2017, Vol., No.41

Journal of History of Modern Art 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 0.77

pISSN : 1598-7728 / eISSN : 2733-9793
https://journal.kci.go.kr/kahoma

This essay examines how the younger generation of Chinese contemporary artists and collectives used the alternative exhibition sites outside of art museums and galleries in the 1990s, the decade known for the Government’s oppressive policies against experimental arts in China, particularly after the notorious China/Avant-garde in 1989 until Shanghai Biennial in 2000. It also pays special attention to the 1990s as popular culture and consumerism became rapidly expanded in China; subsequently, an array of marketplaces such as stores, restaurants, and shopping centers became appropriated as the sites for art exhibitions. New History 1993: Mass Consumption (1993) by the New History Group, the exhibition held at Mcdonald, Beijing, and Art For Sale (1999) led by Xu Zhen, will be closely examined as each representing the earlier and latter types of unconventional art exhibitions. The emphasis, thus, rests upon highlighting unique political, social, and cultural contexts in which alternative types of art exhibitions arose in China, distinct from its western counterparts. Furthermore, it also highlights creative solutions that Chinese performance, media, and installation artists had devised by using marketplaces in order to avoid censorships as well as to expand their audiences within Chinese society.

Surveillance is a mode of visuality that is performed by the oppressive governing power. Globalization after the Cold War made a paradigm shift from panoptic surveillance to data surveillance. This study addresses artworks responsive to this shift. They resist state surveillance and focus on collection, record, and fabrication of data and information, rather than visual observation. In order to criticize the domestic surveillance during the Cold War, Margia Kramer dealt with the FBI secret file on Jean Seberg (1980), while Pam Skelton conducted Conspicuous Dwellings (2004-2007), a project on the Stasi file. Both are based on the disclosure of secret governmental documents on the domestic surveillance. Kramer exposed surveillance and character assassination of artists by the state institution in the 1960s and 1970s; Skelton revealed the network among places which had been established for surveillance on the populations. Laura Poitras, who worked on the problem of surveillance in the US after 9/11, reconstructs the panoptic surveillance within the context of data surveillance.

The thesis is a study about the project Earthworks: Land Reclamation as Sculpture (1979-1982) conducted in King County, Washington, USA. It was a public art project to transform the devastated site into Land Art, aiming to provide the selected artists with an opportunity to rehabilitate the technologically abused sites through art, while raising concerns over the local community environmental issues. The project consisted of 2 phases: Phase-1 was a Land Art to transform the damaged site into sculpture, and Phase-2 was designed to establish a mockup to showcase the theme of the Project. Robert Morris and Herbert Bayer were selected for Phase 1: Morris created the work Untitled to claim desolation caused by industrialization and Bayer designed the project Mill Creek Canyon Earthwork and established the Mill Creek Canyon Park that was used for an entertainment facility for local residents while taking a role of erosion control in the region. For Phase 2, six artists - Iain Baxter, Richard Fleischer, Lawrence Hanson, Mary Miss, Dennis Oppenheim, and Beverly Pepper - were chosen and their earthworks were contributed in the land rehabilitation project. Among the six artists, Beverly Pepper suggested a sculpture modeled after ancient monument “Tell” and Iain Baxter suggested a sculpture highlighting the function of art.