Famous Chinese artist 'disappears' in Dunedin

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May 14, 2pm, Talk on Chinese contemporary art with Bridie Lonie, of the Dunedin School of Art, at Blue Oyster Project Art Space, 24b Moray Place, Dunedin.

Famous Chinese artist 'disappears' in Dunedin

In an uncanny parallel with the actual disappearance of famous Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, an art work on show in Dunedin appears to feature the disappearance of one of his artworks from a gallery in China.
The video work, by artists Don Hunter and Ana Terry, is part of their exhibition Indigo Blues at the Blue Oyster Project Art Space. It shows a man repeatedly striking an empty wall in a gallery where a work by Ai Weiwei is to be installed. The video was filmed by Hunter and Terry during a residency in China last year, eight months before Ai's arrest and subsequent disappearance in early April.

Indigo Blues - installation view (photo credit: Emily Hlavac Green)

"Ai's work Relating – It's about a dream was an installation of over 200 mp4 screens each showing the sleeping faces of different people. It was made in response to the Beijing Olympics slogan "One World One Dream" and the irony of China's desire to present a new face to the west alongside this slogan that still resonates with socialist ideologies and control of the populace," says Terry.

"Ai told us it was dangerous to have one dream and one world and in his case it seems the Chinese authorities are fearful of his alternative worlds and dreams."

Ai Weiwei's disappearance will be discussed within the context of contemporary art in China in a talk by the Head of Art Theory and History at Dunedin's School of Art, Bridie Lonie.

"Chinese contemporary art is playing a complicated game between being seen as an expression of the liberty of the individual, and in going too far in its critique of the state," says Lonie, who visited China last year.

"Ai Weiwei is certainly the most obvious artist to have been seen as going too far in his critique, but he is not the only one," she says.

Lonie's talk on contemporary Chinese art will be at the Blue Oyster on May 14 at 2pm.

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