Hosted by the Rightview Art Museum and curated by Wei Xiangqi, Elite Young Artists Program 2017 kicked off at the Rightview Art Museum on March 18. It presents 184 works by 49 young artists, which are divided into two phases: 110 works are on show in the Rightview Art Museum from March 18 to May 4, and another 74 works are shown at the Tiandayunhua Art Museum from April 10 to May 4.
Young art is the art group that is defined by age rather than a category of artdivided by a style and genre or a region. It is obvious that it creates many problems to unify the research of the young art. At this stage, the post-80s young artist groups are still emphasizing the sensitivity and concern of the self, which might be a necessary course for any intergenerational artist groups when they are young. Curator of the Elite Young Artists Program Wei Xiangqi said that, at present the “post-80s” young artist groups faced more complex and diverse visual scenes, especially through the network and other media access to a lot of rich visual resources and even had direct access to the active site of contemporary art in Europe and the United States. The information resources are conducive to young artists to better understand the direction of thought for contemporary art. Although this exhibition is based on easel paintings, we can clearly see the positive state for the contemporary art language from these young artist groups.
Elite Young Artists Program invites many senior theorists, curators, directors of art museums and media professionals as members of the jury and the selection of artists is dominated by the curator Wei Xiangqi. It is the second session of the“Elite Young Artists Program”, continuing the theme and organization model of the last session. Curator Wei Xiangqi is still partial to the expressionist paintings, abstract works and some sculptures or images, in the selection of work. In the first “Elite Young Artists Program” held in 2016, it has sorted out two clues: firstly, taking the “painterly” and “expressionism” as the title, secondly, taking “image” and “conceptual consciousness” as a title so a total of 171 works by 51 artists are selected, respectively displayed at Beijing Rightview Art Museum, Tiandayunhua Art Museum from March 5 to April 4, and at Guan Shanyue Art Museum in Shenzhen from June 24 to June 29. Compared with the Elite Young Artists Program (2016), the average age of the participating artistsis younger, including half of the artists born between 1985 and 1989, 16 artists born between 1980 and 1984, and 8 artists born after 1990. Through the investigation of the artists of the two sessions of Elite young artists, it researches the artistic language and ideas of the young artists who were born after 1980.
It can be said that as a post-80s artist who has grown in the context of globalization, are different from the artists of extensive and prominent “common” features in the period of “85 New Wave”, placing more emphasis on individual experiences and “personality differences”. However, seen from a large number of young artist groups and young art exhibitions in recent years, because young artists often lack a clear awareness and places emphasis on the surface and are frail, even if the artist recognizes the importance of subject construction, their creations depend more on the self-perception of the art itself which forms a single trend in such a free and diverse artistic creation atmosphere. It is the young art phenomenon that is worthy of attention. It attempts to perfectly promote the creation of young artists from the technical and research areas and to introduce the docking mechanism between young artists and curators. On the morning of the opening of the exhibition, curator Wei Xiangqi invited the academic guests and some participating artists to have the first discussion on the “conscious awareness” of young artists’ creations, with the subtitle of “Subjective Transformation of Visual and Ideological Experiences.”
For this project, curator Wei Xiangqi said that the “Elite Young Artists Program” aims to find the young art talents who were neither widely recognized by academic circles nor had signed cooperative agreements with art spaces and organizations, nor supporting them through the form of exhibitions and publishing. Sun Zhizhong, Director of the Rightview Art Museum addressed the opening ceremony and said that the “Elite Young Artists Program” chose different artists every year, and the Rightview Art Museum would continue to promote and organize exhibitions in accordance with the different combinations of the artists that participated in “Elite Young Artists Program”, or cooperated with other art institutions to hold an exhibition, residency, as well as the recommendation to foreign art institutions.
The exhibition remains on view till May 4.
Text by Lin Jiabin, translated by Chen Peihua and edited by Sue/CAFA ART INFO
Photo by Rightview Art Museum
Participating Artists: Bai Qing, Bian Tao, Chen Cheng, Chen Dongrui, Chen Ying, Chi Hui, Ding Yongsheng, Dong Siyue, Fu Site, Gong Daxiao, Han Xiuzhi, Hao Rui, Huang Xiaoliang, Huang Zikai, Jiang Zhe, Li Jing, Li Qi, Li Tingting, Liu Genqun, Liu Shiqi, Liu Yang, Liu Yujie, Lu Hang, Lu Jinhuan, Ma Lili, Ouyang Sulong, Qiu Fei, Rong Yun, Shen Muyang, Shi Qun, Song Peng, Sun Ce, Sun Wei, Sun Ziyao, Wang Lei, Wang Yongxue, Xiong Shuang, Xu Dawei, Xu Quan, Xue Ruozhe, Yang Xinjia, You Diwen, Yu Guo, Yuan Zeqiang, Zhang Wei, Zhang Xin, Zhang Xu, Zhu Baoyuan, Zhu Liqun.
