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An Eye for An Eye
Chen Yu's new works
Vernissage: 13 January 2005 6:30 PM - 8:30 PM
Exhibition: 14 January - 2 February 2005
Schoeni Art Gallery is proud to present Chen Yu's second one man exhibition in Hong Kong, to be held at the main Gallery on Thursday the 13th of January, 2005 and the exhibition will continue till the 2nd of February, 2005.
Chen Yu, best known for his "Lining Up" series, explores the notion of "individuality" in his earlier works, believing that "the individual must take on some kind of identity as their reason for existence, showing that they are the working parts of the social machine. Although people are different in appearance and character, what I get is the same impressions, the same thoughts, and the sense of a thousand people with one face".
Chen Yu's work has been participated in the ChinArt travelling museum exhibition, which has been shown in Duisburg at the Küppersmühle Museum, in Rome at the MACRO, in Budapest at the Ludwig Museum and in Bydgosszcz, Poland at the Stadtgalerie and in Palma de Mallorca at La Lonja in September 2004.
Economic expansion in China in recent years has prompted the artist to question the rapid changes in society and its impact on the ordinary people. One can also find in Chen's work that the artist rejects individuality as being any different than monotony (based on the observation that people are driven by the same motive) and also argues that despite "individuality" is regarded as the new "vague", they are in fact a group of collective monotonous symbols with slight variations. Chen cleverly expressed his view with references heavily borrowed from Rouge Cynicism (i.e. political and satirical) and Pop Art (i.e. confrontational and open), which had both dominated the thinking of contemporary Chinese art in the 80's and 90's.
In this new collection "An Eye for an Eye", Chen Yu further blurs the line between the two schools of thoughts and explores a new visual language that is responding to the social changes of our time. The language employed by the artist is subtle; the viewer may need to read his entire series in order to understand the messages behind his works.
A fully coloured catalogue will be released in conjunction with the exhibition.
Article written by Martha Liew
Click on image for an enlarged view.
Untitled No.8 - 2004
O/C, 130 x 180 cm, 2004
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This is my first attempt at black & white monotone and some time had to be spent on the preparations beforehand. I had no idea of what the effect of using only black and white tones would have on human facial expressions and so I only dared to try the grey tones on the people's clothing and the background first. I believe an artist needs some courage before making some drastic changes to paintings.
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Untitled No. 12 - 2004
O/C, 97 x 130 cm, 2004
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The saliva dripping from the child's mouth expresses the physically out-of-control characteristics of a "non-adult". I hate those teaching models that emphasize on training a child to be as much like an adult as possible.
I believe that children are sweet because they carry a child's individuality.
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Untitled No. 20 - 2003
O/C, 80 x 130 cm, 2003
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The man in this painting is one of my friends. He dropped by one day when I was in the middle of working on it to see how the painting was going. He furiously criticized my work when he saw it and complained that I have recreated him as looking old and hideous. I was indignant about his comment and we had a quarrel. After he left, I decided to draw an ant, biting him sharply on his forehead in order to release my wrath.
Later when he saw the painting again he was happy and pleased to see the ant on his forehead, thinking the portrait looked very much like him.
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Untitled No. 19 - 2003
O/C, 80 x 130 cm, 2003
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Untitled No. 8 - 2003
O/C, 80 x 140 cm, 2003
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Untitled No. 23 - 2003
O/C, 90 x 160 cm, 2003
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Untitled No. 21 - 2003
O/C, 97 x 130 cm, 2003
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Untitled No. 26 - 2003
O/C, 130 x 97 cm, 2003
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Untitled No. 10 - 2004
O/C, 120 x 150 cm, 2004
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Untitled No. 17 - 2004
O/C, 120 x 180 cm, 2004
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Untitled No. 19 - 2004
O/C, 120 x 180 cm, 2004
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For further enquiries, please contact Selina Liu.
Tel: (852) 2869-8802
Fax: (852) 2522-1528
Email: gallery@schoeni.com.hk
www.schoeni.com.hk
Exhibition
Venue:
Main Gallery: 21-31 Old Bailey Street, Central, Hong Kong.
Monday - Saturday 10:30am - 6:30pm.
Closed on Sundays and public holidays.
© Schoeni Art Gallery Ltd. 2005.
All rights reserved.
Images of art on this website may not be reproduced
without prior permission of Schoeni Art Gallery Ltd or the
artists.
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