Basic introduction of conceptual photography

Compared with the origin of western conceptual photography, in a sense, Meng Minsheng and Wang Qiusheng, who appeared in China 1976, used their photographic works to reflect on the "Cultural Revolution", and satirical works can also be classified as conceptual photography. 1979 The April Film Festival in Beijing and the subsequent Fission Group, Beijing Modern Photography Salon, Shanghai North River Alliance, Xiamen's Five Ones, Harbin's Obelisk and Guangzhou's Shadow Festival are all concepts in photography. However, these are not the origins of China's conceptual photography. They still reflect on the reality in a documentary way, and do not enter the context of thinking, evaluation and narration of contemporary art, so the distance and gap between them is getting bigger and bigger.

In China, the concept art (also called idealism) clearly appeared for the first time in the field of contemporary photography. It was an article "Our Works Wait for the Test of Society" in the 44th issue of Photographic Newspaper on April 28th, 1988. The signatures were Wang Hu, Wang, Chen, and Wang, then students of the Central Academy of Fine Arts. Because this type of photography did not appear on a large scale in China at that time, and it did not form a wide recognition. China Photography Press 199 1 translated and published ICP Photography encyclopedia americana, which introduced the concept of "conceptual photography" for the first time.

The term conceptual photography first appeared in "New Images: Conceptual Photography Art Exhibition" planned by Shimazi in 1997 in China, and then Zhu Qi planned "Image Similarity: China New Concept Photography Art Exhibition" in 1998. Because the two exhibitions used the name "conceptual photography" in unison, this name has become a reference for this kind of works for a long time. From 1997 to 1998, the conceptual art of photography officially began to enter the category of avant-garde art criticism in the name of conceptual photography. Conceptual photography was first popular only once in the art world. As works of art spread in art publications, domestic mainstream photographic media almost turn a blind eye. It was around 1999 that concept photography gained international recognition and began to enter the sales channels of avant-garde galleries and collectors. China concept photographers have gradually become frequent visitors to various international avant-garde photography exhibitions and comprehensive international art exhibitions.