Image artist-Yang Fudong

? I got to know him-Yang Fudong after I got a preliminary understanding of his image during this time. In my opinion, Yang Fudong is one of the most internationally renowned contemporary image artists in China, and he is an image poet. This contemporary artist slowly transformed decades of knowledge aesthetics into a solid breakthrough medium and made many collision attempts, and also infiltrated many oriental classical connotations into modern photography techniques.

? Yang Fudong's works are beautiful and sad, connecting modern scenes with classical literati temperament, blurring the sense of history and reality, broadening the narrative mode of images, reflecting the compromise, confusion and powerlessness of a new generation of young intellectuals between rich material life and increasingly scarce spiritual world, and also implying the helplessness of China's traditional culture being trampled by the modernization frenzy. His Seven Sages of the Bamboo Forest (seven books) became a classic in the history of local video art, and was selected as the Guggenheim Contemporary Art Award in new york in 2004, becoming the third China artist to win this honor after Cai Guoqiang and Huang Yongping. The above is Baidu Encyclopedia's evaluation of him.

? Abroad, Yang Fudong has held many exhibitions in many art galleries and important art institutions around the world with his own films and video installations, including: Art after 1989 and China: World Stage, Guggenheim Museum in new york, USA (20 17), Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art, etc.

? At home, Yang Fudong also has high attention and market enthusiasm. 20 12, Yang Fudong's "Out of context" exhibition was held in Shanghai Overseas Chinese Town Center for Contemporary Art; 20 15 held "South to North: Exhibition of Yang Fudong's Works" in BudiTek Art Museum; 20 16, the solo exhibition "Yu Gong Yi Shan" was held in Shanghai Photography Art Center. 2065438+On March 24th, 2008, the Dragon Art Museum held his large-scale video solo exhibition "Tomorrow Morning". As one of the most influential video artists in China, Yang Fudong weakened the linear narrative structure of traditional films in his works, and created an illusory realm far from real life with multiple cultural perspectives, complex illusion of time and space and poetic editing style.

Second, the introduction of the work:

1. Seven Sages of Bamboo Forest

? There are five "Seven Sages of Bamboo Forest", which was filmed in 2003 and ended in 2007. Yang Fudong tried to tell an epic story of a group of young people who didn't want to be bound by the world. The title of the film comes from a folk story in Wei and Jin Dynasties. A group of wise men and poets came to a bamboo forest to escape from the world and express their dissatisfaction with the real world, so as to reveal the inevitable internal conflict between the old and new lifestyles of young people in contemporary China and the self-deception struggle of weak urban youth caught in compromise. They ignore normal social behavior, are informal, bare-chested and wanton. The five parts of this film describe the story of seven educated and confused urban young men and women who entered Shan Ye, returned to the city, went to the countryside, arrived at the island and returned to the city.

? To put it simply, tomorrow morning is a "blockbuster" shot by Yang Fudong in the art museum. He filmed for 36 days in Shanghai Hailong Art Museum. And it is open to all audiences, which makes a brand-new concept of film-the only version that can only be seen once. This work, supported by more than 300 Nietzsche quotations, was also recorded by Yang Fudong on his mobile phone in these 36 days. It is in these days that his thoughts are getting closer to the truth step by step, and some details may only be seen and grasped by the eyes.

? This work begins with the "courtyard". In the first part of the image, Yang Fudong visited the city center, desert areas, public squares, coasts and ports, mosques and temples in Sharjah. In addition, apart from its historical significance as a palace building, the advanced hydraulic system and irrigation system of Alhambra show the brilliance of Arab experience and wisdom in European civilization, and also respond to the topic that 1 1 Sharjah Biennale reevaluates western centralism. Yang Fudong maintained consistent restraint in his creation, and constructed a picture of modern life in the Middle East from the perspective of "the other" between reality and imagination. On the third floor of the Art Center, eight black-and-white images with a height of 3.2 meters are arranged in a row. The independent sound of each image echoes in the dark exhibition space, and static photography and dynamic images emerge alternately. Independent but non-narrative multi-picture images, with Brecht-style fragment meaning, * * * constructed a Middle East landscape under the solidification of time and space dimensions.

? Just like someone asked Yang Fudong, "Does the spiritual life of contemporary people really exist?" He replied: "In fact, I don't think it is a problem, but whether you believe in something as an individual and a real person. If you believe in one thing, there are many things around you. I think life is sometimes seeing is believing and seeing is believing, and you need to return to the truth sincerely and truly. " Back to our childhood, that little bit of simple, pure desire and pure yearning for life is probably the psychological expression of this moment. So I think his video works are full of purity and sincerity, which brought me into his inner world. That's why I like him.