cai guo qiang: hanging out in the museum

cultural melting bath: project for the 20th century 1997. 18 taihu rocks, hot tub with hydrotherapy jets, bathwater infused with herbs, and pine trees collection of fonds national d’art contemporain photo by hiro ihara courtesy cai studio

currently on display at the fine arts museum, taipei is the retrospective exhibition of chinese born, new york based artist cai guo qiang. the show features numerous works including day and night and toroko gorge, large drawings created from explosions of gunpowder on sheets of paper covered with stencils. he initially began working with gunpowder to foster spontaneity and confront the suppression that he felt from the controlled artistic tradition and social climate in china at the time.

also on display is his ‘head on’ installation consisting of 99 life sized wolves running in a high arc against walls.

be it creating elaborate installations, drawing his explosive art on paper, or illuminating the sky with colorful fountains, bridges or dragons, all of cai guo-qiang’s works combine chinese culture with western, post-conceptual thought.

‘people say you can hang out with a pretty girl or hang out at an internet café. in essence, the term ‘hang out’ means to enjoy something.’ – cai guo-qiang explains the title of his new show.

cai quo qiang ‘hanging out at the museum’ will be on view until february 21, 2010.

‘tree with yellow blossoms’, 2009 gunpowder on paper, mounted on wood as 4 panel folding screen emmanuel perrotin galerie, paris france photo by i-hua lee, courtesy cai studio

cai guo qiang creating the gunpowder drawing day and night, taipei, 2009 photo by on works

‘head on’ installation consisting of 99 life sized replicas of wolves and glass walls wolves: gauze, resin and painted commissioned by deutsche bank at deutsche guggenheim, berlin, 2006 photo by hiro ihara courtesy cai studio

‘head on’ installation shot deutsche guggenheim, 2006 photo mathias schormann courtesy cai guo qiang

cai guo-qiang was born in 1957 in quanzhou city, fujian province, china. the son of a historian and painter, cai was trained in stage design at the shanghai drama institute. his work has, since the outset, been scholarly and often politically charged.