The boundaries of reality are the area of play…

I’m showing a small series of 15 images called “Flashbacks” in this group show at Inter Gallery, 798 Art District. This exhibition will then move to Shanghai, then travel around the rest of China.

Here’s a sneak preview of a few images that caught my interest:

王久良的《垃圾围城》系列
From the series “The Great Wall of Trash,” © WANG, Jiuliang

许宝宽的《新风景》系列
From the series “New Landscapes,” © XU, Baokuan

杭鸣峙的《移山》系列
From the series “Move Mountains,” © HANG, Mingchi

蒙超的《新景观》系列
From the series “New Scenaries,” © MENG, Chao

游莉的《寂静的纬度》系列
From the series “Silent Altitudes,” © YOU, Li

Looking forward to seeing friends in Beijing at the opening! © Post-Modern China Doll

不一样的风景

Another Landscape

主办：色影无忌网

Host：www.xitek.com

参展摄影师: （按 姓氏笔画排名）王久良、卢彦鹏、区志航、任曙林、许宝宽、陈焕庭、何宜昌、吴沁沁、辛冈、张晓、杭鸣峙、佬京、罗凯星、徐永春、黄 觉、矫健、储楚、塔可、蒙超、游莉、潘钺。

photographers: Wang Jiuliang, Lu Yanpeng, Ou Zhihang ,Ren Shulin, Xu Baokuan，Chen Huanting, He Yichang，Chin-Chin Wu，Xin Gang，Zhang Xiao，Hang Mingzhi，Lao Jing，Luo Kaixing，Xu Yongchun，Huang Jue，Jiao Jian，Chu Chu，Taca，Meng Chao，Eris Yo ，Pan Yue

策展人：那日松

Curator：Na Risong

顾问：（按姓氏笔画 排名）任悦、林路、尚陆、顾铮、鲍昆、颜长江

Consultants :Ren Yue, Lin Lu, Jean Loh, Gu Zheng, Bao Kun, Yan Changjiang 

开幕时间:  2010.03.27  下午3点

Opening:  27.03.2010 / 3 pm

展览时间:  2010.03.27 – 2010.04.5

Duration:  27.03.2010 – 05.04.2010

展览地点:  映艺术中心（北京市朝阳区酒仙桥路4号“798艺术区”七星中街）.

Venue:  Inter Art Center and Gallery. Sevenstar Main Street 798 Art Zone No.4 Jiuxianqiao Road Chaoyang District Beijing

The Namaste Dagoba, Famen Temple
Shaanxi Province, West China 

While driving on the highway from 宝鸡 Bao Ji to 西安 Xi’an, we came across this golden structure towering above a group of ancient temple structures. Is this a science fiction or dream turned nightmare? The Namaste Dagoba was completed on May 9, 2009.  In front of it is a 2 km grand boulevard leading to the gate of the temple. It houses the world’s only veritable, authentic (middle) finger bone relic of the venerable Buddha. For the history and photographs of the old Famen Temple, please click http://www.chinaculture.org/gb/en_aboutchina/2003-09/24/content_25384.htm

**Entry fee is now 90 rmb (about 13$). Pilgrims beware: finger bone only on display  during the weekends, and the 1st and the 15th of the lunar month.

 Gansu Province, West China

Gansu Province, West China

Insiders probably already know that Gayographic (大城小同) is holding the first ever Mr. Gay China beauty pageant on Jan. 15, 2010 at the Lan Club. The winner will represent mainland China in Oslo, Norway, vying for the title of Mr. Gay World Ambassador. This is of course a monumental event in the history of the Chinese LGBT community. I finally did some test shots with 3 candidates last Sunday, courtesy to Gayographic organizers Ben Zhang, Ryan and Niu Niu.

So here is the scoop:

1) Xuefei. Calm, laconic, and mysterious.

What I especially appreciated about this candidate was his timeliness (first to arrive), patience (always a plus in the eye of a photographer), and a certain forlorn, other-worldly quality. This definitely sets him apart from any kind of visual stereotype. He’s not the first one you notice when you enter the room, yet there’s a sense of mystique and intrigue that will slowly draw you in.

2 ) Emilio. Handsome, upbeat, winsome.

Emilio’s good looks have a mass appeal by most societal standards, gay or straight. He also possesses the kind of physique that gives strength, hope, and inspiration to all health-related New Year resolutions. Potentially the poster boy of Mr. Gay China, I think this beauty pageant could be the perfect opportunity for him to fine-tune and deepen his already hugely likable character and personality.

3) Simon. Charismatic, uninhibited, fun-loving.

Simon is a ball of energy, capable of proposing 60 dramatically different poses per minute. There’s definitely a bit of an artist’s soul in him, not to mention an off-beat fashion sense. I trust that what he lacks in physique, he will amply make up by creativity and enthusiasm!

Finally, a rather dignified group portrait:

I look forward to meeting the other candidates. Their courage is a constant inspiration. It’s one thing to come out of the closet to one’s friends and family; it’s another thing to participate in such a highly publicized event, obliging each to clearly broadcast his romantic and sexual preference. Let’s face it, China is still an immensely traditional and limelight-shy society, deeply steeped in the Confucian culture of modesty (中庸) for the sake of (outward) harmony. These men are the first (hopefully of many) to break these barriers.

This contest is about community. It’s about beauty. It’s about identity. It’s also about the lessons of self-conquests, the phoenix rising high from the ashes.

Best of luck to all the candidates! If you wish to get involved with this event, please contact Gayographic. Mr. Gay China needs all of your support!

I met sculptor Chen Fei at a little craft shop in Old Beijing nearly two years ago. She was living near Nanluoguxiang and had been experimenting with making masks with paper maché and I was immediately drawn to the expressive possibilities of these hutong characters come alive. Over the span of two years, our friendship grew as we saw the surroundings of our neighborhood demolished and rebuilt at a jaw-dropping rate. As old businesses move out, new businesses settle in; Chen Fei was forced to move with the construction of the new metro line… This series is inspired by the simple people who inhabit here and whose lives are constantly affected by the mass exodus in the face of modernization. It is an elegy to the perishing traditions and lifestyles that made Old Beijing such a unique place.

This work is on show at CNEX as part of the annual Greening the Beige art show. All prints are for sale and the proceedings go to the art collective Greening the Beige. Please contact organizer Carissa Welton for detail.

In April 2010, we are holding another art show with a stage performance involving a new series of masks at CNEX.

 Snapped at a quiet park in Paris, XXe arrondissement

 The poster for the concert of a Czech revival rock band that sang Chinese songs from the 80’s
Prague, June 4, 2009.

Robert Berman Gallery Presents:

«VIS-À-VIS, PORTRAITS OF NEW WOMEN»

«对视 : 新女性肖像 »

Pigment print, Edition of 5, 120×160 cm
© Chin-Chin Wu, 2006-2008

Catalog available upon request

photo MIAMI
Wynwood Art District, Miami, FL
(Enter on Midtown Boulevard)
BOOTH #304
Robert Berman GALLERY
www.robertbermangallery.com

December 3 - 7, 2008
Opening December 2th, 6 - 10 pm

Upcoming exhibitions:

photo LA
January 21-29, 2009
Downtown Convention Center, Los Angeles, CA
BOOTH #C109
laartshow.com

30th Anniversary Exhibition, Part 1

Robert Berman GALLERY
At Bergamot Station Arts Center, Santa Monica, California
January 24 - February 21, 2009

 

Group exhibition of selected photography and photo based works featuring:
Alex Prager, Jeff Charbonneau & Eliza French, Andres Serrano, Rafael Serrano, Man Ray, William Wegman, Robert Rauschenberg, Ed Ruscha, Dennis Hopper, Edmund Teske, Shirin Neshat, Christopher Felver, E.T. Risk, Harry Bowers, Lauren Marsolier, Marc Fichou, John Colao, Marla Rutherford, Dietrich Wegner, Cameron Gray, Gerald Slota, Chin-Chin Wu, Hana Jakralova

前几天千儿告诉我, 记得她小的时候大家都管喜欢漂亮女孩的女孩叫”花痴”。这是我听到过的最美的称呼。

“都云作者痴，谁解其中味？”

想来能体会”花痴”二字的真谛的，也应该是上上品，不管他/她是男的还是女的。。。

Are you looking to push boundaries of your body and mind? Interested to get to know your body better? Want a better nude portfolio but haven’t found the right photographer? See how an artist works?

I am a Chinese-American artist living in between Beijing and Paris. Currently seeking women of all background and ethnicity for a large-scale conceptual art project – portraits of the female genitalia. The identities of the subjects will remain entirely anonymous and I offer to make other nude photographs or portraits in exchange. Length of time is estimated at around 1 1/2 hours (please plan extra time for other photo shoots).

My studio is in the historical center , 2 minutes from the Drum Tower（鼓楼) subway station, very close to Nan Luo Gu Xiang（南锣鼓巷）, Hou Hai (后海）， and other major tourist attractions. You can find information for this project on:

http://www.chinchinwu.net/?page_id=98

including a making-of video where the models who have participated talk about their experience and their views on the subject matter. You can also find some pictures and background info on the site. There’s a Chinese article in the magazine Hope／希望杂志报导 about the project:

http://www.chinchinwu.net/?page_id=191

39 women world-wide have already participated in this project. I hope that you will decide to participate in this very important project! This work will be edited into a book published by Trolley Books (London, www.trolleybooks.com) in May 2009 and exhibited in Photo Miami, Photo LA, etc.

Contact me at:
mail@chinchinwu.net with your phone number and I will call you.
Also Skype handle: chinchinlive

Thank you,
Chin-Chin Wu

Dear Friends and Family,

The Chinese magazine “Hope” (希望）just published an article on the female genitalia project in its March issue. I thought it would never make it with the hypersensitive attitude of the government with the coming of the Olympics, but here is the article.

When I was in India this past winter, a 22-year old freelance journalist called Riva contacted me from Shanghai about doing an article on the project. She had read about it on a well-visited art and culture blog in China (the blog continues sending me traffic until this day even though much of the message of the project is unfortunately distorted as censorship prevents people from viewing the video in China). She explained to me that the readership of Hope is mostly cosmopolitan, independent-minded young women, and could I please talk about my artistic intentions to China’s youth? I was equally intrigued. Besides being a freelance journalist, Riva is also a successful entrepreneur and owns her own boating magazine. She is truly the exemplification of what I find so incredibly exciting and refreshing about today’s China.

In the article, I talked about growing up in Communist China in the 80’s, migration and displacement, the Chinese diasporic experience, how I arrived at the idea of the project, difficulties that I encountered, reactions of the models and the public, recent fads in plastic surgery for the vulva and my experience working with plastic surgeons, my ideas of feminism and female fulfillment… She’s even run a small advert for interested models at the end of the article. For the Chinese-literate, all of this is obviously self-explanatory.

I am going to be in Shanghai from the 11th of April. The family has opened up a gallery on Changde Rd in the Jing An District, and we will have a stand at Art Shanghai. I am bringing some of my prints, many of which are not available online. I am also bringing two artists, one Czech, one French. And then of course I’ll be stopping by in Beijing where I hope to see many people I love and miss.

Then going to the Czech Republic to work on a group conceptual art project in situe in an arms factory, about 14 days in June.

And of course I’ll be appearing in Arles with Better World under the guise of Etranges Etrangers for the opening week in July. Look forward to some new VJ sequences at Cargo de la Nuit, the place where cool people congregate.

Thank you for reading until this far. I hope that this e-mail finds you joyful and in good health and that our paths will cross again soon!

Much love,
Chin-Chin

On the edge of perceptibility,
Subcutaneous tickles -
I exchange my brightest hair ribbon for a soft kiss,
I tilt recklessly for you.

Each day I get a mili-inch closer,
No need to push further -
Both you and I know,
I tilt at a dizzying angle.

We sit next to the kitchen table,
As I watch you chop the water spinach -
At the rim of sharpness,
I tilt to cut through…

© Post-Modern China Doll

Currently reading : Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes By Frans de Waal Release date: By 10 April, 2000

OK, this should come as no surprise, but I’ve been busy working on a video on my female genitalia series that we are projecting for the opening week of Rencontre Photographique à Arles.

This is the link towards our exhibition for Arles:
http://europeanphotographers.wordpress.com/

JM is arriving in Paris from Copenhagen on the 3rd of July and we are taking an early train on the 4th to Arles. We are likely to stay until Sunday the 8th. The program afterwards stays open. I think I’d like to see Zhang in the French Riviera, possibly hop to Vienne depending on the concerts this year, and take my Vienne sidekick Philippe’s invitation to Juan les Pins for Nora Jones and Keith Jarrett’s appearances (Attn: Tim!!).

What bothers me is that there’s a 10-day lapse of time and should I just bum around in the South or come back to Paris and get down to work? Or go to Peru and Istanbul? Afterwards, my Greek ex has extended an open invitation for me and Maxime in Athens and in a Greek Isle. Pékinoise is trying to get me to Beijing in September to make a short feature fiction. Meantime, I think I should shut myself off with Sandrine in some abandonned house in the countryside from July to August and finally finish the picture book project that we’ve been working on all year long. Decisions, decisions…

Wireless is faithless, and I’ve just gotten myself back on the Wifi network. Mom was here for about 9 days, which was short and long. That was true for both of us. We’re the only surviving members of our nucleus family of three. When Daddy Doll was alive, we had this powerful bond that seemed to exclude the rest of the family, i.e. Mommy.

Triangle relationships are very fascinating. My life seems to be full of these: Mommy, Daddy and I; me and my twin male cousins whom I loved and hated by turn, and with whom I formed and broke pacts; me and my “wife” back in boarding school, and the “daughter” we adopted (and sometimes tried to get rid of), and the resulting threesome “wedding portrait” at the local photographer’s. It is still the oddest piece of souvenir from my pubescent years.

When I was a kid, adults seemed to have the tact of bombarding kids with the “innocent” question of “who do you prefer the best - mommy or daddy?” By the way, my mom was a part of a sisterhood of three, and to add to the confusion, my cousins and I called all three sisters “mommy” and all their husbands “daddy” (don’t ask me why, I think it was linked to some Communist ideal of sort, and I still have three moms, but only one dad left from the original Communist days, having lost one to divorce and one to death). So the questions could also turn to, “Which mommy and which daddy do you prefer the best?”

My cousins were stupid enough to give the honest truth, including their rankings, and got subsequent punishment from invisible forces. I always told everybody, “I love mommy and daddy the same!” And the adults would nod their heads in approval, “What a smart kid!”

In fact, this was the watchword of mommy, “Share your toys! Love everyone the same!” Until this day, I cannot bring myself to say that I feel closer to cousin #1 than to cousin #2, or vice versa (I’m careful to add), for fear of being punished for my unfaithfulness and partiality. As a matter of fact, I am so out of touch with my feelings in this arena that I cannot answer to that question if my life depended on it.

Most people think that my concept of faithfulness is more than a little bit skewed. There are days that I don’t want to share my toys. And sometimes I really love one person more than anyone else. But I usually immediately tell myself that this is selfish thinking, and that I have to elevate myself to the status of a selfless saint, at any rate enlarge the couple to a triangle. In the end, there’s really no striving necessary in the formation of couples or triangles, or in the acquiring and giving up of toys. What is yours will be yours. What is meant to be will be. The dynamic is never static, ever-changing, as you are struggling in the very act of defining. This is like the flow of Yin and Yang, and the subsequent creation of all things from this generative force; or Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva - the Hindu trio of the creator, the preserver and the destroyer; or the Christian trinity - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost…. All ancient wisdom seemed to have understood this principal of three and the ceaseless movement that is a part of our life in this universe.

In my case, it has been one long stupendous suspension of judgment facing the delicate threads of human tissue being constantly weaved and re-weaved, exactly like how as a child, I could watch in wonder for hours at ends my Chinese silkworms spin out their own miraculous universe.

Oh yeah, in case you still wonder, I’ve always loved both Mommy and Daddy the same, only differently.

© Post-Modern China Doll

p.s. I’ve got questions about private posts. I have cleared some of them out from MySpace and all diary is in Livejournal now, and everything there is private. I think the blogging function of MySpace sucks ass. Have tried Wordpress and am thinking of integrating either Mambo or Wordpress into my website. Does anybody have any suggestions?

Currently reading : Curves to the Apple: The Reproduction of Profiles, Lawn of Excluded Middle, Reluctant Gravities By Rosmarie Waldrop Release date: 15 September, 2006

Happy 2007!
Bonne année!

新年快乐！

Peace and love from China Doll
Shanghai, New Year’s Day

沁沁，二零零七年元旦于上海