Visual Archaeology
by Pi Li
As a sensitive artist, Zhong Biao has captured the pulse of China's social reforms through the visual symbols Chinese people are familiar with. He takes the visual experiences of an era as the image source of his works, including sculpture and china representing China's past glories, the labor models of the Cultural Revolution, and such symbols of modern life as McDonalds and Boeing aircrafts. Of course, most symbols are skyscrapers and western-style buildings in old China. What attracts artists is the different meanings of these images, because in the language of ordinary Chinese people, what used to be synonymous with corrupt capitalist society or colonization is now the symbol of modernity. With the development of movies, TV, printing, and digital technology, it seems that the way modern man receives information has already undergone the transition from text to images. In these new circumstances, images from different eras are frequently taken out of their original context and used repeatedly. And in this process they are continuously endowed with new cultural meanings. Zhong Biao's work is similar to the "knowledge archeology" described by Facult Michael. In "visual archeology" similar to "knowledge archeology," he cuts a section from the visual symbols people are familiar with, then takes out those fragmented symbols from the cultural deposits of different times, and last arranges and combines them in a unique way. What he wants is not to show the meaning of symbols themselves, but to reveal the changing meanings of the images through setting up peculiar scenes.
As an artist, Zhong Biao adheres to "visualization" to accomplish his "archeological work." Instead of juxtaposing concepts, he expresses himself through paradoxical scenes. While his early works usually juxtapose cultural images from different times, his later works are characterized by more transformation. He sets color dimensionality against time direction. The artist's imagination adds color to aged images, yet the images close our daily life are deprived of any color and context. Living people lose color, yet the dresses and accessories they wear, which are the symbols of the era, stay on. With the fading away of colors, the limit between reality and memory is completely destroyed and illusion begins. This illusion, rather than being founded on pure biological sensation as in the case of surrealism, is based on cultural accumulation and memory. If surrealist style is but a reflection of the identity crisis experienced by people during the earlier rapid industrialization, then Zhong Biao's works appear to have initiated a "new surrealist style," which embodies an individual's doubt about his knowledge.
Zhong Biao's unique work style means that his cultural attitude is entirely different from that of previous artists. Be it political pop or gaudy art, what they were eager to put across was their own attitudes, criticizing either ideology or commercial culture. Zhong Biao seems to keep a distance from this sort of criticism. In his works we find the calmness unique to intellectuals. What he considers is not how to criticize, but the source of evidence for our criticism and how it's meaning undergoes changes. Behind Zhong Biao's approach to China's pop culture and mass culture, we find a new cultural attitude. He is unlike other artists who deal with pop culture, who either mix their works with real pop culture under the pretext of concept, or use old handcraft methods to criticize the mass production of pop culture. It is possible that art based on handcraft and individual production is not a match for real mass culture and its media. The relationship between art that criticizes mass culture in the name of art and mass culture itself is much like that between a small flyswatter and an enormous fly. In Zhong Biao's works, we can see that through the creation of illusions and the incompleteness of images he gives up not only the antagonistic relations between art and mass culture but also the attempt to control mass culture. Through 'visualization' Zhong Biao has staked out his own claim within the domain of mass culture.
Born in Chongqing, Sichuan Province, China
1987
Studied at Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts (now China Academy of Fine Arts), Hangzhou, China
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2007
Beyond Paintings, Xin Dong Cheng Space for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China
Splendid Over 10 Years of Exploration, Olyvia Oriental Gallery, London, England
Zhong Biao :American Debut, Frey Norris Gallery, San Francisco, USA
2006
Chance Encounter, Chinatoday Gallery, Brussels, Belgium
Zhong Biao, Zeit-Foto Salon, Tokyo, Japan
2004
Zhong Biao, Benamou Gallery, Paris, France
Ubiquity, Art Scene Warehouse, Shanghai, China
2001
A Chance Existence, Art Scene China Gallery, Hong Kong
1997
The Fable of Life, Schoeni Art Gallery, Hong Kong.
1996
The Fable of Life, Museum of Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Chongqing, China
Selected Group Exhibitions
2009
Beijing - Havana, New Contemporary Chinese art Revolution, Cuba Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Havana,Cuba
2008
Beijing-Athens: Contemporary Art from China, City of Athens Technopolis, Greece
3.15- Let's consume!, Xin Dong Cheng Space for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China
2007
Chinese Contemporary SOCART, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia
2006
The Self-Made Generation - A Retrospective of New Chinese Painting, Shanghai Zendai Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai, China
Bologna International Art Fair, Bologna, Italy
ARCO, Madrid, Spain
Time and Signs - China - Vietnam - Indonesia Joint Art Exhibition, Jakarta, Indonesia
Oriental Imagination, China Art Museum, Beijing, China
Taipei International Art Fair, Taipei
New York Asian Art Symposium, The Armory Show, New York, USA
Grosvenor's House Fine Art and Antiques Fair, London, England
Now - Wiedergeburt des Mystischen , The ESSL Collection Museum, Austria
Body - Contemporary Art Exhibition, Nanjing Endless Contemporary Art Space, Nanjing, China
Singapore International Art Fair, Singapore
Temptation, Olyvia Oriental Gallery, London, England
Art London, London, England
Art Beijing, National Agricultural Exhibition Center, Beijing, China
FIAC, Paris, France
2005
The Second Triennial of Chinese Art, Nanjing Museum, Nanjing, China
In Honor of ' 85: 2005→1985, Shanghai Duolun Modern Art Museum, Shanghai, China
In the Deep of Reality - A Case of Chinese Contemporary Art, UG Beyond City, Hangzhou, China
Grounding Reality, Seoul Art Center, Seoul, Korea
Above and Below the River - Oil Paintings of the New Period in China, China Art Museum, Beijing, China
Art Ghent, Ghent, Belgium
2004
In Between, The Contemporary Oil Painting Exhibition, Tang Gallery, Bangkok, Thailand
2003
People and People - Chinese Modern and Contemporary Art Collections, Guangdong Art Museum, Guangzhou, China
Chicago International Art Exposition, Chicago, USA
The First Beijing International Art Biennale, China Art Museum, Beijing, China
Third China National Exhibition of Oil Paintings, China Art Museum, Beijing, China
Image of Image, Shenzhen Art Museum, Shenzhen, China
2002
Art Miami 2002, Miami Beach Convention Center, Miami, USA
Chicago International Art Exposition, Chicago, USA
Chinese Contemporary Art Exhibition of Painting, National Art Museum, Peru
Chinese Contemporary Art Exhibition of Painting, Mexico Post Palace, Mexico
2001
China Art Now!, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore
Chinese Contemporary Painting Exhibition, Salvador, Brasilia, Saint Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Next Generation - Contemporary Asian Art, Passage de Retz, Paris, France
Lust for Life, Galerie Piltzer, Paris, France
2000
At The New Century: 1979-1999 China Contemporary Art's Works, Chengdu Contemporary Art Gallery, Chengdu, China
The Individual and Society in Art - A Collection of Works of Art by Eleven Artists, Guangdong Art Museum, Guangzhou, China
1999
As Beautiful as Materialism - Chinese New Concept Art Exhibition, ShanghaiSharp New Sights - From Young Artists Born Around 1970,Beijing International Art Gallery, Beijing Hexiangning Art Museum, Shenzhen, China
1998
Confused - Reckoning with the Future, Contemporary Chinese Paintings and Photography, Amsterdam, Holland
1997
Walking to a New Century - Young Chinese Oil Painters, China Art Museum, Beijing, China
Guanshanyue Art Museum, Shenzhen.Pacific Plaza, Chongqing.Art Museum of Luxun Fine Arts Academy, Shenyang, China
1996
Eleven's - The Avant-Garde, Taikoo Place, Hong Kong
1995
History of Contemporary Chinese Oil Painting- From Realism to Post-Modernism, Galerie Theoremes, Brussels, Belgium
1990
The Second Chinese Sports Art Exhibition, China Art Museum, Beijing, China