Sculpture :
Location : Cardero Park, Vancouver
Media : Painted bronze
Meeting is made up of eight identical life-sized crouching figures in painted bronze by the Chinese artist Wang Shugang. The figures in Asian dress are spare and appear still and fixed. They are contemplative, show no movement but suggest a latent energy; the potential to stand-up or leap. They are striking in their bright "Chinese red", a colour that renders the forms decorative and formal. This red elicits multiple cultural meanings in China. Historically red was a color representing happiness, but it was also the colour of terror during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Today red is the colour of the faded lettering praising Mao on the ceilings of the factories. "The Chinese flag, the walls of the temple, which coats the Buddhist monks, but also the clothes of a bride in red... said Wang Shugang. "But it is rather the Chinese, glowing red of communism, which I use."
The grouping was first exhibited during the G-8 summit meeting in Heiligendamm, Germany in 2007 where world leaders held a "meeting". The placing of the figures in static sitting positions with cupped hands is not without irony, as Shugang has pointed out. "Would there be important results from their meeting? Wasn't it really just a few people carrying on some formality while wining and dining away?"
For more information visit the artwork page on www.vblearn.ca
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Meeting
Artist :Wang Shugang
ChinaLocation : Cardero Park, Vancouver
Media : Painted bronze
Meeting is made up of eight identical life-sized crouching figures in painted bronze by the Chinese artist Wang Shugang. The figures in Asian dress are spare and appear still and fixed. They are contemplative, show no movement but suggest a latent energy; the potential to stand-up or leap. They are striking in their bright "Chinese red", a colour that renders the forms decorative and formal. This red elicits multiple cultural meanings in China. Historically red was a color representing happiness, but it was also the colour of terror during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Today red is the colour of the faded lettering praising Mao on the ceilings of the factories. "The Chinese flag, the walls of the temple, which coats the Buddhist monks, but also the clothes of a bride in red... said Wang Shugang. "But it is rather the Chinese, glowing red of communism, which I use."
The grouping was first exhibited during the G-8 summit meeting in Heiligendamm, Germany in 2007 where world leaders held a "meeting". The placing of the figures in static sitting positions with cupped hands is not without irony, as Shugang has pointed out. "Would there be important results from their meeting? Wasn't it really just a few people carrying on some formality while wining and dining away?"
For more information visit the artwork page on www.vblearn.ca
prev | back | next
