A panoramic view scanning the context of my neighborhood from my 19th floor office.

On right, the Shanghai Stock Exchange Building and Pudong Development Bank Building next door as well as tall buildings located at horizon were all smouldered in the fog.

A view taken as I was walking from my neighborhood to work at the Shanghai Stock Exchange Building shown in this foggy early morning.

A shot taken from the window of my office floor, showing the early morning rush on ground while the River Pu in the horizon was lost in the fog.

A view toward my neighborhood from my 19th floor office. Two buildings left of the blue roofed building is where I now live.

Fog day on January 10th 2008

l, Lo Ching, the curator; ctr, me; r, Li Jinyuan, the exhibiting artist

From Genesis to Home Away From Home Pastoral Landscape

A quick preview of Li Jinyuan's exhibition - The Divine Quest - at the Sunbow Art Gallery sets free the mind to think solely on origin and tradition, time and history in temporal and panoramic perspective. Another gingerly thumbing through the exhibition catalog would further delve into Li's artworks in a very psychologically entrenched ways. His paintings exude either the paradox of time gone by or time forever craving for; they are but during the time of Genesis through the virginal pastoral landscape. The exhibition seems to continue to exert the traditional painting form cum literati mind set in idealizing for pristine living landscape; however, it is a paradise lost. It is the search for ideal, for heavenly state of being and for peace of mind.

The whirlwind coagulation or diffusion of ink darkness delineates Genesis, the beginning of time. Rather, it is the inquiry into the beginning of a simple notion when the very first ink drop splashed onto the blank painting canvas. The notion of divine inquiry sets in when the very first notion was formed. Why is it that we are here on Earth? For what purpose that we are born on Earth and not elsewhere? These are merely a few divine inquiries that shall presume neither a polemic stance nor an end to means.

As reading of Li's work continues, the pristine landscape and earthly delight soon formed. Together with absolute calm and aloof solitude, all else is peaceful. Untainted, unruffled, untouched, it sure looks like heaven and earth and as the way it should be. All in all, a very quiet beauty rumbles and creeps within Li's paintings that speak about the living tradition of Chinese ink painting.

Like his generations before and many generations to come, Li also tirelessly examines the state of mind, a universal appeal or topic. One after another, these paintings incrementally reveal the order and nature of the world we once lived in but lost. These are scenarios of Genesis that nobody would ever remember even in their deepest psyche - for it is only some living imagination of the mind, and for they are the undying generational quest to know the very first moment when the state of matter was formed. It is long gone, long gone for an uncountable number of light years, and could only be resurrected via ceremonially reprised presentation of Li's paintings alike.

The truth may still be out there; however, it is certainly not the ulterior quest at this moment of writing. As a painter and via his mastered painting medium, Li Jinyuan carries on to inquire into the very divine nature of truth as well as truth about nature. It is easy to say that he paints time while time drips away across the painting canvases. It can also be interpreted as Li's curiosity traversing into the uncharted territory close to heaven. Otherwise, he made it so clear that his paintings broke through into the universe of the mind. These are some of the never-ending inquiries so near and yet so far away from home, and home away from the home of heart.

p/s all the pictures of paintings are lifted out of the catalog The Divine Quest.

Jeremy Tew
Art Explication
Shanghai, January 1st 2008

Sun drenched winter morning on Sunday, Dec. 30th 2007

听画《帐篷中的笑声》

绘画本是视觉的；形而上，绘画也可以聆听来欣赏。2007年6月，上海美术馆展览《跋涉者——方增生艺术回顾展》，新浙派人物画画家方增先其中的一幅《帐篷中的笑声》（120cm X 130cm，1984年），它就是这样情趣十足，可以聆听的水墨绘画。

《帐篷中的笑声》的高原地理气候，地广人稀，冬日比夏季还长。人物的厚重衣著，本是颜色斑斓，但都以黑白为色调；有一些稀落的颜色描述不知名的物件。这里应该是一家五口吧？如果是，父亲该是欠身取饭菜的，手持工具的母亲面对男孩，男孩背后两个站立的女孩，她们仨都把眼光投向男孩。帐篷里虽然有些幽暗，似有似无灯光照明，男孩衣著的大面积留白以点题，整幅画侧重在他身上，聚焦在他笑逐颜开的稚趣脸庞。

高原的生活方式简陋淳朴，没有多少物质可以享受，但精神境界丰硕。画里简朴的小小帐篷空间，充满日常的笑声。应该是什么对话内容使男孩腼腆把自己的脸庞遮盖吧？他少了一颗门牙，可爱之处，可发一噱！他的笑声作为绘画主题，自然而然地点缀并布满画面，豁然开来。

画家之于九朽一罢，经过数笔构勒修改，最后一笔描绘而成。图画里依然留下水壶和旁边器具的轻描淡写，到后来位置明确一描而成的水壶，它似乎无意的或有意的安排，若有若无的景象，暗喻高原人家生活虽然似乎贫瘠，依然有热呼呼的、热腾腾的烧水饭菜，集聚在一起的欢乐时光，维持一个温暖的精神境界。

从构图基础和画意涵义来说，《帐篷里的笑声》不能以一眼蔽之，它是需要时间来细细品味的一幅画，它也需要更贴切的空间来定位。在博物馆，它不该处于那个转弯后面，空间和光线都不足的地方，它的确需要特殊的方位才能衬托其可以受到时间考验的绘画内涵。

为了将其装置形象提升到当代的空间，笔者建议重新将它传统的装帧形式改造，使用前后两片透明聚碳酸酯镜片，四粒不朽钢螺栓固定四个角，扣住四方形的绘画，整体包装过后，找个适宜的光线和方位摆设；传统的笔墨，现代的手法，当代的美感就迎刃有余了。

处于当时快速记取情景，画家把帐篷里的生活片刻捕捉入画，他能够扣准题目，形而上地细腻表达主题。简略地说，《帐篷里的笑声》的固有情景，在于它活灵活现的笑声，从画里生动地透彻出来。笑声似乎从帐篷里传到帐篷外面，甚至开始感染到画外；绘画的景致，其乐融融，尽在不言中。


张 文德Jeremy Tew
Art Explication
Shanghai
August 30th 2007

A harlequin building of Gemdale Development

Found this currently popular whacky harlequin design style, usually of Club House or Sales Center of many housing or commercial developments around, when visiting Gemdale Development for meeting this morning. Gemdale Development is located in Jiading District, NE part of Shanghai.

青色的年华: 观摩《果冻时代Infantization》后记

遥望蓝天，青色山脉，是一段年代久远，几乎被埋藏的记忆；观摩《果冻时代Infantization》后，几乎被尘封的潘杜拉盒子，里边仅有的希望，又再蠢蠢欲动。《果冻时代Infantization》极其生动地体现其英语标题的意义，Infantization——幼稚也，是成长的过程。果冻时代，发育时期，青春活力——幼稚、不知天高、强说愁的憨厚态度。令人发噱！

果冻，Jell-O，软绵绵、甜蜜、清香、细腻。。。果然是被冻结后的记忆。廿多年前，美国中西部，北方草原上的大学小镇college town，阳光透过窗口照射厨房，照亮地板。将果冻从冰箱里端出来，桌上的腾腾咖啡、几块可口的饼干，手中的彩色笔——那是构思建筑草图，千头万绪的一个深秋午后。遐想飞扬，历历在目。。。

少男少女，裤子掉了，衣冠不整，躺在生日蛋糕上、伏在玫瑰花上，巧克力琼浆滴露在脸庞，有做不完的青春梦想；春潮暗涌。是不是玫瑰花啊？玫瑰多刺，玫瑰花香，玫瑰无语；自然的神态，大自然的本质。唤不回，唤不回的青春，换不回的一切；咧嘴一笑，心里头，暖滋滋，泫然。整天整日把玩不放的玩具，在绘画里；图图写写的草稿图画，洒落满地。爱情与学业、理想与未来，天天希望，夜夜梦想，不亦乐乎、踌躇满志的日子。如果不会表达，那就直接套用电影情节，反正每个人都可能在游乐场发生的情节：小小的草地角落，秋千静止不动，留下一双鞋子。人呢？比喻和暗喻，无声无息，全都用得淋漓尽致。腼腆低头，裸体，花一样的男子；抬头绮思，红唇，拥抱熊宝宝的女子：清淡的色彩溢出淡淡的忧愁，宝绿色和黛绿色是无法表达的境界。圆形的球体，排列形成枪械，性与力量的诱惑和幻想，自然与事实的影响，统统都照搬再现在画面上。浴缸的西瓜、丝袜、宴会的面具、啤酒；酣睡的畜牲、娓娓刻画的人鱼传说动画、幼儿般手笔的小丑、悬浮的太空境界、深沉鸟瞰的冷漠城市、熊猫发怒的核爆场景。。。接着，深受电影〈Lord of The Ring指环王〉、电视剧〈Prison Break越狱〉、以及性感明星玛丽莲梦露等影响的肖象或偶像。。。联展的题材与时并进，视觉意象万千，但迷迷糊糊的感觉多过写实的倾向。记得电影〈Blue Lagoon蓝色礁湖〉的情节：因事故遗落在孤岛，两个小女孩小男孩在成长的故事里，他们莫明地害怕身体日渐发育的迹象。美术馆的拜访者稀稀落落；哦，我人在上海！

果冻很快就会凉切下来，再松软的话，就不好吃了。你们继续努力绘画，继续真挚地表现吧！远去的日子，记忆就近了。

张 句 Jeremy Tew
Art Explication
上海2007年6月22日夏至

Serving up with Homemade

Everybody knows real well that nothing beats a homemade cup of coffee. Especially inspiring during early morning and in late afternoon, it can be a real kicker by indulging a gourmet shot of freshly brewed coffee with its inherently swirling caffeine aroma, so divinely hospitable and gratifying to one's nostril and palate. Mmm...hmm. For casual or purist drinkers alike, it can be more than therapeutic experience or addictive fix.

Deriving out of everyday life, homemade is always the engaging product of utilitarian and pragmatic order readily found in kitchen corner. Indeed, nothing beats the old fashion homemade conical strainer, made out of selected remnant fabric as sieve and intricately stitched onto a metallic hoop with handle. This distinctive feature is maximized in its application in the Homemade installation.

Sensitively drawn from and living up to its site specific intent, Homemade is unassumingly well pivoted into its neutral circular niche of the Gallery. Being part of the inextricable kaleidoscopic condition, the niche has in turn well-received or complemented Homemade that eventually giving rise to the in situ presence of thematic presentation. One naturally gravitates to stroll around those rising tall and short pyramidal structures. Within its site specific context, Homemade invokes strong spatial order with clear visual language. Strategically positioned, somewhat stately dressed up, densely meshed in vortex funnel and in cascading manner, these sculptural forms indeed unveil multiple layers of meanings and contents.

The sepia tones or stains on those strainers indicate the various number of coarse or smooth blends over time, directly implicating the coffee making process of grinding, plunging, filtering and dripping, and finally, with coffee grains clogging or congealing towards the bottom of the strainer. Also drawing exceptional attention is the coffee grains collected encircling at the bottom of those structures. Formally speaking, the best of elixir has already been filtered, drained and consumed while the grains heaped in concentric spread.

To see a society at large from the installation, the presentation essentially explicates the trickle down theory, a provocative ideological rhetoric concerning a social structure as well as its economic process of filtering and draining. If so, putting it in larger social context, this installation investigates deeply into those incrementally propagating but forever less than appropriately addressed issues, those inevitable and identifiable social and economical problems, locally, regionally and globally.

Furthermore, could this installation be interpreted as a form of narrative exposé, a concurrent toast to the best or the worst of all things in everyday life? Could this simply or superficially be the divine fountain of insatiable material or ecological consumption, along the way, the ever-continuing woeful state in gravely sacrificing the disenfranchised needs of those who are piled at the bottom of the social structure?

As the object of artistic study, the simple subject of Homemade derives and extrapolates from the context of coffee; however, Bibi Chew has literally served up another aromatic brand of Homemade, with roasted or brewed blend.


Jeremy Tew
Art Explication
Shanghai, China
Nov. 1st 2007


Note: As one of the artworks of Out of the Mould that features ten Malaysian new generation women artists, Bibi. Chew's installation Homemade is currently being shown at Petronas Gallery, Kuala Lumpur from October 25th through December 25th, 2007. Photography by Jeremy Tew.