[BCMA] Nanaimo Art Gallery presents: Gu Xiong "Waterscapes: Migration along the Vancouver Island, Fraser and Yangzi Rivers' September 9, 2011 to January 7, 2012

[Moderated BCMA subscriber listserv.]

Coming up at the Nanaimo Art Gallery
900 Fifth Street, Entrance 5D, Nanaimo
Waterscapes: Migration along the Vancouver Island, Fraser and Yangzi Rivers
Gu Xiong
September 9, 2011 - January 7, 2012
Opening Friday, September 9th from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm
Free Artist's Talk: Friday, September 30 at noon
Free Docent Led Exhibition Tours: Saturday, October 22nd at 1:00pm &
Saturday, November 19th at 1:00pm

The Nanaimo Art Gallery, at 900 Fifth Street, entrance 5D, is honoured to
present well known artist, Gu Xiong's mixed-media installation entitled,
Waterscapes: Migration along the Vancouver Island, Fraser and Yangzi Rivers
from September 9, 2011 - January 7, 2012.

The goal of the project is to integrate community-engaged visual arts
production with theoretical and ethonographic research on migration in order
ignite discussion amongst migrant communities and rethink the spaces of
contemporary global flows. In particular, the exhibition has included images
from Victoria Chinatown, Harling point Chinese Cemetery, Victoria Chinese
Public school, Nanaimo China Steps, Nanaimo Chinese Cemetery and Cumberland
Chinatown. It focus on the role of waterways (oceans, lakes, rivers) in
shaping migration flows along the Vancouver Island, Fraser River of Canada
and the Yangzi River of China.  
In response to the increasingly multidirectional nature of contemporary
migration, existing geographic frameworks have moved away from
center/periphery or here/there paradigms to focus on themes of mobility and
to develop theoretical frameworks based on global circuits, networks,
interstitial zones or border crossings. (Papastergiadis, 2000; Clifford,
1997; Appadurai, 1996) Some studies have extended these debates by exploring
the potential of using seas and ocean basins as frameworks of historical
analysis, citing the central role of trans oceanic relationships and
exchanges in the shaping of world regions and identities (Carlson, 2002;
Steinberg, 1999; Bentley, 1999). Waterscapes extends these frameworks to
include rivers. It explores the contemporary and historical meaning of
waterscapes in the context of large scale migrations in/to Canada and China.
	
Xiong explains his motivations: "As children we always loved to fold paper
boats and float them down the stream. We believed that they carried our
hopes for the future, especially for going out into the world, into unknown
places. This work carries forward the idea of migrations, including my own
from China to Canada, by bringing the Yangtze and Fraser rivers together
across the Pacific. Both rivers are formed by smaller rivers joining
together as they flow towards the ocean. In my experience, they signify the
coming together of peoples and cultures.

For me, there were no bridges to help me cross these rivers. I learned that
you have to jump into the river and swim a long distance to experience
another culture, and to be open to benefiting from differences. There is
conflict in that process. I have asked myself, How can I bring the two main
rivers in my life together? The answer: I have to become like a river
myself-a river of migration, a river of transcultural identities, a river of
change and uncertainty-in order to bring these forces into a new global
space."

Gu Xiong, a multi-media artist from China now lives in Canada, works with
painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, photography, video, digital
imagery, text, performance art and installation. 
Xiong received his BFA and MFA degrees from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute
in Chongqing, China. In Canada, he twice attended the Banff Centre for the
Arts as artist-in-residence, and in addition to many other colleges and
universities in Canada, the United States and China. He has served on Canada
Council, the Governor General Awards Jury for Visual Arts, Media Art and
Architecture, Canada Council Visual Art Grant Jury, Seattle Arts Commission
Jury, BC Arts Council Jury, and Vancouver Foundation Jury. As Associate
Professor in the Department of Art History, Visual Art, and Theory at the
University of British Columbia, Gu Xiong is engaged in the disciplines of
installation, painting, drawing, photography and contemporary art theory.
He has exhibited nationally and internationally including more than 40 solo
exhibitions and three public art commissions. He has participated in over 80
prominent national and international group exhibitions including Border
Zones: New Art Across Cultures, (Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver, 2010);
Art Is Nothing - 798 Art Festival (Beijing, China); Post Avant-grade Chinese
Contemporary Art - Four Directions of the New Era (Hong Kong, 2007. His work
is represented in the collections of the National Gallery of Canada, the
China National Museum of Fine Arts, and the Vancouver Art Gallery, among
many other museums and private collections.
Xiong's practice centers on the creation of a hybrid identity arising from
the integration of different cultural origins. Through the critical angle of
visual art, his work encompasses sociology, geography, economics, politics,
and literature, as well as the dynamics of globalization, local culture and
identity politics, through which he constitutes an amalgamation of multiple
cultural histories and seeks to create an entirely new identity. The
construction of a new level of being is Gu Xiong's primary interest.
For more information please view www.nanaimoartgallery.com or contact
250-740-6350 or info at nanaimogallery.ca

 

	


 
 
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