LSH: Your works often utilize industrial products that are mass produced and standardized. For example, the pieces on view in “Trilogy” used televisions, washing machines and natural gas tanks. But you didn’t simply take industrial products and use them in your works, rather, you either mutated their intended functions, or nullified those functions altogether. So, what thoughts do you have on ready-made objects?
LW: My immediate personal feelings have a few different facets. Firstly, I don’t need to make anything brand new; it’s more than enough for me to use my hands to make something and express myself through a pre-existing object. I’m not willing to add to the amount of “new” things out there. Secondly, the materials I use are always relatively inexpensive. I don’t need anything custom-made because those are classist objects, and I don’t accept their value because I have my own aesthetic valuation. People on every level of society should be able to experience the objects that I make.
But this includes my aesthetic sense of beauty. Why don’t I create many things from scratch? Because the things I create are a result of my aesthetics, and even my aesthetics must be removed. I have been taught that my aesthetics are my privilege and birthright, and anything privileged is problematic. If the work is not comprehensible to every viewer, it must descend to the lowest level of discourse, then it becomes meaningful, then it finally becomes immersed in reality, and is no longer for the privileged few and the wealthy to use as their ornaments.
Of course, the work doesn’t always end up like this, but it commences with this intention. We should experience art together; we can’t just allow those with culture, power, and knowledge to understand it. It must be understood with each person’s subjective perception. Everyone must take part in a work of art for it to have true meaning, to become a work. Otherwise it’s just an ornament, meaningless.
With regards to objects, I don’t require specificity. I’m expressing the authentic spirit of an entire society, the spirit of society as a whole. An object may look simple, but in fact, this simplicity is the most difficult to reach. There are different ways to judge if art is beautiful. Take, for example, a painting — a work that everyone thinks is beautiful. It is beautiful because it captures the spirit of an era; this beauty is recognized and built by all of us, collectively — it is not static.
LSH: What do you plan to do in the future?
LW: I might do a shoot, not a film, just a shoot. Originally I wanted to go very large, very ambitious in scope, but now I think it’s completely unnecessary because the playing field has been flattened. Early on, I did video installations, but I stopped because when I saw the works of Bruce Nauman and Bill Viola, I realized there was no longer any room to progress. They’d already played around with film materials and camera modification so much that there wasn’t any more room for anyone else to play. On the other hand, if I wanted to create something with a narrative, then I couldn’t possibly compare with commercial films. The entire playing field has been flattened because of technological advancement. Sometimes if you compare an online video to a blockbuster film, you find the online video stronger than the blockbuster — the playing field has been completely leveled. Now the possibilities are more numerous, the space is more expansive, there is a greater degree of freedom.
Art is a pursuit of freedom; you don’t want to smother yourself. When you’ve lost your freedom, it’s over.
Liu Wei (Born 1972 in Beijing) graduated in 1996 from China Academy of Art. He works in a wide range of mediums, including painting, photography, installations, sketching and sculpture.
(The artist’s biography comes courtesy of Long March Space’s website)
