ALLEGORY – ROUND DOOR Qiu Zhijie

WORK

In the mid-1990s, Qiu also wrote extensively on Chinese conceptual art and performance art, which led to the meaning controversy. The most important debate in art theory in the Chinese art world. The round door is Qiu Zhijie's photograph. In his work, he always puts text into it. His art is called "calli-photo-graphy". He masters photography, painting, video and performance. This led him to the installation. Qiu Zhijie wants to deal with Chinese history and self-affirmation. Here we see a wall with an inscription. We see graffiti in the air. This is a photomontage from 2005. These inscriptions are positive messages, inclined to memory and hope.

ARTIST

Born in 1969 in the province of Fujian QIU ZHIJIE graduated from the printing department of the Central Academy of Fine Arts in 1992. He also received intense training in traditional calligraphy at a very young age, as well as in Literature, History and in Philosophy. An experimental artist, he produces works on a wide range of media, such as photography, video, calligraphy, painting, installation and performance. He is now Associate Professor at the C.A.A. Hangzhou, deputy director of the Hangzhou Visual Culture Center (C.A.A.) and artistic director of the “Beijing 25000” Culture Transmission Center and lives and works between Beijing and Hangzhou.

Particularly sensitive to the transformations that were shaking up China at the time, Qiu Zhijie took an incisive look at the evolution of mentalities and behaviors in Chinese society from the mid-1990s. He is thus one of the first artists to give a parodic account of the rupture that is created between the generations of the Cultural Revolution and those who will form the Capitalist China of the 21st century.

In his book History of Chinese Art in the 20th Century, the historian Lü Peng describes the Fine photo series in these terms: “The Fine work of Qiu Zhijie embodies a unique satirical vision of Chinese society. This group of photographs depicts young “white-collar workers” who wear the uniform” of the business world but whose movements and postures evoke the era of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. In Fine N°3, two young men proudly support a woman, as if carried by a hope that seems incongruous as the postures and clothing choices send contradictory signals. By superimposing in this work outdated ideals and postures with clothes symbolizing modernity Qiu Zhijie seeks to provoke surprise and uncertainty in the gaze of his viewer.
(in History of Chinese art in the 20th century, Lü Peng, ed. SOMOGY, 2013 p.686)