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Back Home

Background Story: Landscape Painted on the Double Ninth Festival

PHOTO|VIDEO

Materials: Natural debris attached to frosted glass panel


2012

Exhibition Location: MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts, USA


2015

Exhibition Location: SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia, USA


INSTALLATION

Background Story: Water Village

PHOTO|VIDEO

Materials: Natural debris attached to frosted glass panel


2012

Exhibition Location: Palace Museum, Beijing, China



INSTALLATION

Book from the Ground - Shop

PHOTO|VIDEO

First exhibited: Book From the Ground: From Point to Point, Shanghai Gallery of Art, Shanghai, China, 2012

INSTALLATION

The Character of Characters

Installation view at Out of Character: Decoding Chinese Calligraphy, Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, USA, 2012

Instalation view of The Character of Characters at MASS MoCA (North Adams, MA, USA), 2012

Draft for The Character of Characters, MASS MoCA, 2012

Draft for The Character of Characters, MASS MoCA, 2012

Instalation view at Things Are Not What They First Appear, SCAD Museum of Art Savannah (Savannah, GA, USA)

PHOTO|VIDEO

2012: 17'

2012, 2015: 15'

Materials: seventeen-minute animated film 


This animation is conceived as a study and imagination of a calligraphy masterpiece by Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322) in the collection of Yahoo’s founder, Mr. Zhiyuan Yang. Through the medium of widescreen animation, The Character of Characters describes the source of the unique character of Chinese people. Everyone in China who has received basic education must, over the course of years, commit to memorize and then write and re-write thousands of characters, each character a drawing. This is the way things have been done over thousands of years in the Chinese history, so this must have had some influence on the formation of the character of Chinese people. It implies the way that Chinese people see and approach things, and why China is the way it is today – developing at this breakneck speed but not in line with the Western value system.

 

Chinese people’s worldviews and concepts of freedom; the consequences of Chinese people’s flexibility, collectivism, face-saving mentality, moral stance that demands focus on communal interests, and worship of symbols and big names; the ability of Chinese culture to digest other cultures, and the Chinese culture of copying (“shanzhai”). All of these special characteristics could be said to have a deep connection to the Chinese way of writing characters. This animation seeks to reveal the relation between Chinese writing and cultural characteristics, the core and energy of Chinese culture, and its advantages and disadvantages for people to continue to build new modes of human civilization.

 

 Supported by The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation.



CHARACTER NEW MEDIA

Background Story 8

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

Background Story 8, North Adams, 2012

PHOTO|VIDEO

2012

Materials: Natural debris attached to frosted glass panel

Location: Mass Moca, North Adams, MA, USA


INSTALLATION

Tobacco Project: Ridgefield

Work in Progress

1st Class

Installation view -- Miscellaneous Book

Light as Smoke

Installation view

Installation view

Installation view

Installation view

Installation view -- Traveling Down the River

PHOTO|VIDEO

Location: The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield, Connecticut, USA

Medium: Mixed media installation/ tobacco leaves, live tobacco plants, various tobacco related materials

INSTALLATION

Forest Project: Sao Paulo, Brazil

Child drawing, San Paolo, 2012

Children and Xu Bing, San Paolo, 2012

Children creating their own art work, San Paolo, 2012

Children drawing, San Paolo, 2012

Children and Xu Bing, San Paolo, 2012

Children and Xu Bing, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

Installation view, San Paolo, 2012

PHOTO|VIDEO

2012

Medium: Mixed media installation/ Student drawings, painting, primer, computer (auction website)

Location:  Sao Paulo, Brazil (30th Sao Paulo Biennial)


Website: http://forestproject.net


Through art, the internet, culture, education and the involvement of local folks Forest Project creates a system to facilitate the automatic and uninterrupted flow of funds from developed countries to Kenya, earmarked for the planting of new trees.

SOCIAL PROGRAMS

Xu Bing Phoenix (MA)

PHOTO|VIDEO

2008 - 2010 / 2012

Materials: construction debris, light emitting diodes

Dimension: 27 and 28 meters in length, 8 meters in width 

Location: MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA, USA


INSTALLATION