Shanghai | 'Boy' contemporary portrait exhibition

LEO XU PROJECTS - a contemporary art gallery in Shanghai exhibiting young Chinese and international artists - presents 'Boy: A Contemporary Portrait' including works by contemporary visual artists, dance and fashion photography from China, France, Germany, Vietnam, Thailand. February 19th - April 8th, 2012 Artists: Jérôme Bel, Cheng Ran, Guo Hongwei, Hu Xiangqian, Li Qing, Liu Chuang, Mei Yuangui, Wolfgang Tillmans, Fred Tomaselli, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Danh Vo, Yang Fudong, Zhou Haiying. “Boy: A Contemporary Portrait” juxtaposes recent and commissioned new works by contemporary visual artists with a selection of works of contemporary dance, fashion photography and mid-20th century’s documentary photography, etc. Boy, as Oxford Dictionary suggests, also refers to “a man, especially a young or relatively young one”. The first decade of the 21st century sees a transforming representation of men in different cultures, media and regions. This exhibition attempts to portray young men of the time and to redefine the manhood within a global context. Since the early 1990s, celebrated German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans has been exploring—through his photographs and his involvement in publication—the range of gestures and physicality that have become the distinguishing characteristics of young men in visual culture. His wall installation on view comprises of eight representative photographs he made between 2000 and 2010. Through his signature way of display, the set of photographs constitutes a visual fiction in a first-person narrative that reveals the emotional, sensual and intellectual aspects of young men’s life. Intimate and earnest, French choreographer Jérôme Bel’s critically acclaimed “Cédric Andrieux” (2009) provides a choreographed account that portrays a contemporary dancer’s life and career and outlines the relationship between the performer and the dance as a medium. The exhibition includes a series of male portraits that are multifaceted and conceptual. Beijing-based Liu Chuang’s “Buying Everything On You” (2007) assembles all the possessions he acquired from a passer-by, which are laid out on a plinth in a way reminiscent of taxonomical or criminal research. Danh Vo, a Vietnamese-born conceptual artist produced specifically for the show a gilded Bud Light beer packaging (“Bud Lite”, 2012) and makes it a metaphor for the experience of being a young man in the consumer culture. “Faith” (2006) a double-channel video installation commissioned for Liverpool Biennale 2006, continues the award-winning Thai filmmaker and video artist Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s experiment in visualizing a man’s innermost world. “Faith is a tender portrait of lost love and transformation. READ MORE about the exhibition and artists. LEO XU PROJECTS, a contemporary art gallery in Shanghai exhibiting young Chinese and international artists is located on Fuxing Xi Road, by Wulumuqi Road, in the heart of Shanghai’s old French Concession. LEO XU PROJECTS is the brainchild of Shanghai-based curator and writer Leo Xu. Continuing Xu’s curatorial experiments, the space exhibits a dynamic program of shows and events featuring a young generation of artists from or living in China who work in a variety of media. Dedicated to new art and new ideas, the space also presents projects in collaboration with individuals including architects, writers, filmmakers, as well as with galleries, publishers, and institutions. Image: JÉRÔME BEL, "Cédric Andrieux", 2009, Video, 87 min 49 sec