(This short piece originally ran in China Daily's 60th Anniversary of the PRC issue)
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2009-09/30/content_8756551.htm
A lot has been made of China’s commitment to the so-called creative industries in recent years. In Shanghai alone there have been so many new creative parks, zones, hubs, lifestyle malls etc. popping up that it’s hard to keep track anymore. But what is the real commitment to creativity in China? And actually, how should we go about measuring it?
One way to look at it is through the young creatives themselves, who will be leading the way forward in the years to come – they are the ones who have made the decision to pursue art, writing, design, fashion and film making over time honored, left brain professions like engineering, law and finance. It’s not the easy choice. It’s much harder to tell your parents in China that you want to be a designer than in America, where you might become the next Andy Warhol. There, your parents will have seen an artistic spark in you early on and either encouraged it, or at least accepted it finally, knowing that you can still have a fine career in design due to the creative industries. But that idea is just now taking hold in China.
Real creativity needs encouragement and nurturing from family, society, and institutions. The emergence of creative industries like marketing, fashion and event planning offers serious careers to young Chinese kids with an artistic degree. With all the pressure in China to make money first, it’s hard for these kids coming out of school to view their work as a higher calling yet, one that is above the rat race. Unless they are pursuing a classical career, no kid who wants to make music will be taken seriously. They’ll be told to ‘get a real job’. For now, a real job will be coming from the creative industries. But watch out, things are changing quickly and the next Andy Warhol will probably come from the Chinese post-90’s generation.
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Ron Wong Review
RON WONG’S FIRST SOLO SHOW AT M50 IS A SHANGHAI SURPRISE
(Long version of China Daily review)
Shanghai artist Ron Wong opened her first solo show last weekend at Moganshan lu’s M-Art center. This gifted young artist who grew up in Singapore and got her master degree from Shanghai University College of Fine Arts has delivered a show that features watercolors, sketches and oil paintings and captures a side of Shanghai that is at once familiar and inscrutable - like Shanghai itself.
To the outsider Shanghai is a mad jumble of energy, dialect and some of the most happily neurotic people in the world – all of which make perfect sense to local Shanghainese. But it’s with an insider’s eye that Ms. Wong has lovingly captured local street scenes and simple caricatures. In the series of three subway scenes called Monday, Tuesday and Weekend Train we see crowded trains packed full of people who are all caught up in their own little worlds, detached even as they deal with the overcrowding and stress of their everyday lives. Every character in the hectic scenes plays a part in the human drama – no one is left out. There is a sense of knowing humor in these paintings that can only come from a curious and loving eye.
When I first looked at the caricature paintings I thought, ‘Oh, I’ve seen this before’ but they held my attention and realized I wasn’t in any way bored as I returned for a third perusal of a seemingly innocuous scene of two old neighborhood guys playing Chinese chess. Looking on is a peanut gallery of people you might find any day in Fuxing park, for example, but each face is alive with its own secrets, boredom or joy. These people, unlike many simply ironic or absurd scenes you often find in contemporary Chinese art, have humor, depth and soul.
The set of two large canvases entitled Oldies Love pits four senior citizen would-be Romeos looking across (to the other canvas) at four obviously pleased Shanghai aunties. We don’t know these people (possibly Ron Wong does) but again I felt compelled to study them longer, down to the small details of one man’s salt and pepper chin stubble, and another’s well-worn pork pie hat and neat little hipster mustache. On the other side I was equally curious about the vigorous beauty of a long nosed grandmother with short straight hair and her shy stooped over friend in a permed hairdo and a yellow sweater. These are Shanghai people, clearly, and yet they have a warm universality about them – they could have just as easily been old people in Central Park or the Jardin de Luxembourg.
The second part of the show is a series of landscapes that include some Chinese country scenes as well as a few stark Shanghai cityscapes. Again Ron has captured a certain feeling that one instantly recognizes to be local, with economical use of phone lines and roof tiles. For anyone who has ever looked out of their Shanghai apartment window in winter and wondered if the sun will ever reappear, you will sense time and place instantly. The non-urban landscapes are distinguished by their geometric shapes and swirls, plus the confident use of color and depth. One minor disappointment is the choice of the matting and framing for some of the oils. I think they all would have been better complimented with simple black or wood frames than the faux gold ones used, although I did wonder if this may have been a humorous nod to local tastes. In any case, the landscapes play second fiddle to the city scenes, but should be by no means overlooked, just as the small sketches in the front room of the gallery also hold a few pleasant surprises, again with human faces being the most compelling.
The gallery notes at the entrance explained that these works represent Ron Wong’s university years in Shanghai, with simple scenes from her everyday life. For any curious person who has lived in this city I would venture to say that her impressions go deep into the heart of it, and touch all you have seen with humor and a loving grace that is not in any way ordinary.
(Long version of China Daily review)
Shanghai artist Ron Wong opened her first solo show last weekend at Moganshan lu’s M-Art center. This gifted young artist who grew up in Singapore and got her master degree from Shanghai University College of Fine Arts has delivered a show that features watercolors, sketches and oil paintings and captures a side of Shanghai that is at once familiar and inscrutable - like Shanghai itself.
To the outsider Shanghai is a mad jumble of energy, dialect and some of the most happily neurotic people in the world – all of which make perfect sense to local Shanghainese. But it’s with an insider’s eye that Ms. Wong has lovingly captured local street scenes and simple caricatures. In the series of three subway scenes called Monday, Tuesday and Weekend Train we see crowded trains packed full of people who are all caught up in their own little worlds, detached even as they deal with the overcrowding and stress of their everyday lives. Every character in the hectic scenes plays a part in the human drama – no one is left out. There is a sense of knowing humor in these paintings that can only come from a curious and loving eye.
When I first looked at the caricature paintings I thought, ‘Oh, I’ve seen this before’ but they held my attention and realized I wasn’t in any way bored as I returned for a third perusal of a seemingly innocuous scene of two old neighborhood guys playing Chinese chess. Looking on is a peanut gallery of people you might find any day in Fuxing park, for example, but each face is alive with its own secrets, boredom or joy. These people, unlike many simply ironic or absurd scenes you often find in contemporary Chinese art, have humor, depth and soul.
The set of two large canvases entitled Oldies Love pits four senior citizen would-be Romeos looking across (to the other canvas) at four obviously pleased Shanghai aunties. We don’t know these people (possibly Ron Wong does) but again I felt compelled to study them longer, down to the small details of one man’s salt and pepper chin stubble, and another’s well-worn pork pie hat and neat little hipster mustache. On the other side I was equally curious about the vigorous beauty of a long nosed grandmother with short straight hair and her shy stooped over friend in a permed hairdo and a yellow sweater. These are Shanghai people, clearly, and yet they have a warm universality about them – they could have just as easily been old people in Central Park or the Jardin de Luxembourg.
The second part of the show is a series of landscapes that include some Chinese country scenes as well as a few stark Shanghai cityscapes. Again Ron has captured a certain feeling that one instantly recognizes to be local, with economical use of phone lines and roof tiles. For anyone who has ever looked out of their Shanghai apartment window in winter and wondered if the sun will ever reappear, you will sense time and place instantly. The non-urban landscapes are distinguished by their geometric shapes and swirls, plus the confident use of color and depth. One minor disappointment is the choice of the matting and framing for some of the oils. I think they all would have been better complimented with simple black or wood frames than the faux gold ones used, although I did wonder if this may have been a humorous nod to local tastes. In any case, the landscapes play second fiddle to the city scenes, but should be by no means overlooked, just as the small sketches in the front room of the gallery also hold a few pleasant surprises, again with human faces being the most compelling.
The gallery notes at the entrance explained that these works represent Ron Wong’s university years in Shanghai, with simple scenes from her everyday life. For any curious person who has lived in this city I would venture to say that her impressions go deep into the heart of it, and touch all you have seen with humor and a loving grace that is not in any way ordinary.
The Best of Both Worlds
As I prepare for my fourth Chinese New Year in Shanghai I think I am finally getting the hang of living life in this fast forward city. I recently moved into Jing An district after a year in exile…sorry, I mean Hongkou. I have nothing against Hongkou personally, but until they finish the Bund tunnel project I think I would rather help dig it (with a gardening spade) than sit in any more mind numbing Haining Lu traffic. But why look backwards? It’s Chinese New Year, and a new beginning. Gong Xi Fa Cai, I say, and a happy Xin Nian Kuai Le to all!
Back to my new apartment. I have moved to nearly fashionable Dagu Lu, a road whose name will resonate deeply with all lovers of ethnic cuisine, massages and DVD’s. I now live in the swanky Zhong Kai Cheng Shi Zhi Guang (a mouthful in any language). Well, sort of. Technically speaking I’m next door to the aforementioned mouthful. Don’t get me wrong, we share the same address, but that’s pretty much where the similarity ends. You see, when they razed the city block of hu tongs a few years ago to make way for progress, the developers did something unusual: they built two extra high rises for all the displaced Dagu denizens to live in, right next to the new complex. And that’s where I live now.
It’s a nice life over here I must say, in my little hu tong in the sky. And I’m settling right in with the locals too. On the day I moved in there was a lot of commotion and kibitzing among the guards, staff and residents as my trusty Da Zhong rental truck backed into the parking lot. A new laowai in the building was a bit of news, but of more interest seemed to be the contents of the truck. By the time it was half empty there were a good twenty people standing around commenting and smiling at me good naturedly, pointing at my inscrutable paintings and furniture (I scored big points for a few antique Chinese pieces). One framed print was from a student art show I curated last year, and the message was in Chinese, which brought sighs of approval and prompted one august fellow in thick pajamas and running shoes to give me the thumbs up. I was all right in his book anyway. When it came time to move everything upstairs (to the top floor thank you very much) the building ayi was very animated, and made a big show of blocking off the elevator for me exclusively until we’d finished. She was on my side too it seemed.
I soon realized that I was living among the real natives of Shanghai. That first day my new next door neighbor, an elderly lady wearing five layers (that I could see) to combat the cold, knocked on my door to voice displeasure that I had left a few end tables of the landlord’s outside my door against a common wall between our apartments. Through a combination of mime, broken Chinese and charades I tried to explain that the end tables weren’t mine, and the landlord would be coming for them soon. But she was unimpressed, so I somewhat grudgingly shifted them over to the other side by my door. I’m new to the building, so I wanted to make nice. At this point her antique husband teetered in from the elevators with his equally vintage Forever bicycle. It turns out she was defending his time honored parking space.
As a New Yorker I know what it means to have quirky neighbors. It can be trying, annoying, even enraging – but it can also be fun, hilarious and heartwarming, and let’s face it, it’s what gives a building character. In every building I’ve ever lived, it’s not the location or any aspect of the apartment that I remember most. It’s Crazy Lenny chasing kids with a baseball bat, or Mrs. Z who sat in the first floor street window and would always ask everyone to get her stuff from the deli. When I lived in Chinatown there was an old lady who walked up and down the stairs all day muttering in some incomprehensible dialect, glowering at anyone she didn’t know. We called her the security guard.
So now I wake up each morning to the sounds of my neighbor tinkering endlessly with his bike, upside down, wheels off, parts everywhere. Every day he does this, but I don’t mind. It’s his space more than mine, and I accept that. He cooks fish for his wife every night and it smells and I can deal with that too. When I was getting rid of an old desk I didn’t want I gave it to them, and when I couldn’t find a certain type of light bulb and asked her, she presented me with two brand new ones and a fa piao for eight kuai the very next morning. We are neighbors now, and I’m living in the hu tong in the sky, surely the best of both worlds.
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