Amid towering trees, fledgling artists blossom

Pigeon's House by Cui Jie. [Photo/China Daily]

This idea found favor with Shea, and the project began to take shape.

Explaining how the foundation went about executing the plan, Shea says: "When we began discussing an international exhibition, we talked about the exciting work being done in China. In particular, we thought it would be interesting to show works by a younger generation of artists, whose works had not been widely exhibited internationally. We then approached artists and commissioned works and they responded in unique ways, establishing the concept of A Beautiful Disorder."

The foundation has about 10 hectares of open ground in Goodwood, Sussex, where 80 sculptures will be displayed. Sixteen of them have been specially commissioned for the event.

"Some of the artists, such as Cheng Ran and Xu Zhen, are conceptual artists who usually work on large installations and use digital media, so they are not sculptors in the traditional sense," says Liao, adding that creating large outdoor projects demands a different mindset.

The title of the exhibition comes from a quote by Jean-Denis Attiret, an artist and missionary in the 18th century.

His writings about Chinese landscaping and gardening had a great impact on English garden culture.

Attiret used the phrase to describe how Chinese gardens could provoke strong and often opposite reactions from viewers.