“Trace of Existence” explores the basic idea of the work of art as a record of its own creation. Juxtaposing eight positions from China and abroad, with works by Andrew Beck, Li Jinghu, Liang Shuo, Mateo López, Jon Pestoni, Shi Yong, Koki Tanaka, and Yang Guangnan, it looks at the ways in which medium and materiality function to structure a work’s rhetorical proposition and ultimately testify to its maker’s presence. Taking its title and inspiration from a radical underground exhibition curated by Feng Boyi on the eastern fringes of Beijing in January 1998, this exhibition reflects, through formally and conceptually disparate works, on the notion of “survival” (as the title might be alternately translated) in contemporary aesthetic practice.
