Are you going to enjoy
calligraphy or measure blood pressure?
"2002 In Shanghai, Yangjiang some event occurring."
Modern Calligraphy Exhibition
Opening: 2002/5/15, Wednesday, 18:00-20:00
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| Sun Qingling World Trade Center Remains Cleaned Up calligraphy 292 x 92 cm 2002 zggc01 世贸废墟清理完毕 |
Chen Zaiyan American inspectors enter Middle East? No way! calligraphy 262 x 94 cm 2002 zggc14 美观察员进入中东没门 |
Sha Yeya Xiaoquan self-account of losing virginity at 20 attends the talk show calligraphy 300 x 96 cm 2002 zggc09 小泉自爆20岁失去童贞，参加脱口秀 |
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Zheng Guogu 好同常加入WTO后广东挑及对策，性格就是命运。 |
Zheng Guogu 隐 |
Chen Zaiyan & Zheng Guogu 核流氓 |
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| Sha Yeya No. 1 Gambling Queen in Asia calligraphy 113.5 x 313 cm 2002 zggc30 亚洲第一赌后 |
Sha Yeya Announcement: Semen wanted calligraphy 110 x 315 cm 2002 zggc31 收购精子告示 |
Sha Yeya I once had one night stand. Self-account in talk show about losing virginity at 20 calligraphy 234 x 82 cm 2002 zggc04 我曾一夜风流 参加脱口秀，自爆20岁失去童贞 |
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Zheng Guogu Air Surveillance firing calligraphy 354 x 95 cm 2002 zggc28 防空炮火 |
Zheng Guogu
calligraphy
男女同囚血书（1996年，浙江省天台县年仅16岁的少女邱彩萍被浙江省天台县公安局关押，其后邱与20多名男性犯罪嫌疑人同拘一室，时间长达7天7夜，身心都受尽凌辱，猥亵。2002年1月11日，几度状告天台县公安局的邱彩萍收到了浙江省高级人民法院终审判决书，邱彩萍胜诉。至此，长达5年、震惊全国的“男女同囚事件”画上……
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Sha Yeya Reported by CCTV. On Oce. 30th this year, the 1st case of sex harassment in China has been accpting and hearing the case itself is a big step forward on the road of democracy. Sex harassment is a new concept introduced in 1990s while relevant legislation has been well established in many other countries. calligraphy 272 x 92 cm 2002 zggc11
据中央电视台新闻报导，今年10月30日，西安市莛湖区法院对我国首例性骚扰案进行了审证，尽管还没有结果，但该案件受理本身是对我国民主法制的一个推进，性骚扰一词是上世纪90年代才传入我国的。世界是许多国家已立法。
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| 2002 IN YANG
JIANG SOME EVENT OCCURRING
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Pendulum of Change
| Chen Tong
The artistic events that appeared in Yangjiang, Guangdong, are both exciting yet hard to understand. At first, Zheng Guo Gu combined Yangjiang, an ordinary seaside city, into the territory of contemporary art, with his seemingly unrelated but basically identical disastrous performance. After that, under his influence, a lot of artists easily veered from many of the regionally binding constraints, and started a small revolution in photography, literature, architecture design and other fields, effectively moving the central focus. It seems that such events mainly have effects on those traditional local cultural authorities, but since artists are not interested in local cultural authorities, we would rather say that, due to their existence, the city is drifting. At least culture is no longer the customarily “Superstructure”. It is no longer based on economy, but independently takes up the task of creation in a modern sense. No matter what kind of evaluation these events will be given, positive or not, their non-traditional features are very impressive. From another point of view, it is such events that have adjusted the artistic position of Guangdong, and changed its image. The occurrences of these events are actually quite frequent, and there is a relationship between them. The opposite of individual works is group works, including exhibition, lecture, architecture and interior design. Between Yimei Company, the world organization and the artists, it is hard for us to identify if the individual leads the group, or if the group encourages the individuals. What’s more, different from the periodic and restless revolutions in cultural centre cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Nanjing and etc., what the Yangjiang youth did are things that have never been done, for example, the “strange buildings” being blamed even today, which we cannot find any acceptable historical resource. If not for modernization providing limited acceptance, we could only watch it cautiously, other than live in it comfortably. We can say that in the Handwriting Exhibition held at the “World Organization” as well as at the “Ningbi Space” at the same time in March 2002, the impulse of “Continued Revolution” once again changed path. As we know, the authors include Zheng Guo Gu, Sha Ye Ya, Chen Zai Yan and Sun Qing Ling. Except for Chen, who is a penman of deep foundation and experience, the other three persons do not belong to any folk group that relates to handwriting, and perhaps have never even touched brush pens before. Knowing this fact causes us to doubt their qualification and authorization to put handwriting as their revolution target. According to our personal handwriting inability, we will further doubt the realness and effectiveness of the revolution. “Are you coming to appreciate handwriting or to test your blood pressure?” – The title of the exhibition transforms the simple “handwriting art” into “concept art”, in its teasing. Thus people will increasingly consider how this could happen, rather than reacting after its occurrence. For example, someone may ask, “Mr. Zheng, you always love to do strange things, why have you become interested in handwriting?” Or, “Mr. Chen, your handwriting is quite good, why have you messed it up with these people who do not have any handwriting ability?”. But this is the result that the authors want. Obviously, they did not want to state, “I can write” or “Everybody can write”, nor did they want to try the extension of reformation by paper and ink, the latter being the basic proposition of “modern handwriting” as an attitude. But during the battle with tradition, the extended feelers withdrew. People found that the realization of “freedom” is not the responsibility of handwriting. What they are concerned with may be how to make handwriting strange again. It is the same as the houses they built, the familiar functions but interesting based mainly on their “strangeness”. Therefore the meaning of handwriting’s existence will be presented in “strangeness”. At least the houses and the handwriting have the same strong cutting effect due to their lack of familiarity. It seems that Zheng Guo Gu will specially emphasize the different content from traditional handwriting. Using traditional poets has long since disappeared, newspaper scripts, and artificial maxims all scattered over paper (e.g. “Good, Same, Regular, Entry of WTO in Guangzhou, Personality is Destiny”), each of which is full of queerness and provocation. But, since the fonts are difficult to recognize, except people who read the descriptions beside the work, one cannot understand what these characters are talking about. For me, this chief difference greatly presents the non-traditional features of the artists. But it is not related to the shock and impact we receive from these works but rather what mostly interests me is that the artists deliberately involved themselves into a special art mode which is ridiculous and lacks the possibility for revolution. They have expressed their detached attitude ensuring they will not perish at any moment. It is like a group of street boys passing through downtown, who pick up an orange from one seller’s basket, and put it into another seller’s basket. They do not need to take responsibility, yet at the same time, they were achieved their purpose of provocation. The beauty in structure and shape inside these works is not lowered in the least. As a necessary discussion of the works that hung on the wall, a few “health machines” were placed under a pile of wasted rice paper, which sent out wave-like power, similar to a man and woman under a quilt. Though this accessory is the extension of handwriting, it is more noticeable than the writing itself. It used contradiction to clear away those stubborn concepts that want to establish certain aesthetic logic between the strokes. Therefore, one side is the ink game, which cannot completely dispose of writing rules, and the other side is the site magic that resolves such games in a strange suspense. If the blood pressure tester is added in, a test of watching and its psychological reaction will occur in the name of art. Yangjiang handwriting, is obviously not a precious path. Similar to those strange buildings, these handwritings are not universal. The same may also be said of those handwritings that reflect certain local characteristics in traditional scope (the World Organization is surrounded by this public artistic mode). Therefore simple opposition has excluded our love to Yangjiang artists from the very beginning. We want to know precisely if every event brings extraordinary stimulation, and if such stimulation is enough for Yangjiang to consolidate its position as a centre of modern art. On my way back to Yangjiang from Zhapo Island, I got to know a sea arthropod named the “horseshoe crab”. Its blood is blue and Zheng told me that this giant animal, like a helmet and a sword, takes ten years to grow to usable size, but its price is lower than a quick-raised fish. After tasting the horseshoe crab soup, I immediately started to respect and love it. If I had realized some strange theories for life through a tree in my hometown, in the same way the horseshoe crab has also inspired me to use special care in the sensation and experience of all the artistic events occurring in Yangjiang. Of course, I have to say that I have already equated these artists to the horseshoe crab. |
