CAI GUO-QIANG in
In the twenty-first century
My work is sometimes like the poppy flower
It has this almost romantic side
But yet, it also represents a poison
Gun powder
From its very essence, you can see
so much of the power of the universe how we came to be.
You can express these grand ideas about the cosmos
Very epic and heroic,
but at the same time it's used for such destruction.
Gun powder possesses a physical danger for anyone who is near it.
But with time, you get to know the material.
First you have to accept that it's uncontrollable.
And then, work with it.
I've worked with the material so long,
that I've gained an understanding of how it works
My way of doing it is just to flow with the material.
To let it take me where it wants me to go.
So I continuously want it to give me problems.
Give me obstacles to overcome.
This whole process of making drawing is very much like lovemaking.
From the very beginning of laying down the paper,
it's like laying down the sheets on the bed.
And it's a very long process.
Always working towards a final goal.
And all the time there's this feeling that you just want it to explode.
to finish.
But you're afraid that maybe it's too early,
maybe it's not the best time yet,
maybe you need to work on it a little more.
And then afterwards, you either have great satisfaction
or you have disappointment as to your entire performance.
You can talk all day about the ancient philosophies and modern philosophies
art history, criticism, theory, subject matter, historical context,
contemporary, post-modernism, form, representation.
All these things can be discussed
but in the end,
it's really this on sight performance, so to speak,
that really makes a work.
What I'm using here is a sort of a fold out sketchbook
It's not so much a scroll, but traditionally it's
always been used for people to record their thoughts.
Almost as in a journal, or a diary format.
In Chinese,
we actually say: ''Reading a painting''
Reading a picture
Because it's actually page by page, section by section
That you're reading this.
Not just looking at it.
These 'folder books' are very similar in this aspect to the scrolls.
The longhand scrolls are very traditional, in Chinese painting.
Here I like to show you what my father has painted on silk.
A very long scroll.
Sometimes I see my explosion projects almost like these scrolls.
Ones you open it,
it opens up the universe, in that it seems boundless.
As the explosion project unfolds, it's like opening up the scroll.
But then it disappears.
And yet, it's pregnant with all kinds of possibilities.
What really influenced me the most, are these very tiny matchbox paintings
that my father used to make.
He would paint these small landscape paintings with his ink pen.
I saved some of these from that time.
When I was little and I would ask what he was painting.
He might point to one of them and say:
''Ow, this is the sea of our hometown.''
But then I would go back with him to our home village
and it was nothing like that.
From very early on I understood from these that art is not about what you say
It's about these other things that you don't say.
I wouldn't say that the entire exhibition at MASS MoCA is
like a long scrolls unfolding.
It links to my past.
And it's linked to my culture as well.
When I first saw the exhibition space
I felt that it was like a section of road
A very wide road, that's been transported here.
Further extending the idea of this path, or journey
Is very much like taking a walk along this path.
In the main gallery,
as the first car takes of
tumbling through the air in a very dreamlike fashion
it lands safely back on it's four wheels.
Undamaged
Unharmed
Is it just the repetition, it goes right back to the very first car again.
The video in Times Square also borrows the image of the car bomb.
This continues cycle suggest that something might or
might not have happened.
This illusion that we're seeing in front of us
Ever since September 11th
The idea of terrorism is ever so present.
Always on our minds
This work
obviously has some direct reference to these conditions that we live in now.
Looking at the work that I've done
I noticed that things are sticking out of or into objects a lot.
I think this has to do with my interest in explosion.
But it also has to do with the aesthetics of pain.
There is a very visual response that the audience has to the work.
They feel pain when they see the tigers
The tigers are realistically made
But they are completely fake.
It's a stage setting that you're entering into
It's through visual impact that you transmit these ideas
And it's through visual impact that this pain is felt.
You can actually elicit a very direct response from the audience
A very strong response.
This installation in Washington D.C.
The sunken boat with the broken ceramic pieces
Shows the power of destruction, the beauty of destruction.
The aesthetic of decay.
And in this way,
I feel that this work is quite close to some of the things
that I'm discussing in the pieces at MASS MoCA as well.
A number of years ago I went to a factory in Delhua for a visit
And I saw all of these statues that looked perfectly fine
But they were rejects.
Because of their imperfections, they're no longer considered diodes.
You know, I thought it was very strange
without these imperfections, these were figures that people worshiped.
They were send to thousands of homes, including my own home.
It seemed to arbitrary.
Here, I see them as artwork
They don't hold so much of a diodes power
But if I take one from here and put it in the studio
I think my emotions will shift very naturally.
This very fine line defines the nature of an object.
I really like to hang this up
It defies gravity
Because I think I don't like the heaviness of things.
The piece in São Paulo is obviously a plane made out of a vine.
We have these sharp objects confiscated from the São Paulo airport
stuck all over it.
Again it looks like it's infected with all this pain.
I travel all the time and I'm always flying in and out of airports
There are times when you just kind of have to stop yourself and think..
Do I have weapons in my pockets?
You know
Even nail clippers, I have a few confiscated.
So for this piece, we used all local materials.
And we borrowed all the pieces from the airport.
Behind all this is a very earnest and frank look at our society today.
And a cultural political issues that we have to deal with.
It really is an honest reflection of our world today.
It's easy for us to depict things of this physical world.
But it's very difficult to depict things that are not seen,
but that have a profound effect on us.
And that's something that I'm continuously exploring and trying to form.
I take a lot from the ancient Chinese philosophies.
These are very much infused in the art making process.
Maybe everything does not have to be resolved.
Sometimes you can allow uncertainties to exist.
The ever changing, never constant
These are the kinds of ideas to understand the world.
To learn more about Art:21, art in the twenty first century
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