Bang! At 3:00 pm on January 25, 2015, along with the sound of an explosion of a bomb at the Unicorn Center for Art in the Caochangdi Art District, the first exhibition of the not for profit art space entitled “Temporary Residence Permit” officially opened. The guns are not the ordinary saluting guns, but the work “The Other Shore” by the artistic Relevant Commission Project, along with the ticking sound, two black salute bombs were propped against the opposite wall every ten minutes, blowing Beijing bus tickets collected by the artists. Bus tickets are the traffic credentials of the people drifting in Beijing, and the representation of the state of “walking along a road”, by which the artists express the frustration and hope of the psychology of the people drifting in Beijing. Qiu Zhijie serves as the Chief Adviser of the exhibition, and Cheng Manman serves as the curator, featuring the works by 18 young artists (groups) such as Relevant Commission Project, Xionghuangshe, Chen Mingqiang, Ma Yongfeng, Ji Ye.

“Temporary Residence Permit” exhibition focuses on “drifting” young artists, curator Cheng Manman has lived and worked in Paris for many years, so she has deep feelings of the unsteady life. Through the exhibition she asks why do we wander? What tempts us towards this movement, through both space and time? The participating artists also convey a way of thinking under the diverse background, Yang Ga, founder of the non-profit art space Unicorn Center for Art, has years of experience in art collection, also observed the hard life of the drifting artists in Beijing, so he opened two studios in the gallery, to allow applications for the artist residency program both at home and abroad, for artistic creations and holding exhibitions.

Beijing is a city entangled in love and hate, as said “Beijing Welcomes You” with a lofty stance, but when she faces a large floating population, she has to establish a temporary residence permit system, among Caochangdi and Heiqiao located in the northeast of Beijing where a large number of drifting artists have gathered to pursue their dreams. “Temporary Residence Permit” exhibition held in Caochangdi arouses the resonance of the audience to the widespread social problem.

Chen Mingqiang’s video installation “The Phantom · Certificate Series” bleached the old certificates, projected the original contents using a projector. The certificate represents personal identity, which perhaps is nothing, nothing more than an illusion, it is meaningful only if it is stimulated by the external factors. “Drifting”, “temporary” means uncertainty and anxiety, Ma Yongfeng’s “Fragile, More Fragile” is a very good interpretation of the state. Beneath floor tiles it spreads the eggs, when the audience walks on the floor tiles, the eggs are broken, by which the artist alerts various perils and the uncertain fragility of life. Ji Ye has collected 1000 real-name rail tickets that are bound for Beijing, to make a soaring eagle, and by linking them controls a flying eagle like a kite, when it moves, there is an on-site ringing of a bell like at Beijing railway station.

On the other hand, part of the exhibiting work expresses the artists’ tender feeling of homesickness when drifting away from home. All the members of Xionghuangshe dug a pit the size of a cube in the land of their hometowns, on the opening day they dug a hole the same size outside the art space, to express the fact that they both miss the life of their hometown and Beijing. Yang Chen’s video work places a camera on his grandpa’s belly which captures his grandpa sleeping, the camera moves up and down as his grandfather breathes, while the photo of the grandfather and grandmother when they were young is located at the head of the bed and flickering, so the silent work is full of emotion.

The exhibition continues to March 16.

Text and photo by Zhang Wenzhi/CAFA ART INFO

Translated by Chen Peihua and edited by Sue/CAFA ART INFO