Included work:
QIU Zhijie
China b. 1969
Lhasa Is Far Away, America Is Far Away, 2007
9 photographs; 2 mani stones; 1 video; 1 map
Courtesy the artist and Long March Space, Beijing
¡®The West site of Sakya Temple¡¯ from Lhasa Is Far Away, America Is Far Away, 2007
Performance, Photography
Qiu Zhijie has been traveling to Tibet over the past few years in an ongoing art project that can be understood as a journey, a pilgrimage of ideas, a collection of factual evidences. In Lhasa Is Far Away, America Is Far Away (2007) and A Railway from Lhasa to Kathmandu (2006¨C07), the artist retraces the steps of the first historic Tibet explorer of the 19th century, of the pundit Nain Singh. Furthermore, he references the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, which opened on July 1st 2006, and now connects Lhasa to the Chinese railway system, a symbolic and infrastructural exploit with lasting impact. In Lhasa Is Far Away, America Is Far Away, Qiu Zhijie created stones that resemble traditional Tibetan mani stones (an instrument of Buddhist prayer: stones inscribed with mantra and usually placed on cairns along a pilgrimage route) with the sentences ¡°Lhasa if far away¡± and ¡°America is far away¡± inscribed in Tibetan on them. By leaving them at sites along his journey from Lhasa to Kathmandu, Qiu Zhijie addresses one¡¯s perception of distance, and hints at the interwoven relationship between real and perceived distance.
Click here for Qiu Zhijie¡¯s 2007 exhibition at Long March Space
Exhibition Abstract:
A Question of Evidence presents work by a selection of artists and cultural practitioners that engages with or comments upon the difficulty of creating, collecting, and disseminating evidence-based source material around issues such as identity politics, the suppression of human rights, democratic reform, and attempts to restrict free expression and representation. As ¡°narrations of urgency¡±, the works in the exhibition often present multiple perspectives on conflicted or rapidly changing realities.
Participating Artists:
Amar Kanwar (India), Raqs Media Collective (India), Ritu Sarin & Tenzing Sonam (India/Tibetan in Exile), Nikolaus Hirsch & Michel M¨¹ller (Germany) in collaboration with the Cybermohalla Ensemble (India), Marine Hugonnier (France/UK), Pak Sheung Chuen (Hong Kong), Heman Chong (Singapore), Khin Khin Su (Burma), Gonkar Gyatso (Tibetan in Exile/UK), Qiu Zhijie (China)
With a special project by Do Ho Suh
Long March Space
798 Art District, 4 Jiuxianqiao Lu
Chaoyang District, Beijing
Phone: +86 (0)10 5978 9768
Fax: +86 (0)10 5978 9764
Contact: lm@longmarchspace.com
www.longmarchspace.com
|
