Long March in Venice

At the Venice Biennale, the Long March crew selected participating artists for the second half of the Long March project. The crew (composed of curator, trustee, advisor, volunteer, and assistant) successfully completed their trip to Venice, with each returning safely to North America, Asia, Europe and Africa. One of the two missions for the trip (the second one of which will be announced shortly) was to select Long March artists and participants for various future events of the Long March, including forums, conferences, and seminars. Aside from finding seven artists to participate at sites 14 and 17, the crew selected four artists and a curator to participate at site 13 at The 25,000 Cultural Transmission Center, Beijing.

Long March Participates in the Echigo-Tsumari Triennial, Japan

The Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial, held in a remote and mountainous area of Japan, has become the most important art triennial in the country. Called Daichi-no-geijutsusai (literally, “the art festival on earth”), the Triennial opened on July 21. Among the 157 participating artists were Christian Boltanski, Yayoi Kusama, Kiki Smith, Jenny Holzer, Ghada Amer, as well as numerous new talents. The opening ceremony was followed by a symposium, where the Long March was given special permission to show a documentary film about the project. Lu Jie was invited to speak as a keynote speaker to introduce the Long March. Other keynote speakers included James Putnam (Curator, The British Museum) and Anthony Bond (Director of Curatorial Services, The Art Gallery of New South Wales). The special significance of the Echigo-Tsumari Triennial was emphasized by almost all at the table including Hou Hanru and Tom Finkelpearl, the advisors of the Triennial. The event brought a breath of fresh air to a contemporary art system that is seemingly at a state of exhaustion.

Forum between the Mori Art Museum and Long March

July 24, 2003 ―At the Long March Space in Dashanzi, (The 25000 Cultural Transmission Center), a forum was held between Chinese curators and the curatorial team from the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo. Co-organized by the Cultural Transmission Center and the Mori Art Museum, the discussion was chaired by Lu Jie. The Japanese side consisted of Fumio Nanjo, the Deputy Director of the Mori Art Museum, and the museum curator, Mami Kataoka. The speakers from the Chinese side were Lu Jie (public space and Chinese contemporary art), Feng Jiangzhou (music and media), Wang Mingxian (architecture), Li Zhenhua (film), Qiu Zhijie (new media), and Pi Li (painting/installation/sculpture, etc). Other participants included Beijing based artists and curators numbering more than eighty in total. Seven hours passed by quickly as they discussed various topics such as visions of Asia, the visual-cultural environment of contemporary China, art communities, creative groups and individuals, as well as specific artworks.

Due to open in October, 2003, the Mori Art Museum is planning an international touring exhibition in 2004 on contemporary Asian visual culture tentatively titled Hot & Spicy. The exhibition seeks to present the situation of contemporary cultural development in Asia by extracting hot, exciting Asian visions from a diverse pool of creativity. One of the important components of the exhibition will be a presentation of accounts documenting all the on-site research taken by the curatorial team across Asia. By putting the whole interactive process of encountering local cultural scenes under examination, the exhibition seeks to cultivate an open and interactive platform in itself. The forum at the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center was organized to be a component of this section.

Lisa Horikawa starts her work at the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum

Lisa Horikawa (Lisha), who left the position of the Director of International Affairs/Curatorial Assistant of the Long March project in the spring, has now begun working in the curatorial section of the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Japan. Joining the Long March prior to going on the road in June of last year, she survived the wild trek of the Long March with the main crew, assisted in the coordination of various projects along the route, and then continued her work at the Beijing headquarters afterwards. In Fukuoka, she is currently working on an exhibition in Japan that will present a panoramic view of Xu Bing's career. As well, Lisa is composing a lecture about the Long March project to be presented at an art university in Kyoto.

Phil Tinari, Assistant Curator of the Long March Project, departs to pursue further studies at Harvard University

July 31, 2003—The Long March crew gathered at Huajiadi Karaoke to sing the song, “Sending off the Red Army 10 Times, ” by which they bid farewell to Phil Tinari who is departing Beijing to pursue further studies at Harvard University. Joining the march in Zunyi, Guizhou province, in August of 2002, Phil joined the crew on the road to Maotai, returning to the Long March headquarters in Beijing after ten days of being fully immersed in the spirit of the Long March. He was later appointed editor, assistant, and assistant curator of the Long March. During his term of office, the Long March had to loan him out temporarily to the Guangdong Museum of Art where he helped edit the catalogue of the Guangzhou Triennale. After returning from Guangzhou, Phil continued his work at the Long March by successfully curating Temporary Space—An Experiment by Wang Wei. He leaves the position of deputy artistic director at the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center.

Zheng Shengtian visits the Long March Space

August 3, 2003—Long March Foundation trustee Mr. Zheng Shengtian visited the Long March space at the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center with Joanne Burnie Danzker, the Director of Museum Villa Stuck in Munich, Germany. Lu Jie took them on a tour of the new art district in Dashanzi. They later met to discuss some immediate plans of the Long March project.

Long March organizes a discussion with British artist Antony Gormley

Friday afternoon, August 8, 2003—the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center organized a discussion with British artist Antony Gormley. Sui Jianguo, dean of the sculpture department at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, was invited as a special guest and Karen Smith (curator/art critic) and Lu Jie co-chaired the discussion. Discussion topics included Gormley's career, his impression of the “Asian Field” project that he carried out at the China National Museum, and also various issues such as art production and displacement of space, translocal cultural work and cultural power, etc. More than eighty artists from within and outside of China took part in the discussion, which was also joined by art students.

Out of Focus - A Dimension for Painting opens at the Long March Space

Out of Focus exhibits the paintings of three artists: Chen Wenbo (Beijing), Yan Lei (Beijing/Hong Kong) and Zhou Tiehai (Shanghai). The exhibition does not emphasize a revival of the "painting" medium, nor is it focused on painting per se, but it displays an emerging methodology of artistic creation. Compared with those contemporary Chinese paintings with which we are familiar, these works abandon the narrow tendency towards turning ideology into a system of symbolism and blind attitudes and views. Instead, they open up the potential for visual indefiniteness and conceptual forms. They are as the artists' "clicks" on reality and psychology, and each click realizes an excellent "transformation." The exhibition was curated by Pi Li. Exhibition: August 16 - September 10, 2003

Please visit: http://www.longmarchfoundation.org/english/exhibitionspecial.htm#out

back