Wang Jin
Wang Jin was born in Datong, in the Chinese province of Liaoning. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts…
Fighting The Flood : Red Flag CanalBiography
Wang Jin was born in Datong, in the Chinese province of Liaoning. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in 1987, where he specialized in traditional Chinese painting. Wang Jin lives and works in Beijing, and exhibits regularly in many countries.
His work uses several mediums, such as photography, sculpture and performance, indiscriminately and sometimes simultaneously. His very conceptual work is inspired by personal experiences. It expresses an assumed subjectivity while echoing, with biting irony, the evolutions and problems of Chinese society.
His famous photograph Marrying a Donkey (1995) features him in costume, leading a donkey in a wedding dress. This performance denounced the absurdity of bureaucratic blockages denying him a visa to go to the United States, which led the artist to divorce his wife who was studying in this country.
In another photograph, Fighting the Flood – Red flag canal (1994), he poured 25 kilos of red paint into an old canal. If red is the traditional color of happiness, marriage and revolution, the artist evokes with this gesture the transmission of pollution or poison. He also repainted, with a red obtained from elements of traditional Chinese culture, the rails of a railway line between Beijing and Hong Kong. More recently, in the same order of ideas but in a different register of expression, he exhibited traditional Chinese costumes woven from PVC, a symbolic material of contemporary consumer society, now well known for its toxicity. The robes are transparent and white, the traditional color of death.
Career
EXPOSITIONS PERSONNELLES
2007
Wang Jin, Friedman Benda, New York, U.S.A
2002
Measuring the USA, Beijing China
1999
100% Beijing, China (performance)
1996
Ice, 96 Central China (Performance), Zhengzhou, Henan, China
Chinese Art Festival (Performance), Munich, Germany
1995
Quick Stir-frying RMB (Performance), Jianxin Hotel, Beijing, China
The Dong'AnMen Night Market (Performance) Wangfujing Dajie, Beijing
Knocking at the Door (21 Cashbricks), Forbidden City wall, Beijing, China (performance)
To Marry a Mule, Laiguangying Village, Chaoyang District, Beijing, China (performance)
1994
Beijing-Kowloon (Performance) Beijing-Kowloon Railroad, Beijing, China
Fighting the Flood - Red Flag Canal (Performance) Lin Xian, China
Investment Guide—the Last Bus, the Beijing Railway Station, China (performance)
Endorse a Declaration—Insect Spray, Forbidden City walls, Beijing, China (performance)
1993
Knocking at the Door (drawing US dollars on the Bricks of the Wall of the Forbidden City) (Performance), Beijing, China
EXPOSITIONS DE GROUPE
2009–2010
The European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF) Maastricht 2010, Maastricht, Netherlands
2009
My Tooth, Shandong, China.
Take Part – Zeitgenössische Chinesische Kunst, Galerie Urs Meile, Lucerne, Switzerland
EXPO 2000 Hannover - My Bone, Hannover, Germany.
Our Chinese Friends, ACC Galerie; Galerie der Bauhaus-Universitat, Weimar, Germany.
Inside, Out: New Chinese Art, SFMoMA, San Francisco, U.S.A. Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Monterrey, Mexico
2008
Wang Jin: Dream of China. Designer's Gallery, Köln, Germany
Food and Shelter, Pekin Fine Arts, Beijing, China
Spring Training: Beijing 2008, Pekin Fine Arts, Beijing, China
Zhu Yi! Contemporary Chinese Photography, Palau de la Virreina, Barcelona, Spain
2007
The Quiet Gesture: Recent Chinese Art, Newark Art Museum, Newark, NJ
Energy: Spirit, Body, Material, Today Art Museum, Beijing
Zhu Yi! Contemporary Chinese Photography, ARTIUM de Alava, Spain
The Year of the Golden Pig: Contemporary Chinese Art from the Sigg Collection, Lewis Glucksman Gallery, Cork, UK
2006-2007
Mahjong - Chinesische Gegenwartskunst aus der Sammlung Sigg, Hamburger, Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany
XIANFENG! Chinese Avant-Garde Sculpture, Beelden and Zee Museum, the Hague, Netherlands
2006
Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany
2005-2006
The Wall, Millenium Art Museum, Today Art Museum, Beijing, China; The Albright-Knox ; Museum, Buffalo, NY, USA
2005
Mahjong: Contemporary Chinese Art from the Sigg Collection, Kunstmuseum, Bern, Switzerland
Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle; Museum of Contemporary Art, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, U.S.A
Xianfeng! Chinese Avant-Garde Sculpture, Museum Beelden aan Zee, The Hague, The Netherlands
2004-2005
Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK
2004
Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, International Center of Photography, New York, U.S.A
Le Printemps de Chine, CRAC Alsace, Altkirch, France
Chinese Object: Dreams & Obsessions, Salvatore Ferragamo Gallery, New York, U.S.A
2003
Together with Migrants, Today Art Gallery, Beijing, China
Le Printemps de Chine, Crac Alsace, Altkirch, France
2002
Paris-Pékin, Place Cardin, Paris, France
The Long March - A Walking Visual Display - On the Wall Hang the Swords, Which are Upside Down, Jing Gang Shan, China
Triennale of Chinese Art - The Landscape Here is Beyond Compare, Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou, China
Guangzhou Triennale, Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou, China
2001
My Tooth, Shandong, China
2000
EXPO 2000 - My Tooth, Hannover, Germany
Our Chinese Friends, ACC Galerie/Galerie der Bauhaus-Universität, Weimar, Germany
1999
Inside Out: New Chinese Art, SF MoMA, San Francisco, U.S.A., Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Monterrey, Mexico
Art 30 Basel, Galerie Urs Meile, Lucerne, Switzerland
TRANSIENCE: Chinese Experimental Art at the End of the Twentieth Century, Smart Museum of Art; University of Chicago, Illinois; University of Oregon Museum of Art; The Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, U.S.A
100%, Performance in Beijing, China
POLYPHENOLRENE, Bow Gallery, Beijing, China
APERTO over ALL: The 48th Biennale di Venezia, Venice, Italy
1998
Ink Art Released, National Gallery of Art, Beijing, China
A Chinese Dream, The site of the Ming Imperial Tombs, Beijing, China
Museum City Fukuoka 1998 - Forward to the Victory, Memorealism, Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Fukuoka, Japan
Inside Out: New Chinese Art, Asia Society, New York; P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, U.S.A.; Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Monterrey, Mexico; Tacoma Art Museum; The Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, USA
Eight Chinese Artists, Galerie Urs Meile, Lucerne, Switzerland
1997
Chinese Contemporary Art 1997, Watari Museum, Tokyo, Japan
W2.Z2: Multimedia Slide Art, CIFA Gallery of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, China
A Chinese Dream, Imperial Summer Palace, Beijing, China
1996
Reality: Present and Future. International Art Palace, Beijing, China
1992
100 Straw Portraits, Works: March 1992. The Beijing Youle Amusement, Beijing, China
1986
Trend - Ink Body. The Beijing International Art Center, Beijing, China
1985
Advanced Chinese Youth Art - Pure Brightness, The National Gallery, Beijing, China