There always emerges a kind of taste experience inside us when we see familiar food, i.e. flavour. The experience comes from the stimulation of the features of food left on the tongue, triggered by the tongue's taste buds. The reason why we know the taste is that we’ve tasted the food and retained the memory. On the other hand, we also benefit from the taste when thinking of the food, which is in fact through a combination of memory and experience. Food, as original real objects, after transformation, leave the taste on the tongue and disappears while leaving the taste. The taste, as a copy of the objects, is a legitimate record of the original characteristic of the objects. Here there is a basic concept - the concept of legitimate copy.
There is nothing more suitable to elaborate prints than the concept. Although they are different in many ways, the truth is quite the same.
Traditionally, prints are commonly understood as a means of engraving to achieve replication, duplication or printing. Although these literal words can be expressed from different angles certain existing features of prints, are far from enough. It is inadequate not only in the aspect of feeling, feature, function, approach and character, but especially in the lack of a reasonable interpretation of the concept of legitimate copy. Prints can be divided into two legitimate copies -- re-creation and reproduction, both of which mean reproduction or reasonable representation of the originality and original works. Only with understanding as the premise can we acquire the most basic cognitive of prints.
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Prints, based on their existing production methods, can be broadly divided into: woodblock prints (traditional single-tool wood carving), etchings, lithographs (zinc plate), silkscreen prints, and composite material prints.
Woodblock prints are also known as the Toppan, the bulge as the blotting creating the image. Etchings are also called intaglio, the dents as the trace to create the image with pressure. Lithographs are also known as lithography produced with oily materials, the pattern created with the principle of incompatibility between oil and water. Serigraphs adopt the principle of hollow graphics. The composite material prints combine a variety of ways like relief, intaglio, lithograph or engraving. It also refers to the extension of the printmaking methods. (Print animation, etc.)
Five flavours originally refer to the five kinds of taste experience as pungent, sour, sweet, bitter and salty. Since the Exhibition shows the works of five artists and five ways of print making reflecting five kinds of visual experience, I’d like to borrow the five kinds of taste experience to express my taste for the exhibition and the works.
Li Xiaofei brings us with his woodcut works "State", spicy seasoned with simple but vivid characters, concise but comprehensive.
Li Shuang’s lithographs, like a cup of ice lemon tea in the summer, fresh and thorough, slightly acidic, are the best for the season.
The woodblock prints and print animation of Luo Zhixia are pure and neat as sweet natural dews, leading us to endless aftertastes.
Zhao Rong’s silkscreen works shows intentionally or unintentionally a devout faith with unforgettable bitterness like coffee.
Qin Guanwei’s copper etchings will bring the audience into a wonderful but ambiguous world, a level higher than the real world we live in. They are to us like the salt in the dish, salty and flavored.
This kind of experience is like drinking tea, smelling, observing, tasting and enjoying the after taste. It is a full range of experience, but also a very personal perception.
Every observer, I believe, will have his own unique feeling and taste.
About the Exhbition
Curator: Li Wenfeng
Artistic Director: Serena Zhao
Organizer: Artdepot Co., Ltd.
Opening: Saturday, June 30, at 4:30pm
Dates: June 30-July 31, 2012
Artists: Li Shuang / Li Xiaofei / Luo Zhixia / Qin Guanwei/ Zhao Rong
Courtesy of the artists and Artdepot, for furtther information please visit www.artdepot.cn.
