Thomas Palme @Stage Back Shanghai PRIMORDIAL BAVARIAN DRAWING HITS SHANGHAI

I wandered up the candlelit concrete stairs of the once opium den of the 696 Weihai Lu artists studio complex to the StageBack art space. On entering the space I was relieved to discover no paintings overly tastefully framed on the walls, no flowers arranged in a vase, no guilt, or glitter. Thomas Palme Madness, Booze and Social Phobia is what art exhibitions are supposed to be – energetic and stimulating, and NOT about the transaction of goods.

The white walled gallery space is strewn with drawings pinned to the wall, or pegged to string criss-crossing the space. The packing materials that the artist, Thomas Palme, had used to transport his drawings to Shanghai in are also used in the installation. All the works are on white paper, done with pencil, hard black lines – none of this soft delicate pussing around drawing stuff, hard in your face ‘this is what I’m about and deal with it’ kind of stuff.

Apparently he draws with both hands though I doubt he limits himself to using just hands to draw with. His work is body but a body drowned in history. I spotted Van Gogh with a female nude body. Animal bones, animal heads, and Christian crucifixes a primordial art man alone in the Bavarian mountains draws out his cultural history.

When I spoke to the artist, Thomas Palme, we discussed the privacy needed for drawing, something that isn’t needed for painting. Internal secrecy that is spewed out onto the page, then in the case of this exhibition the drawings in the travel tube were exploded around the gallery by the artist, the resultant curation being the trace of a performance. The artist also makes books (books this soon to be redundant object) to share his work with others.

Palme shows one of his videos too. It is a TV screen attached to the fence that is on the Stage Back Shanghai terrace that is at the back of the space. I watched the video of Palme doing odd things in the snow clad Bavarian woods with bone like penis coverings (and a BMWs having an appearance too) with the fast paced Shanghai skyline in the background. A personally moving conjunction the bright fast paced densely populated Shanghai with the snowy solitary wooded mountain in Bavaria. Where would I rather be?

Exhibition kindly supported by the Goethe Institute

Exhibition on until 21^st November 2009

StageBack art space

310, 3^rd floor, 696 Weihai Lu, Shanghai, China

ZendaiMOMA - Liang Shaoji 'You Si Miao - An Infinitely Fine Line'

Ok, so I'm cynical. Going to an exhibition about silk worms/moths in China is SO predictable and appears uninteresting. 'You Si Miao' - an infinite line. Just googled 'You Si Miao' to find a bit more about its historical references in Buddhism but couldn't find any. To get back to the show. Everything in the show related to silk and its life cycle but was then taken to a more seemingly philosophical level. I loved the large room, fully of data projectors projecting stunning images of skies just filled with clouds - my inner hippie was very happy. I think I would have preferred without the 31 days of the month LEDs made up of silk caccoons,  this piece would have had a quality about it similar to Turrell.

Upstairs was another great installation. First you walked into a dark room with two rows of silk cushions, each with headphones resting on them. There seemed to bits of rubbish on the floor, bits of paper. Then I walked over to a light that was lighting up an empty wall to see lots of moths collected in the light, some still alive. This was so natural and moving I loved it. Then I turned round to move into a back area of the installation to discover wood and straw stands and hundreds of moths. It was so cool. I didn't listen to the head phones. It is to me interesting about how much we access exhibitions, how much to we 'do' to actively participate to receive the work, sort of like going to exhibitions and not watching all of the video installation.

Internet Access in China - the Great Fire Wall

Apologies to all followers. Even though I now host this blog on a domain name because blogger was/is blocked. Contemporary Art Shanghai is inaccessible in China unless you have a proxy or personal VPN, which a lot of people don't.  It is very strange to write a blog to an audience that is on the other side of the Fire Wall, not the local art community. At the moment, I have access to blogger because I have a personal VPN but for the last few days even with this I can't access facebook or twitter. With a personal VPN or a proxy web surfing is super slow, basically accessing any sights that are outside of China have been 'made' very slow, similar speed to when the big internet cable near Taiwan that goes to the States got damaged. Sadly this censorship is not just about control of who says what, but about money, about which companies have access to the Chinese market, e.g. Chinese companies with state connections.

Frustrating!

Gladly, the internet is the only place where I experience any control over what I do or say really. Though exhibitions can be sensored - I don't know of any shows in particular but there is a feeling or sense that if you exhibit anything really outrageous overtly it will get closed down. I suppose most people just perpetually self sensor. It is not so much that they are just aware of the controling power but people here are nationalistic and, often rightly proud of their country.