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| December 2012 | |
Hung Liu Studio Newsletter
Happy & Gay, Upcoming Bay Area Exhibitions, Travels, Friends, Studio Teaser, Publications
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Welcome to the End-of-Year 2012 Hung Liu Studio Newsletter. It features Hung's current exhibition at the Rena Bransten Gallery in San Francisco, "Happy & Gay." A list of three major Bay Area museum exhibitions is also provided. Hung traveled to China in October, and gave a lecture at the UCLA Hammer Museum about Alison Klayman's new documentary on Ai Weiwei, "Never Sorry." A recent essay appears in Feminist Studies by Rebecca Jennison - well researched and clearly written. Links for other books may be found as well.
Enjoy the newsletter!
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Exhibitions
Happy & Gay Rena Bransten Gallery San Francisco November 15, 2012 - January 12, 2013
Hung's new body of paintings are based on the patriotic stories in Chinese picture books, or xiaorenshu, from her childhood. Like little graphic novellas, the picture books tell patriotic stories of heroic figures and deeds, but their official realism is tempered by the individual styles of artists who, though in the service of the state during the Maoist era, were once trained in traditional Chinese art. Like Dick & Jane primers for American children during the 1950s, the images of Chinese workers, peasants, and soldiers building a better nation are tender lessons in totalitarian socialization. Painted in Liu's dissoluble style, however, and in a brighter, more graphic palette, her new paintings become knowingly - but not merely - ironic.  | |
Happy & Gay: Star Family, 2012
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Happy & Gay: Father, 2012
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Happy & Gay: Thanks Mom, 2012
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Fortune Reader, 2012
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Upcoming Bay Area Exhibitions Hung Liu: Offerings Mills College Art Museum January 23 - March 17, 2013 Summoning Ghosts: the Art of Hung Liu Oakland Museum of California March 16 - June 30, 2013 catalogue available through OMCA and UC Press Questions from the Sky: New Work by Hung Liu San Jose Museum of Art June 6 - September 8, 2013 |
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Events
Lecture: Never Sorry, Alison Klayman's acclaimed film about Ai Weiwei
Hammer Museum, UCLA
September 24 2012
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Skyping with Ai Weiwei
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At the Rena Bransten Gallery Opening for Happy and Gay November 15, 2012
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With the picture books
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Leafing through the pages
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With Mills College students and Cissie Swig
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Friends
Hung Liu's life experience, complex personal history, understanding of female identity, sensitivity to immigrant culture, and vigorous powers of expression have made her a one-of-a-kind artist. Ai Weiwei November 2012
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With Ai Weiwei in Beijing
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With one of Ai Weiwei's cats
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With Eric Fischl at the San Jose Museum of Art
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With Amy Evans McClure and Michael McClure
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At the Vulcan Cafe with Michael Hall, Steuart Pittman, and Andy Witrak Explaining the new paintings to the Rena Bransten crew.
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Travels
Beijing, China - the 798 Arts District October 2012
The 798 Arts District in Bejiing, which began a dozen years ago as a place for artists to establish affordable studios, quickly became the Soho/Chelsea of China. Filled with galleries, cafes, studios, and anchored by the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, 798 is at the heart of the international pulse for the contemporary Chinese art scene.
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Studio Teaser
New etchings from Paulson Bott Press ...
From the studio ...
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Warm Off the Press Feminist Studies Painting Life Back into History: Hung Liu's "Hard-Won" Feminist Art by Rebecca Jennison 
That lives are made and unmade at the intersection of history and memory is a theme that guides Rebecca Jennison's "Painting Life Back into History-Hung Liu's 'Hard-Won' Feminist Art." In this passionate discussion of Chinese American artist Hung Liu's work, Jennison invites us to engage the complexities of this intersection. Drawing on in-depth interviews and a sixteen-year love of the artist's work, Jennison examines the prominence that the thematic concerns of history, identity, citizenship, and memory hold for Liu. Liu's own border crossings of national and political systems, coupled with her own fractured sense of belonging in both China and the United States, have all inspired many of her well- known pieces such as Resident Alien, Strange Fruit, and Where is Mao? For Jennison, Liu's art is emblematic of what it means to see "history as a verb"-a phrase that Liu uses to evoke history as a living artifact that "is always flowing forward." Sensitive to this dynamism in Liu's art, Jennison explores both the inter-temporality of Liu's work and the power of her creative voice to recraft history and memory. Jennison's discussion reveals an artist who demonstrates a profound commitment to ensuring that women's voices and memories will eventually comprise what we know as history.
Suzanne Raitt and Michelle Rowley, for the editorial collective
Magazines American Art: Smithsonian American Art Museum
an interview with Hung Liu by Joann Moser
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Leap: The International Art Magazine of Contemporary China
a visual history and commentary by Phil Tinari
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Books
Contemporary Chinese Art:
Primary Documents
edited by Wu Hung
This MOMA publication brings together, translates, and contextualizes primary documents that are pertinent to a deeper understanding of recent artistic practice in China, but which were not previously available in the English language. Hung Liu is featured in the text.
Hung Liu: Great Granary
(Tai Cang 太倉)
Wu Hung
essays by Xu Bing, Sui Jianguo, Yu Hong, Liu Xiaodong, Li Songsong, & Wei Lin
Xin Beijing Art Gallery, Beijing
Timezone 8, Beijing
Books available at Timezone 8 and Amazon.com |
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Thank You!
Hung Liu Studio |
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