Visual collisions
By Cheng Anqi (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-12-26 09:29
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Larger than life fiberglass sculptures and cheongsams studded with ceramic shards stand against an animated LED installation and a flashing neon-light slogan.
They are part of the installations and easel works on display at the aptly named exhibition Head On, which is full of visual collision, at the Red Gate Gallery.
Tsewang Tashi, a gifted young oil painter from Tibet, confronts the audience with his large portraits (pictured left). The human figures created by his brush, in rose and lavender, have an intense gazes and shimmering skin, making a tense visual impact.
The series Night Trip (pictured middle), by Han Qing, stands in vivid contrast to Tashi's portraits. An aquamarine blue fills the canvas, fading out at the edges suggesting a traffic jam on a night street. Viewers will feel like they are standing in the middle of a street dotted with a kaleidoscope of headlights.
The svelte silhouettes of Li Xiaofeng's ceramic-cheongsam artwork, Classical (pictured right), are a new take on the Cizhou antique shards of the Song Dynasty (960-1279).
Individually painted with distinct calligraphy, the shards are pieced together in ebony tones to form the classical Chinese cheongsam.
10 am-5 pm, until Feb 28, Levels 1 and 4, Dongbianmen Watchtower, Chongwenmen, 6525-1005