When does contemporary British art by Chinese artists based in Britain become contemporary Chinese art? This is the reverse of the question frequently asked by artists from other cultures impatient for recognition and usually resentful of being sidelined--pushed on the fringes of the mainstream. Exhibitions based on the artists' racial origins arouse passions, just as they lead to curiosity, categorisation and a certain coherence in the inevitable dialogue with their audience. But, controversial as such group displays are, they are also useful as early intimations of trends, and even for finding the sources of larger waves. Journeys West, the exhibition accompanying the conference, which took place at two venues in Colchester from October to November 1995 and was expected to travel to other cities, was one such event.[1]
The selection of paintings, sculpture and installation art put together jointly by the University of Essex, the Chinese Arts Centre in Manchester and the Lambeth Chinese Community Association, set out to retrace the steps of Chinese artists who, for all intents and purposes, are European or aspire to be European but cannot, or somehow would not, shake off their Chinese cultural legacy. As the works on display showed, the results of this sense of dual identity--or a stepped pyramid of identities--could be varied and fascinating to watch. The exhibition dealt with "experiences of western art...that encourage (the artists) to explore new territories with skills that reflect a Chinese sensibility." [2]
We already know from the artistic practices of other Asian--Indian, Iranian, Japanese or Arab--artists in the West that there is little there that is definable by rules, responsive to agreed patterns or locked on to predestined paths. The usual telltale signs are there, of course, in calligraphic motifs, choice of colours, unfamiliar light. But there is much more that surprises--above all the fusion, juxtaposition or conflict of motifs, symbols and techniques and, more often than not, a freshness of approach. So, what of its identity? How can this not be British or European art while it addresses, usually with remarkable élan and adroitness, the sometimes familiar, the subtext, the small print? Or indeed when it teases out glittering gems of inspiration in dull scenarios?
Journeys West featured the work of internationally established artists like Kim Lim alongside large-scale abstract paintings by Christopher Ku, Kwai Lau and Moses Lee (who died shortly before the show), smaller abstracts by Mao Wen Biao and Gang Chen, mixed media paintings by Ho Ting Fay, Man Hale and Yang Yingsheng, photography by Xi Jian Jun, and installations by Cai Yuan and Huang Xiaopeng.[3]
Xi, who showed three photographic works, stated that he had chosen them because "they are very significant...they cross geographical boundaries, time zones and exhibition spaces."[4]Yang Yingsheng related how alienation in Britain--being singled out as Chinese rather than as an ordinary mortal--led him to start producing work which had Chinese elements in it "because I was forced to think I'm Chinese." That phase didn't last and after several attempts to paint, alternately, in Chinese or European style, he arrived at painting men with no faces.[5]
In the event, so divorced was the show from the aesthetic concerns of a traditionalist China, its political and social dynamics or indeed its currents today, that the fact of all those artists being Chinese became almost incidental. This was further reinforced during the discussion. Indeed, EAR was reminded by some of those present that, as part of their europeanisation, they already had shed the practice of using the surname first--a superficial change perhaps, but not without portents.
Was this an advancement of the multiculturalism that first surfaced as a discourse in art as an offshoot of the controversial Les Magiciens de la Terre exhibition in Paris in 1989?[6] Or was it, at a deeper level, a counterpoint to the Primitivism show at the New York Museum of Modern Art in 1984? Hardly any of the artists or their works in Journeys West appeared to have remained untouched by their immediate surroundings in the West or indeed by global concerns. Yet the way some of them addressed familiar topics of themes led one to the inescapable conclusion that, despite diverse vocabularies and techniques, their interpretations could still be traced back to Chinese art practices. It was her formative stay in Europe in 1984 that practically liberated Yang Yanping from "the Chinese way...concerning the 'right' way to do things," only to launch her on a career of pouring Chinese lotuses on her unplanned, spontaneous paintings![7]
Chinese artists responding to the openness after the Cultural Revolution had to "negotiate the fine line between insularity and a desire to confront the West, between the gravitational pull of an ancient culture--however critical they may be of it--and the necessity to learn and adopt the many languages of modern art.[8] Curiously, the sum of that experience by their colleagues in China resonates with Chinese artists based in Europe. Many of them privately admit to being disillusioned, having to compromise at different stages of their lives and to come to terms with their dual/multiple identities and love-hate relationships with host countries, but who under most circumstances would not barter away the freedoms achieved in exile.
Some of these issues surfaced poignantly in the work of Kary Ka-Che Kwok in I am Not What I am. His diptychs juxtaposed the real and imagined to consider notions of national and individual self-determination (albeit in a reference to Hong Kong), provided metaphors for the bond between the rulers and the ruled, and confronted issues of identity, privacy and power.
But the varying states of non-arrival, suspense or surrender that concern many non-European artists in Europe raise a whole new set of questions. To what extent, for example, do the Chinese artists remain anchored to the philosophical bedrock of their distant motherland while pursuing careers in the West? How long would it be before change set in?
The overseas-based artists featured in Silent Energy were seen by the curators to be sharing "a reflective conceptual and philosophical approach to art which shows little trace of the dualist or Hegelian divisions which characterise modern Western culture. We tend to think of reality as an accretion of conflicting forces: man--nature; body--spirit; fire--water; hunger--plenty; life--death. While the Chinese artists recognise the same entities, they do not see them as opposites. Such states are, rather, different states of energy within a greater unity..." [10]
The artists in Journeys West, however, had a different story to tell. Hou Hanru, quoting from Homi Bhabha's seminal work, The Location of Culture, emphasised the need to adopt a new approach to "difference and identity, past and present, inside and outside, inclusion and exclusion." Thus identity becomes "a process of identification and de-identification in an enlarged hybrid, living context, where communication with the other is an absolute necessity and the only way of survival."[11]
"Change and cultural convergence are inevitable," says Grimsby-based artist Hai Shuet Yeung, who has won recognition in China and in Britain for developing abstract painting in a refreshing new direction. "Such convergence is beneficial to both sides, and we should embrace it. [12] "There can never be two tigers on one mountain," says Glasgow-based Malaysian Chinese artist Hock-Aun Teh, citing the old Chinese saying and in the process explaining his own work. Teh's work, most of it acrylic on paper, features sometimes graceful and sometimes remarkably violent brushwork that startles, shocks and intrigues the viewer. This often reflects, according to Julian Spalding, a "furious impatience" with being uncomfortably on the wrong side of the fence.[13] Chinese Garden, one of several recent paintings by Teh, shown at The Gallery in South Audley Street, captures that sense where arcs of yellow and red--the 'tiger'--denote that formative, all-encompassing struggle over the fence. Everyone is in a Dancing Mood, in contrast, demonstrates a childlike vehemence and joie de vivre.
The issues of identity, issues and imagery confronting Chinese artists in Europe were to resurface at the British Museum symposium, Post-1949 Chinese Painting (24-25 September 1996). Although coinciding with the Hong Kong loan exhibition, Twentieth Century Chinese Painting: Tradition and Innovation, the symposium featured panellists, not least among them Dr Anne Farrer herself, who have observed at close range the Chinese scene in Europe, in particular in Britain. Dr Farrer already has been responsible for a series of British Museum initiatives to study and to promote awareness of contemporary Chinese art. Two previous study days, on painting and calligraphy and on printmaking respectively, were part of that ground-breaking effort. [14]
Although the Chinese communities in Britain, as in France, Germany and other European states, on the whole remain more receptive to the traditional imagery of classical and classical-style painters and calligraphers, their frequent exposure to contemporary practices through public and commercial exhibitions, Chinese newspaper reports and Chinese cable television should not be underestimated.
From the evidence so far, it would be premature to predict the direction of Chinese art practices in Europe, leave alone in Britain, or anticipate their result. Those seeking clues to the beginnings of a particular movement or series of movements should expect to wait a while longer, as should those who wish to define the present in the framework of future identity/identities.
