EXHIBITION OF CONTEMPORARY CHINESE LANDSCAPES OPENS AT LYMAN ALLYN ART MUSEUM
https://www.lymanallyn.org/exhibition-of-contemporary-chinese-landscapes-opens-at-lyman-allyn-art-museum/
New London – Chinese Landscape Rethought, a new group exhibition opening at the Lyman Allyn Art Museum, presents a rethinking of Chinese landscape or shanshui (“mountain-water”) art through the convergence of traditional Chinese ink painting and contemporary experimental art. The exhibition will be on view March 29 through June 9, 2019. It was organized by guest curator, Dr. Yibing Huang, Associate Professor of Chinese and Curator of the Chu-Griffis Asian Art Collection at Connecticut College.
Eleven prominent contemporary Chinese artists, some based in New York and some in China, but all widely traveled and internationally exhibited, offer eclectic approaches to inheriting the rich Chinese landscape art tradition yet also disrupting its boundaries. The exhibited works vary in different styles and media including ink painting, oil painting, photography, installation, performance, and video art. In combination, the selected artists and artworks shed further light on a wide range of themes including landscape traditions in the East and West, reinvented language and abstracted nature, suppressed histories and voices, environmental crisis, dislocated cultural identities, and global contemporary art and politics.
The artists featured in Chinese Landscape Rethought are Cai Dongdong (蔡东东), Cui Fei (崔斐), Gu Wenda (谷文达), Guo Zhen (郭桢), Mao Xiaojian (毛晓剑), Wang Ai (王艾), Wang Mansheng (王满晟), Wu Yi (吴毅), Xu Bing (徐冰), Zhang Hongtu (张宏图), and Zheng Lianjie (郑连杰).
The opening reception will be on Thursday, March 28 from 5:00 – 7:00 PM. Museum members are free, and non-members are $10. Please RSVP to 860.443.2545 ext. 2129.
In conjunction with the exhibition, the Lyman Allyn will host a symposium with the exhibited artists on Friday, April 12 from 1:00 – 5:00 PM. The artists will discuss how through their different artistic approaches and personal backgrounds they make a new contemporary Chinese landscape that is universally relevant. This event is free to the public. Please RSVP to 860.443.2545 ext. 2129, space is limited.
A Chinese Brush Painting Workshop instructed by Eva Leong will be held on Saturday, April 27from 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM. Participants will gather in the studio for a full day workshop to learn about the mindfulness and discipline of Chinese painting history, traditions, and techniques. All materials are included. Museum members are $80, and non-members are $90. Please RSVP to 860.443.2545 ext. 2129, space is limited.
In addition, the Lyman Allyn will hold a curator’s talk with Dr. Yibing Huang on Tuesday, May 14from 5:30 – 7:00 PM. Huang is the Associate Professor of Chinese and Curator of the Chu-Griffis Asian Art Collection at Connecticut College. For his curator’s talk, he will discuss the rich tradition of Chinese landscape and offer an in-depth examination of the featured contemporary Chinese artists. Museum members are $10 and non-members $15. Please RSVP to 860.443.2545 ext.2129.
This exhibition is supported by the Frank Loomis Palmer Fund, Bank of America, Trustee; the Department of Economic and Community Development, Connecticut Office of the Arts; and the Connecticut College – Lyman Allyn Enders Exhibition Fund.
Check the museum website at www.lymanallyn.org and the museum’s Facebook, Twitter and Instagram page for updates. Tours of the exhibition are available for groups. To schedule tours, call Director of Education Caitlin Healy at 860.443.2545 ext. 2110 or e-mail healy@lymanallyn.org. For more information or to request images, please contact Rebecca Dawson at 860.443.2545, ext. 2112 or at dawson@lymanallyn.org.
About the Lyman Allyn Art Museum
The Lyman Allyn Art Museum welcomes visitors from New London, southeastern Connecticut and all over the world. Established in 1926 by a gift from Harriet Allyn in memory of her seafaring father, the Museum opened the doors of its beautiful neo-classical building surrounded by 12 acres of green space in 1932. Today it presents a number of changing exhibitions each year and houses a fascinating collection of over 17,000 objects from ancient times to the present; artworks from Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe, with particularly strong collections of American paintings, decorative arts and Victorian toys and doll houses.
The museum is located at 625 Williams Street, New London, Connecticut, exit 83 off I-95. The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10:00 am – 5:00 pm, Sundays 1:00 – 5:00 pm; closed Mondays and major holidays. For more information call 860.443.2545, ext. 2129 or visit us on Facebook or the web at: www.lymanallyn.org.