The space has, thus, turned into an irreplaceable tool to picture the reality and fantasy in Shi Yong’s practice.

As a representative figure of contemporary Chinese artists who first started working with installation and video media, Shi Yong’s earliest artistic practices focused on revealing the subtlety of our reality and the inherent tension of the "system". He paid close attention to the contemporary transformation of Shanghai that have taken place since 90s, as well as the bigger issues that came with the globalization and consumerism. After 2006, Shi Yong drew back his focus to the art and the art world that he has been involved in and reflected on putting creations “on hold” as a way of resistance, providing a more rational perspective on the idea of “control” under things that deemed as “abstract”.

This kind of reflection about “on hold” and “control” is represented through the space-and-time relation between his installations and the space. In his work, Let All Potential Be Internally Resolved Using Beautiful Form, we see how Shi Yong manipulated the space to create an installation narrative. It was a game of controlling and being controlled about space, material and language. Through the actions of “erasing”, “cutting” and “hiding”, the artist embedded real personal events in a narrative manner on the seemingly beautiful forms that were processed into scraps and hid them along the aluminum strips. He intended to indicate the sensitive situations in reality by forcibly intervening through this abstract form.

In his 2017 solo exhibition “Under the Rule” hosted at ShanghART Gallery in Shanghai, Shi Yong extended the use of “combining words of violence and modification.” By dismantling and reassembling the motor car, his mandatory intervention and absolute control at the scene reconstructed a grammar: a form of aesthetic power that implies realistic dimensions. Here, the fractured objects as a metaphor of a body and the scene as a controlled container became the artist’s invisible salute to the abstract body fragments.

In the neon installation, A Bunch of Happy Fantasies, we see Shi Yong’s adeptness in using light, literature and space to create dialogues of art. He transferred the fantasy character of the poetry to a kind of reality illusion and made it into this neon installation that was displayed upside down. In presenting this discussion of fantasy and reality, Shi Yong extracted elements of consumerism, modernization, common behaviors and emotions and came up with his own personal creations and imaginations. This work showcased Shi Yong’s ingenious control of human perception and cognition within the space and mind.

As presented in his 2018 solo exhibition, “A ( ) Bird Be Released From the Top of a Certain Tower”, the use of literature, space reconstruction and transformation has became a more matured language that signaled Shi Yong. It was a set of mixed media installation that carried the touch of mystic character usually seen in detective fictions that folded the metaphor and reality through the entanglement of two different narratives. It referred to the metaphors from Borges' short story The Lottery in Babylon (La lotería en Babilonia) and morphed the idea of “control” and “being controlled” into an inextricable self-satisfaction and a helpless prospect. The space has, thus, turned into an irreplaceable tool to picture the reality and fantasy in Shi Yong’s practice.

Shi Yong

Shi Yong is a representative figure of contemporary Chinese artists who first started working with installation and video media. Since 1993, his works have been widely exhibited both in China and abroad. His artworks cover a wide range of mediums including performance, video, and installation. Shi Yong’s earliest artistic practices focused on revealing the subtlety of our reality and the inherent tension of the "system". At the end of the 1990s, Shi began focusing on the idea of Shanghai’s transformations under the Chinese economic reform, which contributed to a discussion of globalization and consumerism. Since 2006, with the piece "Sorry, There will be no Documenta in 2007", he turned his attention to the art world that he's been involved in, pondering how to provide a more rational perspective through his creative works. Shi Yong’s 2015 solo exhibition "Let All Potential Be Internally Resolved Using Beautiful Form" continues his art practice, disclosing his intention to expand the reflection and practice of “control” under the seemingly “abstract” future.

Shi Yong was born in Shanghai in 1963. He graduated from the Fine Arts Department of Shanghai Light Industrial School. He now resides and works in Shanghai. Shi Yong has been exhibited widely since the early 1990s. Recent shows include: A Fairy Tale in Red Times, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourn, Australia (2019); Nothing is Impossible (Solo Exhibition), Yellspace, Shanghai; A ( ) Bird be Released from the Top of a Certain Tower (Solo Exhibition), Boxes Art Museum, Foshan; This is Shanghai, Chinese Contemporary Art, Liverpool, UK (2018); Shi Yong: Under the Rule, ShanghART, Shanghai; Floating World, Bahrain (2017); Trace of Existence, UCCA, Beijing; The Crocodile in the Pond, Luzern (2016); Let All Potential be Internally Resolved using Beautiful Form (Solo Exhibition), MadeIn Gallery; Ural Industrial Biennial of Contemporary Art, Ekaterinburg; Essential Matters - Moving Images from China, Borusan Contemporary Perili Kosk, Istanbul, (2015); Hans van Dijk: 5000 Names, Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing; Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam, the Netherlands; Off-Site Programme, Silent Film, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham (2014); Big Draft, Kunstmuseum Bern, Bern (2010); Think carefully, where have you been yesterday?, (Solo Exhibition) BizART, Shanghai (2007); Alllooksame/Tutttuguale? Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin (2006); Second Guangzhou Triennale, Guangsong Museum of Art, Guangdong; Felicidad Indecible (Unspeakable Happiness), Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City; Follow Me!, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2005); The Heaven, The World (Solo Exhibition), ShanghART Gallery, Shanghai (2004); XXV Biennale de Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo; Money and Value, The Last Taboo, Switzerland; 4th Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai (2002); Unpacking Europe, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Living in Time, National galerie im Hamburger Bahnhof Museum fuer Gegenwartskunst, Berlin (2001); The Third Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane (1999); Art for Sale, Shanghai; Cities on the Move (1-6): Exhibition of Asian Art, Secession, Vienna; CAPC, Musee d' Art Contemporain, Bordeaux; PS1 Contemporary Art Center, New York; Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Copenhagen; Hayward Gallery, London; Kiasma; Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki (1997- 1999); Two Attitudes Toward Identity 93, Gallery of Shanghai Huashan Art Vocational School, Shanghai (1993) etc.