FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Show dates: 09•23 through 11•07•2009
Reception: 09•25 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm
*Artist will be present

The Work of Yang Yongliang
Photographic Works

LIMN gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of Chinese artist Yang Yongliang.

Yang Yongliang is a young artist from Shanghai whose studies focused on traditional Chinese shui mo painting and calligraphy. Using a camera - the contemporary visual device chosen by many of his generation - he cleverly recreates "Cun", the main form of Chinese Shanshui paintings in order to reveal modern Shanghai city life and details of current urban culture. Scenes of construction sites, large cranes, traffic signs and fly-overs, have all become critical elements in his artworks. Arranged in the traditional composition of Chinese landscape, These large scale photographs look like dreamy Shanshui paintings. But on closer viewing, they reveal themselves as shockingly modern city views. Yang perfectly handles the contradictions between ephemeral and permanent, vigorous and gentle, sparse and bold, beautiful and ugly to make an entirely poetical and harmonious work, yet the details are 'blots on the landscape'. He achieves a perfect balance between fragility and danger, beauty and cruelty, bringing the viewers not only visual enjoyment, but also the contemplation and self-examination of various social and cultural concerns. His newest series entitled “Heavenly Cities” comes with the Rise of the Phoenix legend in mind. Powerful clouds of dust shoot up in reach of the “Heavens” pointing out the recent infrastructure planning and the dislocation of millions of people in exchange for luxurious high rises, and malls. Yang Yongliang exhibits in China and Europe. This is his first solo show in the US. The artist will be present for the opening reception.


China Avant Garde, part XI
Yu Hang, Han Bing, Wang Ningde,
And Zhang Xianyong

LIMN is pleased to present “Some Other Place”, a group exhibition of four Chinese photographers who explore the realm of a dream state despite the harsh realities of a new China’s economic, cultural and political shifts. All four photographers work and live in Beijing and Shanghai.

Han Bing has been at the forefront of contemporary Chinese art since the early nineties. His photographic work is a continuous response to the changes taking place in China either culturally or economically. His newest series “The Theater of Modernization” is a carefully choreographed body of work. Varied cast of characters positioned atop of a sand filled claw of an industrial bulldozer replicate the well-known propaganda posters of the Cultural Revolution period. However, laborers, soldiers and businessmen are happily mingling, each taking a turn at the central position. Obviously it is a dream Han Bing aspires too. Despite its “classless” aspirations, China’s social classes are strongly defined and hierarchy still prevails.
Yu Hang is a young woman who chose to comment on her gender’s status in China. To this date, Chinese women are still subjected to discrimination. Yu reinvents the woman’s position through the courtesan culture, which existed before the Cultural Revolution; Staged as tableaux from ancient silk screens, a young woman is wearing fabulous attire, headpiece and displays elaborate tattoos personifying the woman as an object. But the woman also portrays¬ herself as strong and powerful like a warrior, a kind of Joan of Arc or Mu-Lan.
Wang Ningde’s hauntingly black and white photographs capture the sense of isolation one might long for. Despite a very tight society ruled by the idea of altruism, Wang’s characters keeping eyes closed, appear to be dreaming, escaping reality to venture outside the conformity and to pursue their personal ideals.
For Zhang Xianyong, self-portraiture is at the core of his work. He is inspired by both traditional story telling such as the Chinese Opera and the old masters from the Romantic period, Zhang Xianyong’s work is fresh and humorous, reflecting the dilemma of finding a place inside modern China that has one foot in the past and another in the inevitable globalization of the present. In his latest series entitled “Hallucinations”, Zhang Xianyong travels through times and lands. Part Wizard of Oz, part open toy chest, a multitude of Zhangs navigate life with a child’s imagination, leaving behind the tough realities of living on the street. His work will be shown during the upcoming Moscow Biennale.