaoyang (b. 1970, Nanyang, China) reflects the perplexity of our society. As one of the representatives of the 'Cruelty of Youth Paintings' school in the late 1990s, Yin illustrates the susceptibility of youth through his profound art language, which has since condensed through in-depth exploration and observation of historic events. On the other hand, Zhao Zhao (b.1982) chooses less elaborate colours but instead a higher emphasis on form to demonstrate an equal acuteness on societal issues. Of his many artwork series, Constellation and Autonomy are exhibited at this show with the symbolisms of bullet-penetrated glass and ladder respectively. What is the connection between human violence and nature? And what is hierarchy to a rigid political structure? Zhao Zhao's experimentation with numerous mediums and forms leave us with complex viewpoints and meanings for contemplation.
The language of art can also be as 'sonorous' outside of political connotations. Zhu Jinshi (b. 1954, Beijing, China), for instance, assimilates and integrates the aesthetic of the East and the West to produce his own individual language system by undergoing self-exploration with brushstrokes. He lashes oil colours with spatulas and shovels, recalling the ethos of the German expressionists who practiced impasto layering. Resulted are small-scale thick paintings that present his dexterity in colour with his detailed painting style. Strokes can also become transformative as demonstrated in Wu Wei's (b. 1981, Zhengzhou, China) creations. By manipulating paper into fur-like entities, the works represent not just Wu's internal reflections about the flexibility of art mediums, but also the fluidity of meanings–instructed and constructed–in society.
Despite sharing drastically different backgrounds, Korean artist Chun Kwang Young and Filipino artist Jigger Cruz ascertain us that the language of art is universal, borderless. Chun Kwang Young (b. 1944, Hongcheon, South Korea) shatters common methodologies by using Korean mulberry paper as the constituents for his sculptures, creating 'brushstrokes' with instead crumbled and reshaped paper sheets. The innovation does not conclude here, however, as Chun is further questioning the fluidity of semiotics in the bigger society–analogous to the breaking down of previous written texts on the mulberry paper and the artist's re-endowment of new meanings. Jigger Cruz (b. 1984, Philippines) shares exactly the same critical view on established notions as Chun. By creating classical images and then immediately vandalising, even destroying them with gestural, thick oil paint, Cruz challenges us with his brushstrokes to rethink the endless possibilities with art as a discursive medium. The longstanding, the traditional, and the normative can always be changeable.
All of the seven innovative artists elucidate the ever-changing definitions of avant-garde in contemporary art with ingrained deep cogitation, imposing an ensemble of originality with their sonorous strokes.