South Africa – New York – South Africa LEAP: So, what got you into making art? Kendell Geers: Well, it’s very simple. In South Africa during apartheid, every white male was supposed to go into the military. Conscription was mandatory and involuntary. I was against apartheid and therefore against the military. And the only way…

The ongoing curricularization of contemporary art from Asia continues with this anthology, edited by the husband-and-wife, museum-director-and-magazine-editor duo of Chiu & Genocchio. They take 2008 as their starting point, noting that the year of the financial crisis was also the year “Asian artists stormed the citadel of the New York art world.” Stormed? Or were…

LATE IN MARCH, China’s wandering tribe of independent documentary filmmakers converged on the city of Kunming for the fifth edition of the Yunnan Multi Culture Visual Festival (Yunfest). Since the founding of the documentary biennale in 2003, Yunfest has become a mecca for alternative film culture in China, a voice for an emerging generation of…

For the performance of Man on The Chairs, a group of trained dancers, following instructions and exerting great effort, clambered back and forth across the gallery space. Admiring this scene, and trying to figure out the narrative of the performance, spectators soon realize that its crux lies in an emphasis of the new “surface” created…

PHOTOGRAPHY: Birdhead STYLIST: Clément Buyi Z. (CLÉMENT & CLÉMENT PRODUCTION) HAIR & MAKE-UP: Kevin Long (MANWOMAN_management) PRODUCER: Aimee Lin PRODUCTION ASSISTANT: Zinn Zhou STYLIST ASSISTANT: Daqian Yongko Leslie MODELS: Lilac H(PARAS) LOCATION: KEE Shanghai

In rhetoric, things come in threes, and Liu Wei is above all a rhetor. Thus his largest exhibition to date was divided, like Caesar’s Gaul— unevenly by size, but evenly by impact— into three parts. To the right of the entrance, the installation Golden Section offered a space divided into several by the lurking furniture…

The Sharjah Biennial was hardly the biggest thing afoot in the Arab world this spring, even if the halo effect of the concurrent Art Dubai seems to have tipped it over into critical mass. (The 2011 iteration of both shows were the largest in their respective histories). Of course, any historic change is inseparable from…

Chinese ink and brush painting is in a strange place. On the one hand, quality works are in short supply, and a “lack of methodology” has rendered the field, as art critic Gao Minglu critiques it, “unsalvageable.” Yet on the other, strong attendance at recent exhibitions speaks to an uptick in interest in the genre,…

Song Dong first began working on his series of installations entitled “The Wisdom of the Poor” in 2005. One piece from this series, the large-scale installation Song Dong’s Parapavilion, is to be shown at the Venice Biennale this year. Apart from this upcoming show, none of the works from this series have previously been presented…

AUGUST 8, 2008, was a major day in world history. Coming at the end of a seven-year countdown, it marked the moment when Beijing revealed its ambitions and accomplishments to a watching world. Hours before the drums beat out the final ten seconds in the lead-up to the 8 p.m. opening of the Olympic Games,…

ONCE UPON A CLOUD: OUR 1980s ART SCHOOL LIVES It’s no coincidence that the elite produced by the art education system of the 1980s have become a galaxy of stars in today’s art world. The unique thirst for knowledge of that era allowed “universities” to transcend space and time. In the words of art critic…

            1. TOBIAS MADISON Twenty-five year-old Swiss artist Tobias Madison’s recipe for artmaking combines minimalist sculpture with slick 80’s design and a touch of branding and glitch aesthetics. The artist, who was recently the subject of solo exhibitions at New York’s Swiss Institute and Kunstverein München, has been known to…

Roughly translated, the Chinese name for Cheng Ran’s new solo show is “day becomes night.” He chose its English name, “Circadian Rhythm,” with the help of translation software. Although the core of the show is his newest video work, WHAT WHY HOW, the entire show is laid out in such a way that the relationship…

IN THE QUICK red firmament of Chinese contemporary art history, names are fascinatingly ephemeral. The specter of the here-today-gone-tomorrow plagues even the most powerful-seeming artists, collectors, and galleries. And though the overall story of art in China has been one of unbridled growth, instances of decline and fall litter the shining path. And none more…

“THIS MUSEUM must demonstrate the nation’s great riches,” wrote Jean-Marie Roland, the French Minister of the Interior in 1792. “France must extend its glory through the ages and to all peoples.” His letter to Enlightenment painter Jacques-Louis David concerned plans for the National Museum of France, better known today as the Louvre. More than two…

SONART First of all, the idea of SONART is not at all limited to sound art or experimental music performance. The concept of a series of cutting-edge live performances and audio-visual publications was proposed by Gao Shiming, Executive Director of School of Intermedia Art, and I am the one responsible for its realization. SONART stands…

Established after Taikang Space moved to Caochangdi and named after the total floor area in the gallery’s space it occupied, 51m² was especially dedicated to holding exhibitions of young artists on a rolling basis. From October 17, 2009 until January 8, 2011, 51m² spanned fifteen months and ultimately played first home to the new works…

JOURNEY OF (NO) REDRESS Beijing Anyone who ever bemoaned the Beijing art world’s lack of a power lunch scene was more or less vindicated when Fennel opened in the Yi House, a boutique hotel in 798, last spring. One year later, on the first Saturday of April and the beginning of the Grave Sweeping Festival,…

IF THERE IS ONE ARTIST apt to leave pundits chewing their pencils, it is Wang Jianwei. He is surely the first to have occupied a 2,500-square-meter exhibition hall— indeed any exhibition hall— with several thousand basketballs in the name of art. “He’s complicated,” remarked a curator on recent mention of his name; “Ah, yes” a…

  WANG JIANWEI: MAN IN-BETWEEN If there is one artist apt to leave pundits chewing their pencils, it is Wang Jianwei. He is surely the first to have occupied a 2,500-square-meter exhibition hall— indeed any exhibition hall— with several thousand basketballs in the name of art. “He’s complicated,” remarked a curator on recent mention of…