[Press Release]

The existence of things does not depend on people awareness. People are always trying to build a spiritual bridge connecting themselves to things and transform it into their internal sense of belonging; moreover, they love to confer meanings to things without regarding whether they are harmoniously associated with them or not. Such efforts made to save the original meaning of things will constantly fall into the trap of a habit. Below is the explanation of the artist Gao Weigang in regard to his exhibition “Vice”:

Actually I have always been suspecting what can be changed or brought about by one thing. For me, a person walking in the snowfield with a cigarette in his mouth is nothing else but a person walking in the snowfield smoking a cigarette. Even if you watch this painting for an entire year, it will never take on any meaning about the end of the world.

Our life is composed by numerous fragments. When describing or simulating these fragments, some images will emerge. Yet sometimes, no matter if its by intuition or because of logical analysis, we would have some illusions and see metaphors in it. We string them together painstakingly and look for a satisfying explanation or answer according with our personal experiences. We call this action “understanding”; actually, most of the time we can only please ourselves again and again with methods familiar to us.

We are happy to rely on our own judgments without questioning or speculating about them, which is a kind of vice.