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The scene within "People, Birds and Beasts" comes from a Confucian allegory of around 500 B.C. that contemplates separation, envy and human nature (“The Analects (‘Sayings’) XVIII”). An intricate traditional Chinese papercutting depicts a fishbowl with an LED inhabitant floating in green, bubbly waters. Under the cherry blossom branches in the vase, an avaricious kitten looms watchfully. A tiny bird hops restlessly from branch to branch above the bowl. Painstakingly crafted entirely from a single sheet with a bamboo knife, the art of papercutting or jianzhi dates back to the Eastern Han Dynasty. The use of traditional rice paper steeped in oolong tea gives the piece its unique brown finish, and its translucence allows the animated LED forms to show through. People, Birds and Beasts was conceived by the Shanghai-based art collective Liu Dao as a commentary on the state of Chinese society, where economic forces and the widening income gap increasingly pushes apart the different socio-economic segments of the country. As the goldfish bobs in circles around its bowl, both at once its secure haven as well as its limiting confinement, it envies the bird perched on its branch, seemingly free and utterly liberated – and yet completely vulnerable to the vagaries of the external environment. Both sectors of society appear absolutely disparate and distinct from each other, and yet they are linked by the unifying theme of human envy and isolation. The blend of the traditional artform of the papercutting with new media of LED serves also to complete the story of contrasts and disparity in modern Chinese society. [Ching Ling Loo] |
