Breakthrough: Work by Contemporary Chinese Women Artists

View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Bowdoin College BREAK THROUGH CONTEMPORARY /OMEN ARTISTS BOWDOIN COLLEGE MUSEUM OF ART This brochure accompanies an exhibition of the same name at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine, from September 27 through December 22, 20 13. The exhibition is presented in conjunction with the symposium "Female Embodiment of the Visual World: Women's Art in Contemporary China," held at Bowdoin College on September 28, 2013. Design by Wilcox Design, Cambridge, Massachusetts Copyright © 20 1 3 Bowdoin College Image opposite: Peng Wei, Autumn of Tang Dynasty, 2008 Back cover: Cao Fei, Deep Breathing (from COSPIayers Bowdoin College Museum of Art 9400 College Station Brunswick, Maine 040118494 20772S-3275 bowdoin edu/art-museum series), 2004 HfS Cai Jin (Tsai Chin) Cao Fei (Tsao Fei) If Chen Qiulin (Chen Hung H $RfX^ Ch'iu-lin) Liu iJ4l LinTianmiao (LinT'ien-miao) $^1s Peng Wei (Peng Wei) Xing Danwen (Hsing Tan- wen) fflS-^X Yin Xiuzhen (Yin Hsiu-chen) 3^"^i# The artists' characters names appear above in Chinese and in two forms of romanization of the Chinese language: pinyin, the current international standard, and Wade-Giles (in parentheses) introduced in the late nineteenth century and used through twentieth century. The much names of the are rendered in pinyin elsewhere in the publication. Introduction The eight artists featured in Breakthrough; Work by Contemporary Women Chinese Lin, Artists — Cai Jin, Cao Fei, Chen Hung Qiulin, —span who came multiple generations, ranging from those of age during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s to those who grew up amid global market during the 1990s. China's a activate artist is their own and wide in the online that may be implied through anew (Hung as futuristic, virtual avatars Liu) (Cao . The torsos of female may for this sophisticated on the body's also figural presence in their art, these be registering, perhaps inadvertently, a growing awareness of their impact on the contemporary and co-curator of this exhibition, Shu-chin been conducting original research over the past Tsui, has women's art. China on the subject of contemporary Her deep knowledge, enthusiasm, and personal many of the artists arts immensely thanks to co-curator was Hongbei Li ' 1 also strengthened art. Co-Directors Museum staff, Anne and Frank Goodyear, especially establish one's position amid to In her text and Fund Shu-chin Tsui, associate professor of Asian works on view film studies, discusses the terms of their formal qualities and in relation to cultural, and societal transformations internationally. In spite Chinese women We the tectonic shifts in Chinese society in recent decades. of their in artistic, artistic accomplishments, art of Jose Ribas '76, and Andrea Rosen. gratefully for die acknowledge the support of the Becker Bowdoin College Museum of Art, James and Winnie Chan P '97, Stevens L. Frost Innes Fund, Karl R. PhilbrickArt Watson Fund, and the Andrew Endowment Fund, Museum Lowell Fund, Katharine W Mellon Foundation. Sarah Montross Andrew as well as Henning, Joachim within China and have historically been absent from facets Suzanne Bergeron, Martina Duncan Homann, way all the exhibition process. Special thanks are also extended to Museum human form becomes self, a Student assistant to 4 was instrumental to '97, Jo Hluska, Laura Latman, Michelle an assertion of the critical to the Peggy Wang's expertise in the field of contemporary Chinese the curator were scene, both within China and internationally. To visualize the studies and vibrant the world stage. exhibition's success. Breakthrough are suggested through visceral, abstract painting (Cai By summoning the initiator connections with Fei). mannequins wash painting (Peng Wei) and canvases for ink artists group nuanced understanding of the conditions artists' arrival several years in Figures from historical photographs appear like ghostly Jin). behind these The clothing or sewing (Yin Xiuzhen, LinTianmiao). Bodies are is foster a a joint perspectives Acknowledgements of others. The corporeal form inhabits (Xing Danwen, Chen Qiulin) or interior of defining realm of the liminal spaces of rapidly changing built environments specters mid-1990s and in the pitfalls concerned with representations of the body each constructed emergence our appreciation work and Diverse as their perspectives are as a group, Life. art since its cautions us about the potential of art of Chinese painting, photography, video, sculpture, and even interventions installation, Second — They work across assistant professor studies, considers the field of artists by geography or gender. Their massive infrastructural reforms and emergence on the range of media and Asian women's LinTianmiao, Peng Wei, Xing Danwen, and Yin Xiuzhen Peggy Wang, historical scholarship. history W Mellon Postdoctoral Curatorial Fellow J. 2 BREAKTHROUGH: ARTISTS AND WORKS SHU-CHIN TSUI Breakthrouah: Associate Professor of Asian Studies and Film Studies, Bowdoin College Work by Contemporary Chinese Women Artists the conceptual claims and creative practices of art" in contemporary China. "Women's category are we gender to is open to question, however. view works by women "women's How, for example, terms of politics as well as aesthetic articulations? have Chinese women artists gendered art" as a artists in Why refused to have their identified in terms of feminism, even engage in feminist art practices? if explores work they seemingly Addressing these traditional to the past. Next modern and is a contrast between ruined sites and urban construction, addressing transition is how China's socioeconomic dramatically changing exhibition then leads us where personal and the history to re-presentations of social on its desires find expression through avatars, environment becomes virtual reality. Finally, an engagement between the search for female identity and experiments with cotton threading, shoemaking, questions and locating them against China's social-cultural and flower painting demonstrate the conditions, the exhibition explores four key aspects of the materiality. work on brings fresh critical attention to eight view. First is a visual dialogue painting and contemporary innovation, between classical which connects landscape. The through cyberspace, a journey making visual languages Through these interwoven themes. significant contributions to artists of Breakthrough who are contemporary art. I 3 Between the Classical and the Contemporary Peng Wei and Hung Peng Wei brings a Liu contemporary interpretation Chinese landscape painting. The hanging Thoughts young artist A Young (2012) features a restrained farewell scene of woman in a boat departing from her lover. literature rather creating a contrasting dialogue Dynasty (2008), Friedrich Schiller, thus between the conventions (2010) and Autumn Relic 8 (2004), an image of two of Tang and resin-glazed, features Chinese characters composed with a female radical and phonetic ideogram to signify the gender identity and social status of the subjects. oil washes and drips of color are Hung painting style. Circles, Liu's signature the canvas in several hues. The inserted birds, flowers, and grasshopper painting Peng Wei's formal explorations extend the — —iconography from relate the figures In The Path (2010-201 historical back to traditional 1), Hung She wraps the torsos of commercial female mannequins to create images paper and then inscribes classical ink paintings memory and that fantasy. Chinese art forms. Liu uses her characteristic layering of brushstrokes, drips, hemp The symbols of the universe, decorate conversation between the classical and the contemporary. with terms photograph, occupies the canvas. The central panel, red art, of subdued Chinese painting and expressive German poetry. In the sculptures Night in of history and memory. In than Chinese narrative for an inscription, poem by and present nineteenth-century courtesans, quoted from a historical away. Additionally the artist turns to Western rendering in calligraphy a Liu's paintings juxtapose past Girl's usually a passive female figure watches her male sail Hung a The has inverted the gender roles present in classical where lover scroll to classical and patterns blend historical documents with The central image, lifted from a mid- across the body's surface. This innovation transforms two- twentieth-century black-and-white photograph, shows dimensional painting into three-dimensional sculpture, two where the female form assumes material rider smiling as she breastfeeds her baby. as well as classical and the contemporary in terms of form and material, Hung Liu, The Path, 2010-2011 women riding donkeys along a rural path the riders within a gendered significance. Whereas Peng Wei's sculptures reframe the 1 a fish —more good fortune complex references field from of imagery classical art offered to the travelers on — Hung — the Liu first embeds birds, deer, and symbols of their journey. U Between Ruins and Urban Chen Sites Qiulin Fiction and Xing Danwen of industrial ruins and brick balconies are primary Chen motifs in Qiulin's diverse multimedia visualizes the transformations of time (2009) and related photography, the make-up and (dis)located when a wedding artist dress Peach Blossom —wearing —appears seen against the industrial ruins or the rubble of demolition in her County, Sichuan Province. hometown A woman's with the decaying landscape to the that and place caused by China's rapid urbanization. In the video elaborate work in Wan beauty contrasts as the artist bears witness tumultuous evolution of urban development. In her installation series Balcony (2007), the detached and detailed apartment balconies, with their characteristic red brick, window wooden door, and hanging laundry, offer a into the customs of the old city about to be engulfed by the voracious spread of urbanization. While Chen Qiulin captures the disappearance of a familiar landscape, in Xing Danwen's Urban an alien landscape emerges. The dramatic scenes from everyday life actor, staging supporting social view, artist gaze Qiulin, Solidified Scenery (from Peach Blossom), 2009 real estate herself appears as the primary episodes with her male counterparts in roles. The architectural problems and gender we Chen into photographs of miniature architectural maquettes from showrooms. Often the Fiction series artist digitally inserts at issues. models pinpoint From critical a bird's-eye the city dwellers isolated inside high-rise buildings or behind walls. The revelation of private life within a projected architectural framework demonstrates how massive construction projects are radically reshaping China's landscape and people's lifestyles. Xing Danwen, Urban Fiction (image 24), 2006 I 5 Between the Real and the Cao Virtual World Fei Critical reality concerns about urban landscape and social extend to cyberspace and virtual reality in an acknowledgment of the hybridity of contemporary life digital realms. A traveler frequently transgresses these lines is Cao between analog and who maverick multimedia artist. urban adolescents role-playing costumes. Using construction or abandoned buildings in "cosplayers" of who manga (2004) Fei, a series commercial Guangzhou show streets, as their stage, the or anime are like alien invaders enact their dreams and exercise their ability to co-opt reality. 2 Nonetheless, after their heroes must return The artist reality into virtual home momentary to face a escape, the mundane existence. extended her exploration of fantasy and cyberspace when world of Second Life. she entered the online Her avatar, named China Tracy, reflects the desire to locate a position in the i. Mirror (2007) is identity. documents a muchinima that as well as tele-presents the artist's blossoming romantic documentary about her own creating a Life. By avatar in virtual space, the artist altogether dissolves the demarcation between Cao in elaborate, fantastical sites, world without losing one's personal entanglement with another avatar in Second The video, photography, and installations related to her COSPlayers virtual The video real Fei and virtual. continued to work in Second an entire virtual island called Chinese or RMB People's City ( Life, building AKifiStlif ) in City in English. Designed by Cao collaboration with the design firm Avatrian LLC, Fei in RMB City again links virtual space with the physical world. Visitors to RMB City recognize familiar sites built environment past and present, such City, the Bird's Nest, or the CCTV Tower. of China's as the In Forbidden remapping architectural landmarks in cyberspace and transforming them digitally, the artist appropriates symbols of China's ascension as a global power. 6 Between Female Identity Yin Xiuzhen, Lin Tianmiao, Flower painting and and Material Embroidery and Cai Jin both have long histories crafts feminine practices in China — as flowers traditionally stand for virtue. In her for scholarly ideals and embroidery 1998 mixed media installation Yin Xiuzhen (presented here as a sequence of photographs), the artist searches through a personal subject deeply for female identity etched in her memory. She inserts old photos of herself at different ages in the soles of ten pairs of handmade cotton shoes. The shoes are identical in material and recalling a time during the Cultural Revolution style, when a standard dress code unified a collective identity. In this self-titled piece that makes art Xiuzhen claims her identity out of material culture, Yin as a subject. Moreover, personally sewing the shoes with her mother, the by artist not only evokes social and familial pasts but also effects material innovation in her creative practice. Lin Tianmiao uses cotton threads to both construct and question from her identity. In a piece (begun in 200 1 Focus series the artist projected an enlarged ), photographic portrait onto paper, which she wrapped with embroidered cotton interplay balls. She creates a visual between individuality and material obscurity, between the artist as subject and artifact as object, and between photographic image and the three-dimensional surface. By transforming the image into a mixed media print overlaid with threads portrait becomes and other materials, meaning. Lin Tianmiao 's Hand Signal series is to customs of the Peking Opera: deliver theatrical expressions female roles? Hand Signal No. this meditation on form and a multifaceted her response how do hand and why do men gestures play 20 evokes the expression of praise in operatic performance. The expressive image Yin Xiuzhen, Yin Xiuzhen, 1998 of the hand invites and challenges the viewer through its visual indications and theatrical narratives. Separated from the body and disassociated from the costume, the gesture becomes inscribed in a mixed media image, memory. a frozen moment Opposite: Cao A Second Life Fei, i. Mirror by China Tracy (AKA: Cao Documentary Film, 2007 Fei), I 7 As women's a craft specific to artistic practice, flower painting can provide metaphoric expression of a woman's inner life. For over twenty years, Cai Jin has continually transcribed banana leaves onto canvas, rendering them in the color red. Her Beauty Banana series when started accidently, in the wild, their the artist form and the color seized "The root, the stem, for life." 3 The found banana plants green colors fading. "The withered my and the artist saturates attention," she recalled. leaves were still breathing the shriveled leaves with blood-red hues and imbues them with a bodily texture. The redness of the force, leaves expresses life energy and organic while the darkness suggests deterioration and even death. The conjunction of beauty and decay is Tianmiao, Lin Hand Signal No. 20, 2005 an irresistible draw to the viewer, a mixture of fascination and horror. Thus, the transformation of color and texture in Cai Jin's Beauty Banana series reflects an ambivalence towards life and speaks about female corporeal experience. Through who artists the work of these eight extraordinary introduce challenging subject matter and formal innovation. Breakthrough highlights the contributions to contemporary Chinese art women aim on to its without reducing engage own it this diverse to a fresh eyes, art we made by gendered category. We body of women's terms, and then through implications. If critical its art first social-cultural look with open minds and through created by Chinese women reveals many avenues for discussion. Notes 1 . Email correspondence between Hung Liu and the author, June 26, 2013. 2. Cosplayers, short for "costume players," wear costumes and accessories of specific characters from movies, video games, and comic books. They often meet conventions or gather in public at spaces for role-playing activities. 3. Cai Jin in interview with Jiang Mei, Deep Chinese Contemporary Female Artists, edited Shanghai shuhua chubanshe, 2008), 20. Cai Jin, Banana Plant 310, 2008 Breath: 19 Samples of by Jiang Mei (Shanghai: Interrogating "Chinese Women's Art" PEGGY WANG Assistant Professor of Art History and Asian Mao Zedong's famous 1968 proclamation that "women such half the sky" has often been repeated as testament hold up to China's the state. acknowledgement of women's contributions to While most observers of recent Chinese history are understandably skeptical of this claim for gender Bowdoin College as intuition, emphasis on personal experience, and used materials drawn from daily artists, in his towards life, life. Women view, were also generally "apathetic and philosophy, and on the politics, history contrary, concentrate [ed] of Mao's assertion speaks to equality, the very familiarity Studies, and humankind and "women's on the themes of nature, survival." 1 Burdened by these art" served less as a rallying call the need to take into consideration the specific ideological descriptions, conditions that have governed the historical status of for female artists, women parameters against which to navigate and negotiate. in China. As a rebuttal against so-called feudalist, Confucian hierarchies, women under of the masses over the individual, gender was obscured as a marker of individuality. Mao-era posters and model operas visually celebrated this masculinization of women. It Throughout the Communism were regarded as comrades in revolution. With the privileging phenomenon through wasn't until the 1 980s the that and more Liao Wen 1 as the start work by female She granted more leeway in her formulations women it as a space through could discover themselves. While the demonstration of female experiences as difference Chen began to re-emerge. In the brief, thirty-year history of contemporary Chinese art, the category of "women's art" gained currency during the 1990s. The 1995 International Women's Congress for in Beijing served as a further catalyst launching large-scale, state-sanctioned exhibitions featuring art by Chinese women. While to a distinctly female voice marked a this attention new interest in questions of difference, the surrounding discourse was not necessarily tied to explorations of inequality, gender constructs, or calls for liberation. Within these early exhibition and narratives, the phrase "women's historical art" often constricted artwork into generalized approaches and tendencies. As a "style," women's particular materials, motifs, and art stylistic was identified with traditions, distinct work produced by men. The prominent Chinese and curator rise Jia Fangzhou noted that the 1 from art critic 990s saw the of women's awareness towards themselves and their gender identity and identified particular characteristics of the resulting art. 1998 exhibition As the curator for the large-scale Century Woman in Beijing, Jia identified specific characteristics in the work of female artists of thorny rose to fame in the Chinese art scene for her of the category and described which set 990s, the independent curator writings and exhibitions championing artists. of a Qiulin, Old Archway (from Peach Blossom), 2009 admitting that a "women's approach" an embryonic room for remained still development given historical absence in its China's patriarchal society. She about distinguishing Chinese was furthermore art by clear women from movement. Even larger international feminist identification of particular characteristics — a her still, the materials on used, "silent subversion," and a greater "emphasis women's in Liao noted the importance of this state, particular feelings and experiences" —continued the trend of narrowing this term into definable attitudes and properties. 1 Through the imposition of this category, gender was soon trumpeted which to access as the sole defining feature and understand these artists' While bringing much-needed attention represented artists, through works. to certain under- the reproduction of similar systems of narrative classification posed troubling problems for over interpretation and intent. As a result, artists female artists began to bristle at this category many and deny its applicability altogether. This rigidly bifurcated response — — either a adoption or rejection of "women's art" at the complete has often come expense of more honest explorations into the actual power dynamics Chinese art. that have In the 1980s, governed contemporary few women entered into academies and even fewer worked in experimental the following decade. went on Of those who to attain significant away into a did, only a handful renown, while many faded male-dominated art scene. these artists faced further challenges international exhibitions art art in where In the late 1990s, when their voices entered into were subsumed within Western assumptions about international feminism and "dissident" art. This generated two problems. identifying female artists within a larger categorizing them according to — gender First, community often failed to clarify the specific cultural distinctions in their works. Tendencies to see agitation for women's rights as a generalized and universal sometimes elided the Peng Wei, A Young Girl's phenomenon, for example, historical particularities Thoughts, 2012 and Hung Liu, RelicS, 2004 personal motivations surrounding the production of these artists' works. At the same time, while positioned within national or regional boundaries artists — — as Chinese or Asian generalizations that served to simply reinforce reductive a backwards East.' In these ways, these and the work the existence of this category artists how we and raised the possibility art" as a category, this exhibition challenges — — as viewers to reconsider formulate and apply these Breakthrough challenges confinement. While the phrase "contemporary Chinese and across historical assured and unambiguous, and contemporary connotations need to be treated prudently. As one approaches the exhibition, important questions arise: group of artists, viewers to break through bounded this exhibition. . Jia Fangzhou, "Preface" What are the assumptions about in Century Woman, transl. and Karen Smith (Hong Kong: Shijie Chen Yang HuarenYishu Chubanshe, 1998), 11. 2. Liao Wen, Women's Approach Morillo (N.p: its labels. this select continually shifting themes that reach within, beyond, 1 art" especially important here to reconsider Notes can be simultaneously a source of empowerment and may seem about gender and our preconceptions. Like race and nationality, the invocation of gender women's we hold and possibly contradictory meanings, groupings, and Understanding the problematic implications of us justify concepts and terms to allow for multiple, nuanced, within post-gender and post-national frameworks. "women's it is By bringing together difference. Subsequently, artists issued as individual creations would kind of critical questioning can ingrained preconceptions that both gender and nation according to problematic metrics of seeing their work at all? Is that there something that apply to any themed exhibition, but given the deeply nationality, denials of this reifying tendency produce can be considered a "women's experience" that inherently found themselves trapped within interpretations about of sameness and that they translates into art? This exhibition narratives often circulated vast views of women 3. A n.p.. lo Chinese Contemporary Art, transl. Isolda 1995), 1-4. notable exception to this was the 2000 exhibition and catalogue Gallery, Text & Subtext: Contemporary Art and Asian LASALLE-SIA College of the Woman Arts, Singapore. at the Earl Lu Artists was born inTunxi, Anhui Province, Cai Jin from the in 1986 and earned degree in a Academy of Fine Arts, hint' in 1965. She graduated department of Anhui Normal University, Wuhu, fine arts Arts Institute. Cai painting in 1991 known best is oil She currendy teaches Beijing. paintings oi banana leaves that including a 2012 retrospective and die seminal group show the Central theTianjin merge themes of fertility and the National Art at Die nen der Gegenwurt /Hulf of the Sky: Contemporary Chinese decay. exhibitions, Museum, Himmels: chinesische Hiilfte des Beijing, at the Frauen Museum, Bonn, Germany (1998). Fei and is was born in Arts, and design, and there made her at returning to Beijing in 1994. She which she winds Cao including Bound /Unbound: creates elaborate escapism in popular youth culture against the everyday life. She has exhibited museums, including prestigious Biennale in 2007. Her project numerous at art realities of biennials and the China Pavilion RMB CITY at the Venice has been exhibited the at Deutsche Guggenheim (2010); the Shiseido Gallery, Tokyo (2009); the Serpentine Gallery, nale (2008). In Chen in Qiulin London (2008); and 2010 she was was born Sichuan Province in now 197 5 pnntmaking department lives in at underwater due the Sichuan Chengdu and on how recent urbanization lives the the projects in multimedia work China have altered and the land. Recent exhibitions include Chen Hammer Museum, Art at the a city to the Academy of Art and now Beijing. Chen's human (2009) and Boss Prize. Dam. She graduated from centers at Hugo and grew up inWanzhou, partially construction of the Three Gorges works and the Yokohama Trien- a finalist for the Qiulin University of California, Los Angeles Displacement: The Three Gorges David and Alfred Smart Dam and Contemporary Chinese Museum the known for multimedia work their appearance and function. Lin has international exhibitions, Lin Tianmiao at the New York Asia Society, the Beijing Center for the Arts, Beijing (2007), at Brooklyn Global Feminisms at the and works lives multimedia projects in which she contrasts themes of fantasy and contemporary is numerous domestic and exhibited in at as a textile designer, before or cotton threads around everyday objects silk and images, transforming Peng Wei was born the where she studied decoration first films. working in Beijing 1987 and studied in 1961 and in degree from Normal University Capital at New York to a bachelor's Museum (2007). 1978 in based in Beijing. She earned her bachelor's degree Guangzhou Academy of Fine moved (2012), The Same Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, She earned in Beijing. Art Students League while and Cao and works the fine art department in Kiinstlerin- Women Artists Tianmiao was born inTaiyuan, Shanxi Province, in 1984. Lin for her striking, nearly abstract numerous solo and group Cai has been featured in at at Lin lives of Art, University of (1997) and contemporary artists among is who a by Peng Wei 2002-201 for A 1 ) ; 1 at (2000) from Nankai use traditional ink painting as their Taking off the Shell — fa- Works He Xiangning Art Museum, Shenzhen, the Attitudes: Female Art in Contemporary Art, 1974 and younger generation of Chinese vored medium. Recent exhibitions include China (201 in earned a bachelor's degree in fine a master's degree in aesthetics University, Tianjin. She Brussels, China at the European Centre Belgium (2009); and INK Chinese Contemporary Art Exhibition at the not INK: Shenzhen Art Museum, Guangdong, andToday Art Museum, Beijing (2008). Xing Danwen was born lives and works in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, in in Beijing. Xing earned from the Central Academy of Fine degree in photography 2000. Xing urban life is best shown Arts, Beijing, and the School of Visual Arts, at known 1 967 and 1992 a bachelor's degree in a master's New York, in for her playful yet sensitive portrayal of in her Urban Fictions series of large-scale photo- graphs of architectural maquettes that straddle the line between reality and fantasy. Modernism and ture Center Recent exhibitions of her work include U.S. Vernacular — Xing Danwen & JimVecchi Houston Foundation (2010) and —Wang Chicago (2008). Chengdu, Sichuan Province, in in Beijing. She Future Di and Xing Danwen at at Chinese the Architec- Seeing Utopia, Past and the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University (2010). Hung Liu was born Changchun, in Jilin Province, in 1 948, a year before the People's Republic of China was established. She earned a Yin Xiuzhen bachelor's degree in art and art education there. from the Beijing Teachers College and a master's degree in mural painting from the Central Academy of Fine Art, 1 984 and received a Beijing. She immigrated to the United master of fine arts of California San Diego in 1986. She Mills College and lives retrospectives of her at the Oakland 1988-2006 at and works is professor emerita of art at in Oakland, California. Recent work include Summoning Museum States in degree from the University Ghosts:The Art of Hung Liu of Art (2013) and Hung the Savannah College of Art Liu: Memorial Grounds and Design (2008). was born in 1963 partment in 1989 with a creative manipulations of to explore topics tion, in Beijing and now lives and works She graduated from Capital Normal University's fine degree in painting. She is known de- arts for her second-hand items, especially clothing, of nostalgia, personal memory, rapid globaliza- and homogenization. Yin has shown in major exhibitions domestically and internationally since the 1990s, including Die Con- Hdlfte des Himmels: chinesische Kunstlerinnen der Gegenwart /Half of the Sky: temporary Chinese (1998); Women Artists at Global Feminisms at the Yin Xiuzhen at the Xiuzhen at the Museum the Frauen Brooklyn of Modern Museum, Bonn, Germany Museum Art, (2007); New York Projects (2010); and Groninger Museum, Groningen, Netherlands (20 1 92; Yin 2). Seeing Shadow No. Works marked with an asterisk (*) are Balcony (1, illustrated in this publication. 2007 10, 11, 12), mixed media, each 18 1/8 on canvas, c-print x 29 1/8 x 9 7/16 F-12, silk 2009 threads, and cotton threads, 72 1/16 x 72 1/16 x 3 1/8 inches (18301x18301x8 cm) inches (46 x 73 99 x 24 cm) and Beam Banana Plant 29s, 2008 Courtesy of the oil on canvas, 78 3/4 x 74 13/16 inches (200 x 190 cm) Contemporary Art, New Private collection Peach Blossom, 2009 *Banana Plant 310, 2008 Courtesy of the artist and Beam ink Contemporary Art, New 8 11/16 inches (70 x 39 x 22 artist York, Copyright of the London on silk, 66 15/16 x 43 5/16 inches York, London (170 x 110 cm) on hemp paper, 27 9/16 x 15 3/8 x cm) Courtesy of the artist *Old Archway (from Peach Blossom), 2009 Private collection giclee print on paper, 60 1/8 x 48 3/8 inches (152.72x122.87 cm) Yanmyat Home (from COSPIayers series), Courtesy of Galerie *Autumn of Tang Dynasty, 2008 DVD, 16 minutes 37 seconds oil artist, New York Lelong, Courtesy of the ink artist and Beam Contemporary Art, New 2004 Night, 2010 York, on hemp paper, 19 11/16 8 11/16 inches (50 x 30 x 22 London x 11 13/16 x cm) Private Collection digital c-print, 29 1/2 x 39 3/8 inches *Solid'med Scenery (from Peach Blossom), *A Young Courtesy of the artist and Lombard 2009 ink Freid Gallery giclee print on paper, 48 3/8 x 60 1/8 inches (282 (122.87 x 152.72 cm) Collection of Ray (75 x 100 cm) Deep Breathing (from COSPIayers series), Courtesy of the Contemporary 2004 digital c-print, 29 i/4 x 39 1/4 inches artist Art, and Beam Freid Gallery oil Inc. New York, London 8, 2004 c-print on canvas, 66 x 66 inches (167.64 16764 cm) Mirror by China Tracy (AKA: Cao Fei), Documentary Film, 2007 x Courtesy of Nancy Hoffman Gallery, *The Path, 2010-2011 Courtesy the artist and Lombard mixed media, 41 x 87 ofRMB City, 2009 (170.2 x Courtesy of the artist and Artist Pension Trust, Beijing *Urban Fiction (image 24), 2006 28 minutes Freid Gallery on paper, 67 x 85 9/16 inches 217.4 cm) New York single-channel video with sound, The Birth and Soo Venkatesan, *Urban Fiction (image 10), 2006 *Relic Life x 14 3/16 inches x36 cm) ( Courtesy of the artist and Lombard A Second Thoughts, 2012 image courtesy of Sotheby's 743x997 cm) *i. Girl's on hemp paper, 111 c-print 1/2 inches (104.14 x on paper, 88 x 67 inches (223.6 x 170 cm) 222 25 cm) Courtesy of the artist and Artist Pension Courtesy of Nancy Hoffman Gallery, Trust, Beijing New York single-channel video with sound, 10.5 minutes *Yin Xiuzhen, 1998 Courtesy of the artist and Lombard *Hand Signal No. Freid Gallery c-print, felt, synthetic hairs, 20, 2005 set of ten color 46 7/16 x 58 1/4 inches (117.95 x 147.96 cm) Live in RMB City, 2009 Copyright of the single-channel video with sound, Lelong, artist, Courtesy of Galerie New York 30 minutes Courtesy of the Freid Gallery artist and Lombard Focus print 06S05A, 2006-2007 silk, cotton threads, foam and print paper made by Singapore Tyler Print Institute, 50 x 39 3/8 inches (127 x 100 cm) Copyright of the Lelong, Artist, New York Courtesy of Galerie photographs on paper, each 16 x 23 3/4 inches (40.64 x 60.33 cm) Courtesy of the artist and Chambers Fine Art