Liu Wei: The East 2020 No.1
The things you make are never free of the things you see.
If you compile all the things that attract you, they become your point-of view.
— Liu Wei
Duration: 1 FEBRUARY 12:00 AM - 1 MARCH 11:59 AM (CST), 2023
Liu Wei's works exhibit composure and violence, absurdity and lucidity, concision and long-windedness, and numerous other peculiar combinations of mutually contradictory elements. His works fuse together cold, bewildering, fierce, fast and hard sensibilities to create a unique temperament.
Liu Wei, The East 2020 No.1 (detail)
For Liu Wei, practically all current art practices are a mere kind of performance, something that has been placed on a pedestal and rendered sacred. This is definitely not the clichéd anti-museum sentiment, but a strong desire to engage with the world. The work needs to possess an authentic element of lethalness, like a brilliant nail that pierces reality or a strong viral dose injected into the social body. This is a rush utterly devoid of conscience and respect for the law, an infatuation with movement, a passion without intention.
Liu Wei, The East 2020 No.1 (detail)
Nowadays, people have already become accustomed to mass media. In a time when artists are highly guarded against "visual immersion", Liu Wei hopes to subvert mass media's dominance over visuals by "occupation" through "sight". Through the forceful incision of real objects, Liu Wei acknoledges medium's sovereignty over reality and appropriates it. In the process of medium transforming the world into imagery, the subject of this outrageously violent "visual-act" reaches a compromise between medium and the world.
——Excerpted from Gao Shiming's "Passion Without Intention"
About Liu Wei
Liu Wei (b.1972) was born in Beijing, China, and was trained as a painter at the China Academy of Art in 1996. He is heavily influenced by the instability and fluctuation peculiar to twenty-first century China, in particular with respect to its physical and intellectual landscape. With different media of creation such as paintings, videos and large-scale installations, Liu has become a singular presence on the global art stage. Liu Wei's work is characterized by a post-Duchampian-inspired engagement with a broad modernist heritage. His work coalesces the visual and intellectual chaos inflicted by the myriad political and social transformations taking place in China into a polytropic and unique artistic language. Liu Wei’s recent solo exhibitions include “Liu Wei: Sanchang/OVER” (Long Museum West Bund, Shanghai, 2020); “Invisible Cities” (moCa Cleveland and the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, 2019); “Shadows” (Long March Space, Beijing, 2018); “Panorama” (PLATEAU, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, 2016); “Colors” (Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, 2015); “Sensory Space 4” (Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, 2014).
Liu Wei - The East 2020
The things you make are never free of the things you see.
If you compile all the things that attract you, they become your point-of-view.
— Liu Wei
Duration: 1 FEBRUARY 12:00 AM - 1 MARCH 11:59 AM (CST), 2023
Liu Wei's works exhibit composure and violence, absurdity and lucidity, concision and long-windedness, and numerous other peculiar combinations of mutually contradictory elements. His works fuse together cold, bewildering, fierce, fast and hard sensibilities to create a unique temperament.
Liu Wei, The East 2020 No.1 (detail)
For Liu Wei, practically all current art practices are a mere kind of performance, something that has been placed on a pedestal and rendered sacred. This is definitely not the clichéd anti-museum sentiment, but a strong desire to engage with the world. The work needs to possess an authentic element of lethalness, like a brilliant nail that pierces reality or a strong viral dose injected into the social body. This is a rush utterly devoid of conscience and respect for the law, an infatuation with movement, a passion without intention.
Liu Wei - The East 2020 No.1 (detail)
Nowadays, people have already become accustomed to mass media. In a time when artists are highly guarded against "visual immersion", Liu Wei hopes to subvert mass media's dominance over visuals by "occupation" through "sight". Through the forceful incision of real objects, Liu Wei acknoledges medium's sovereignty over reality and appropriates it. In the process of medium transforming the world into imagery, the subject of this outrageously violent "visual-act" reaches a compromise between medium and the world.
——Excerpted from Gao Shiming's "Passion Without Intention"
About Liu Wei
Liu Wei (b.1972) was born in Beijing, China, and was trained as a painter at the China Academy of Art in 1996. He is heavily influenced by the instability and fluctuation peculiar to twenty-first century China, in particular with respect to its physical and intellectual landscape. With different media of creation such as paintings, videos and large-scale installations, Liu has become a singular presence on the global art stage. Liu Wei's work is characterized by a post-Duchampian-inspired engagement with a broad modernist heritage. His work coalesces the visual and intellectual chaos inflicted by the myriad political and social transformations taking place in China into a polytropic and unique artistic language. Liu Wei’s recent solo exhibitions include “Liu Wei: Sanchang/OVER” (Long Museum West Bund, Shanghai, 2020); “Invisible Cities” (moCa Cleveland and the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, 2019); “Shadows” (Long March Space, Beijing, 2018); “Panorama” (PLATEAU, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, 2016); “Colors” (Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, 2015); “Sensory Space 4” (Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, 2014).
