Today I gave a talk at T Art Space (bookshop, café, workshop, and gallery space) run by Wang Yingjie and Hanlan. The first audience members to arrive are three young Chongqing girls who hope to study at University of the Arts, London. They are derisive of the education system in China. They say they like the UK very much, but none of them have been there previously and when I ask for references they say they like British movies, but cannot translate the names of which ones. I tell them that Yanyan’s students are very complimentary about his teaching, and suggest perhaps that he takes individual responsibility. This gets me thinking that perhaps this is one good consequence of a sick system, individuals within the institution have to take responsibility. In the UK it occurs to me that no-one takes any responsibility, you can always shirk blame onto the institution.
This is the second talk I’ve given since arriving and it went much better than the first attempt due to shortening my presentation to allow more discussion as well as a better translator. In the poster I had welcomed the audience to bring material such as catalogues, images and writing to contribute to a discussion concerning the art scene in Chongqing. Nobody produced any material although luckily we were in a bookshop, and I had also bought half a suitcase of ephemera (press releases, pamphlets, flyers) from London, collected every press release in sight during my time in Beijing and artists and curators in both Beijing and Chongqing have been incredibly generous in gifting me catalogues of their work. I distributed the ephemera for people to browse through while we settled down ready for my presentation.
I began by discussing my initial interest in art education via working with autodidacts Islington Mill Art Academy in 2009, then how psychoanalYSL have performed a sincere and entertaining reflection of the trends which surround them whilst studying at Goldsmiths. I showed some images of this year’s graduate shows at Royal College of Art, Royal Academy and Slade all in London, my findings so far from research undertaken in China, and some thoughts on how Chinese contemporary art is curated in the west. I show images of the clay Ai Weiwei head made by psychoanalYSL and glance round for looks of disapproval, but I still haven’t got the hang of reading people.
I field some general questions but the real meat arrives when a British man working at Chongqing University asks me about regional difference. I reflect this question back at the audience, citing that I’ve found massive loyalty in Sichuan province but am not best qualified to answer. I was glad to see Tian Meng, curator at the gallery we will exhibit at sitting at the far side of the table from me take his cue to speak. He is a serious man, committed to the art scene in Chongqing and I sense he’s keen I feed back positive things about it when I return to the UK. Since his gallery in Chongqing, Ceiling Space opened just under a year ago in September 2010 he has worked mostly with artists from Sichuan Fine Art Institute, such as Li Young, the artist currently showing with him. He hopes to take risks and probe the 3,000 year history of the region by asking what the value of this history is for young artists.
A researcher of Arts Organisations in Chongqing has many questions for me, but I’m more interested in listening to what he has to say than answering them. He says Chongqing has only recently begun to develop organisations in the last 10 years and there is no clear policy concerning art education, so these discussions are important. Yanyan is questioned by this man concerning the government’s role in the cultural life of Chongqing. Yanyan says it’s difficult to create a mood for his organisation at the moment, but this is more the problem of people than the Government. Also, the media need to cooperate, and organisations need to collaborate with one another. Fairly obvious stuff but needless to say important.
We’re held up by a storm and have dinner in tunnel.
References:
www.islingtonmillartacademy.blogspot.com/
