Fang Lijun
06 Jun - 14 Jul 2007
FANG LIJUN
"Places to Places to Places"
Opening: June 5th 2007, 7 – 9 p.m.
Exhibition: June 6th – July 14th 2007
Humming and buzzing, roaring and raging everywhere. Clouds drive and winds ravage through an apocalyptically agitated heaven. Lightning flashes. Without spatial clues, without finding orientation, the eye of the beholder wanders across seemingly unbounded skies, apparently breaking open the pictorial space in every sense. The only leads: luminaries of a very special kind, small beetles and winged bodies, driven and hovering in the thunderous turmoil of heavenly powers and shining in all shades of the rainbow. Apparently thrown into the exploding space by hazard, they are still imbedded within the magnificently wild structure of this creation.
Complex and mysterious as ever, and in virtually infatuating beauty, the latest works by Fang Lijun not only captivate the eye. The large-sized paintings, but also new sculptures in bronze, can now be seen for the first time in Germany, at the gallery-rooms of Alexander Ochs.
Socialised by the opening of the system during the 1980`s, and especially by the tragic incidents at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989, Fang Lijun belongs to a generation of Chinese artists whose works variously responded to the violent and drastic changes in their home-country in the beginning of the 1990’s. Yet, Fang Lijun’s works cannot be reduced to simple matters, be them political or social. On the contrary: His multilayered paintings, wood-cuts and sculptures seem to consistently defy any clear statement or interpretation.
Renown from picture-series like the famous “bald-headed men”, Fang centred on the human being in his creation, right from the beginning. But where it was once about the positioning of the individual within the world and space, it now seems to be in a much more fundamental way about the positioning of the individual as such. Where man used to be in the focus of his work, we now find dazzling insects. Where there used to be empty situations, we now find raving life: Turbulences, storm and uproar, the agitated, mighty force of nature.
Wide, heavenly panoramas open to the eye, in which we not only discover the winged figures of little putti, but also many tiny animals: petty and chequered beetles and dragonflies, radiating in every imaginable colour. Fang designs them as small valuables, like preciously sparkling and flashing little jewels. Glowing, gleaming and gaudy Fang seemingly elevates them to the status of individuals. They thereby preserve that specific relic of a secret so characteristic for Fang Lijun’s art. Difficult to grasp, floating in a boundless visual space – with no beginning, and with no end.
Text: Anke Mueller, 2007
"Places to Places to Places"
Opening: June 5th 2007, 7 – 9 p.m.
Exhibition: June 6th – July 14th 2007
Humming and buzzing, roaring and raging everywhere. Clouds drive and winds ravage through an apocalyptically agitated heaven. Lightning flashes. Without spatial clues, without finding orientation, the eye of the beholder wanders across seemingly unbounded skies, apparently breaking open the pictorial space in every sense. The only leads: luminaries of a very special kind, small beetles and winged bodies, driven and hovering in the thunderous turmoil of heavenly powers and shining in all shades of the rainbow. Apparently thrown into the exploding space by hazard, they are still imbedded within the magnificently wild structure of this creation.
Complex and mysterious as ever, and in virtually infatuating beauty, the latest works by Fang Lijun not only captivate the eye. The large-sized paintings, but also new sculptures in bronze, can now be seen for the first time in Germany, at the gallery-rooms of Alexander Ochs.
Socialised by the opening of the system during the 1980`s, and especially by the tragic incidents at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989, Fang Lijun belongs to a generation of Chinese artists whose works variously responded to the violent and drastic changes in their home-country in the beginning of the 1990’s. Yet, Fang Lijun’s works cannot be reduced to simple matters, be them political or social. On the contrary: His multilayered paintings, wood-cuts and sculptures seem to consistently defy any clear statement or interpretation.
Renown from picture-series like the famous “bald-headed men”, Fang centred on the human being in his creation, right from the beginning. But where it was once about the positioning of the individual within the world and space, it now seems to be in a much more fundamental way about the positioning of the individual as such. Where man used to be in the focus of his work, we now find dazzling insects. Where there used to be empty situations, we now find raving life: Turbulences, storm and uproar, the agitated, mighty force of nature.
Wide, heavenly panoramas open to the eye, in which we not only discover the winged figures of little putti, but also many tiny animals: petty and chequered beetles and dragonflies, radiating in every imaginable colour. Fang designs them as small valuables, like preciously sparkling and flashing little jewels. Glowing, gleaming and gaudy Fang seemingly elevates them to the status of individuals. They thereby preserve that specific relic of a secret so characteristic for Fang Lijun’s art. Difficult to grasp, floating in a boundless visual space – with no beginning, and with no end.
Text: Anke Mueller, 2007