H&R Block Artspace at the Kansas City Art Institute
Exhibition and Public Program Schedule 2008-2009
January 17– April 3, 2009
Stairway to Heaven: From Chinese Streets to Monuments and Skyscrapers
Opening reception: Friday, January 16, 6:00-8:00 pm
Stairway to Heaven is an exhibition of contemporary urban photography, video and installation analyzing the changing streets of China, responses to traditional monuments, and the unparalleled growth in skyscrapers within the context of cultural transformation.
Today American culture is more global than American and as the 21st century develops Chinese culture will become the next and largest global culture. Chinese art, media, film, design and literature will target a global audience as its own culture begins to maximize efficiencies through an ever-widening international scope. Yet, in 2008 the world is still curious what role China wants to play in the 21st century. What will be the Chinese equivalent of the “american dream” myth? The best way to gauge the future of another culture is through its art. This exhibition is constructed to present Chinese artists serving as augurs of the future of Chinese culture. As China will be the focus of the international scene during the 2008 Beijing Olympics Stairway to Heaven offers a unique context and opportunity to present the great resurgence of art and culture China.
Stairway to Heaven refers to a search for that which will define the Chinese equivalent of the “American dream”. In the Olympic context it recognizes that as the athletes strive for gold, they are searching for heaven and that each citizen of China is also trying to find her piece of heaven in the new China. These artists explore where heaven may be found: from traditional to neon street life to the top floors of skyscrapers to a simple home with a family or a visit to a cultural or spiritual monument. They also look at the mechanization of change through machinery, technology and how their landscape is changing and what it means for Chinese culture to become more urban and conceptual than rural and representational. It is a fascinating time for China and as the world focuses on China for the Beijing Olympics it is important to illuminate the great culture behind the economic and social growth.
The artists will provide insight into how the historically unprecedented growth of Chinese culture is influencing the Chinese’ relationship to the underlying exhibition themes streets, monuments, and skyscrapers. We will learn more about the culture of China, which will dominate the global landscape in the 21st century, through their art than their economics and politics.
Against the grain of the current crop of contemporary Chinese art exhibitions concentrating on only internationally recognized artists this project brings together the infamous such as Ai Weiwei (currently in every art magazine and the essential artist in Documenta XIII) with the local favorite Liang Weiping who rarely photographs or is seen outside of his Beijing neighborhood. It is also important to recognize the generational and gender diversity, which is a critical concern in Stairway to Heaven but has been lacking recent Chinese exhibitions. Some of the artists are professors (Gu Zheng, Luo Yongjin and Ning Ye), photo editors (Zhu Feng), recent graduates (Yang Yongliamg) and a few are better known in Europe and America than in China. This diversity offers the viewer multiple lenses of access to Chinese culture through art.
The exhibition is organized by the Bates College Museum of Art with the H & R Block Artspace at Kansas City Art Institute and the California State Los Angeles Luckman Fine Arts Complex. It will open at Bates in June 2008 and travel to Kansas City and Los Angeles in 2009. The curators are Mark H.C. Bessire (Bates), Gan Xu (Maine College of Art), Raechell Smith (KCAI), and Julie Joyce (CAL State LA).
image: Weng Fen
April 18 – May 16, 2009
2009 Annual BFA Exhibition
Closing reception: Friday, May 15, 6:00-8:00pm
