“Invented in 1828, pencil sharpener embraced its golden age in one and a half centuries later. A mini museum made of 350 little pencil sharpeners, will create new dreams and glories for this little tool (friend) who once enriched the life of a little girl."     
- Gu Jing   

The dreams that lie in these private collections of 1980-90s differ from the various individual background and identity, longing for spread. As one of the essential goods during that period, like the other functional objects, pencil sharpener was usually shaped realistically, which becomes a vivid representation of the actual environment. Though quite limited in style, its motifs cover all aspects of common life. One would love to have even if other has the same.

Back to 2014, the surface structure of art world has been continuously stimulated by the enormous vitality of economy.  Shanghai has recently witnesses an outburst of public and private museum, art fair, showroom, galleria, and other alternative space - while the amount of local artists seems quite insufficient for the volume. The frequent practitioner turnover and individual desire for energy transformation lead to a highly intellectual exploration in term of contemporary knowledge production.

Titled in advertising tone A New Museum’s Coming, the mini museum invited participants   from diverse domains, who could look into the issue from a distance, including publisher, senior editor, freelancer, we media developer, philosopher, art historian, curator and artist etc. Their responses and methodologies will become part of the work presented in V ART CENTER space 1 - the non-profit space, and at same time appear in each of their own work – the field beyond exhibition space, and constantly updated to May 18.

Artists: Shen Qilan, Gu Jing, Wang Xin, Ma Yimu, Liu Xing, Stephen Bradley,
Lu Xinghua, Liu Huatong

*image (left)
Stephen Bradley & Renyi Hu 
Pencil Warriors, 2014
video
courtesy of the artist
To watch the video, please click here.