Will things ever get better?—Xiang Jing @ MocaTp, 2013 is the first Chinese female artist’s solo exhibition ever held in the Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei. The exhibition includes 24 pieces of Xiang Jing’s artworks created in the 21st century. Through these three series in the exhibition, Xiang Jing throws out this grand question “Will things ever get better?” to the world with her penetrating vision that examines the world’s vanity and absurdity. Judging good from bad appears to be deceitfully objective while it could also be subjective, tantamount to the self-consoling human nature. As an artist, with her artworks, she seems to challenge the worldly order with her question, and inspires the audience to be active in their own reading of art. Each single answer might just reveal or respond to the audience’s personal situation in life. Perhaps the god of emptiness is always wearing a mask and there might be no correct or best answer to the question.
The solo exhibition at MOCA, Taipei includes her celebrated series of “Naked Beyond Skin,” “Ordinary People,” and “Otherworld,” which all reflect her experience growing up and her psychic journey. “Naked Beyond Skin” is one of her early series. It focuses on women living in big cities today. She looked into their lives with her unique, insightful perspective, and created many bold and soul-touching sculptures, which explored the relationship between this particular group and the world. After moving back to Beijing in 2009, she turned from creating binary opposition in her works to be more structural and metaphoric in her art. It granted her works with a reflective context and space for imagination. “Ordinary People” directs the audience’s attention to the neglected things, contemplates on them, and becomes a metaphor for people’s positions in the social system and within the power structure. “Otherworld,” with the animals’ innocent but sorrowful looks, summons the nature and purity of humanity, and puts forth questions about human survival and development.
Xiang Jing’s artworks are based on her distinctive philosophy and her freewill She searches repeatedly the pure nature within humanity, and constructs her writing of the body with her unique female perspective. Her works explore and represent the truth of individual existence and the meaning of life within a community when faced with the change of an era and environment. Known as one of the most representative sculptors in Chinese contemporary art, she overturns the traditional idea of sculptures through employing light fiber glass and various layers of paints. The brushes of paint bring warmth and emotion to her works, and transform the sculptures that should have been appreciated from different angles into a figural platform of silent communication between people. In this exhibition, from the question, “Will things ever get better?” to the artworks, the atmosphere of the space and the interpretive context become multi-layered and are interwoven between the artworks and the audience.
*image (left)
Will things ever get better?, 2011
FRP, Acrylic paint, H217x130x270cm
© Xiang Jing
Courtesy of Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei
