Exhibition: Ideal States
The Republic, the earliest utopian in human history, depicts people pursuing justice, goodness, and restraint in the pen of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. In his Ideal State, rulers must be philosophers who endow intangible, nameless, and latent things with their images and ideas, which is the process of creating all things, and this process is no longer confined to the fields of art and philosophy but also exists in the daily necessities of life. We are all constantly constructing and replaying the Ideal State belonging to each current moment, and each of you is the creator of eachmoment.
Whether LEI FENG Spirit, HOU SHUAI: Conflict and Integration Between Virtuality and Reality or WU QIKUI: Gazing the Luo Yang Street, through their realistic portrayals and surrealistic scene representations, these exhibitions are always permeated with a strong sense of epicness, where future inside each current moment, where full of decisive seconds and reflections on exploring the promised land through reality.
Lei Feng has never been to a battlefield but he is the most famous soldier in China. In 1962, he was hit in his temple by a wooden and collapsed next to the car he had scrubbed countless times. Afterward, Lei Feng’s influence in China increased exponentially and he became one of the few people in China who could be passed down with a portrait. Except for him, an ordinary soldier, the other few characters were all political leaders. This Hunanese man, a little more than 1.5 meters tall, is more of a part of the spirit of Chinese people before the 1960s. His name has once been regarded as a generation of Chinese: vowing to defend the country to the death, and loving for the people and the party selflessly. At a time when politics was almost all that mattered, he had a strong aura of the “1960s political personality”. He was a typical case and an invisible mirror of the phenomenon of pan-politicalism of that era for the public, especially students and soldiers, to reflect on and clean up the dark corners of the individual’s inner spirituality and morality.
Hou Shuai often combines photography with digital technology to create surreal spaces that resemble reality, which requires viewers to bridge the gap between the digital landscape and the real world with their visual experience. With the continuous advancement of virtuality and artificial intelligence, the boundaries between reality and virtuality gradually dissolve. He allows his viewers to sense the infinite possibilities of art through diverse art images. Through different media presentations and interactive experiences, he extends and expands the viewer’s perception, explores the rich artistic expression in a multi-media environment, and raises questions about the relationship between these two worlds from his perspective.
Wu Qikui is a native of Luoyang, Quanzhou. Under his lens, he discarded the pure artistic beauty of the old streets in Luoyang, making a long scroll of the street a topographical state to convey massive visual information, which must be a good photography scroll because viewers can understand his creation in detail and capture emotional resonance in the story. The gentleman created a three-dimensional and unusual Luoyang Old Street with the aim of “restoring the scene and transcending the scene”. The uniqueness of his works lies in reminding people to think about what is behind its theme, such as its historical background, social significance, and artistic value. When viewers explore its theme or concept from a broader perspective, which may feed back to provide them with a deeper understanding and an impressive experience. How fortunate to have been born and raised here.
There are ideal states of three different people. In the course of viewing the exhibition, you may feelthe change in society, the self-awareness of photography, and the transformation of the identity of “photographers” in different situations. You may find that “Reconstructing the Ideal” does not showcase photographic work, but puts forward a topic to discuss the spiritual symbols presented by contemporary artists in their works. How to figure out the unique way of existence and mental state of photographers in the era of uniformity has been chosen as the research direction of this exhibition. Thanks to all the artists and the curatorial team for their creations in this exhibition. Life is to make art creations, and creating is the way to gain happiness.
Especially today, LEI FENG Spirit, HOU SHUAI: Conflict and Integration Between Virtuality and Realityand WU QIKUI: Gazing the Luo Yang Street, the three stories still have a universal significance as a kind of the ideal and spiritual point of view. The Republic ended with a grand trial in which the son of the valiant hero Arminius was injured in the battle and came back to life after sleeping for twelve days. He met the judges between heaven and earth, gained happiness in heaven, suffered the punishment in hell, and ushered his rebirth. Whatever happens, even the fate of the great gods is under the pen of the writer. Similarly, your ideal state is ultimately up to you.