randian | 燃点

One of Leo Gallery’s ten-year anniversary exhibition series, the exhibition is an integrated manifestation of Zhu Xiangmin’s recent works in a new form. In this exhibition, Zhu Xiangmin has raised his creative ideas of “Body, Loudspeaker, Electric Charges” for the first time, and has expanded the dimensions and depth of painting. The artist not only integrates his understanding of Walt Whitman’s poetry, a collection of sounds, and the perception of daily life into his works, but also uses charcoal pencils in the creation of oil paintings to capture the feeling of fleetingness. Also, in order to expand the spatial tension of the paintings, the media, which is paper, is rubbed and folded. A three-dimensional effect is created by his combination of cotton cloth and paper. By associating the installation methods with the features of the space, the artist has made the entire exhibition site of Leo Gallery’s second floor a magnetic field that is fully charged with artistic electric charges.

This exhibition displays a series of works created by Zhu Xiangmin after his thorough researches on the features of Leo Gallery’s spaces. From the concepts, works to the spaces, the whole exhibition would be an integrated manifestation of Zhu Xiangmin’s creative approaches. The Body Electric, the theme of this exhibition, is borrowed from Walt Whitman’s poems. In his works, Zhu Xiangmin emphasizes the senses of “strength” and “thickness”. As to present the effects of such, Zhu Xiangmin has extracted three key words – “Body”, “Loudspeaker” and “Electric Charges”, which eliminates the narrative nature of the human figures in the works, and uses these figures as the medium (or “Loudspeaker”) for the perception of senses (or “Electric Charge”).

In order to focus more precisely on the “thickness of feelings,” Zhu Xiangmin does not simply work on the technical level. He uses the images and materials as the medium of expression, which expands the dimensions of the painting. By covering the paper with a piece of rubbing cloth, the level of perception is enriched; And when the paper-based painting is crumpled and then unfolded, the flat-screen image is transformed to a foldable dimension, while the image presents a metallic texture and power.

Located in the French Concession, Leo Gallery owns an exhibition space that is different from a “white cube” in an art museum. In particular, the second floor exhibition hall has the characteristics of a living space. It retains the exquisite sense of the old house with curved door frames and decorative lines features preserved in the exhibition hall. Zhu Xiangyu keenly captures the features of the space. In order to create tension, he used charcoal to extend the painting beyond the frame, cut the frame with an ax to offer it a feeling of roughness and power. Also, two pieces of wood were carefully placed in the exhibition hall. On one hand, the woods, as metaphors of human limbs, echo with the paintings; On the other hand, the woods connect different works exhibited and enable the sensible “Electric Charges” to flow in the hall.

On the day of exhibition opening, Leo Gallery was honored to have invited the famous curator Huang Du, emerging art critic Wang Che and the participating artists to discuss on the theme of “Painting Generating”. For more details you may refer to the follow-up reports.

The exhibition runs till June 30th. You are welcomed to drop a visit and experience it all!