The Third Space in the Fourth World. Press information, 2002

Universes in Universe / Asia / China / The Third Space in the Fourth World
URL: http://universes-in-universe.de/asia/chn/txt/3rd-space/press.htm

The Third Space in the Fourth World

Eastlink Gallery in Shanghai, China presents the exhibition, 'The Third Space in the Fourth World' on Saturday 30 March 2002 at 3 pm. The exhibition will continue until 12 April 2002.

Jianren Zhao, a Chinese artist based in Amsterdam, has initiated the project 'The Third Space in the Fourth World' by inviting five artists from the Netherlands, all to varying degrees émigrés, to exhibit in Shanghai: Tiong Ang, Charlie Citron, Peter Lelliott, Renée Ridgway. Their collaboration with the five Chinese artists: Hu Jieming, Lu Chunsheng, Chen Shaoxiong, Zhang Peili and Qiu Zhijie will be shown in 'The Third Space', a conceptual space that refers to previously invented demographic terms, but ironically reapplies them.

All of the Dutch emigrés express the concept of the Fourth World as challenging the unrecognised distance or displacement involved within a hybrid art identity. Each artist in his or her own way conceptualises globalisation as a local state of mind that is often misunderstood within the historical and cultural discourse of an international art framework.

The commodification of Chinese art in this century may have originated from the west, but the values held by Chinese artists have been changed by a complex combination of forces: some local, some global, and so their meanings are not necessarily understood or contextualized by western arts' historical framework. 'The Fourth World' describes the existence between the influence of the west and the transformation of Chinese culture, and defines contemporary Chinese society. Not yet capitalism, no longer communism, this world is transitional.

'The Third Space in the Fourth World' might be then the ideological slippage between the understanding of cultural, historical and artistic positions within differing points of view and value systems. Communication need not create homogeneity and assimilation. Instead this could be the catalyst to examine the mutual understanding and acceptance of difference as a celebration of finite idioms and social practices of others that exist in the world.

Scheduled events at Eastlink Gallery:

Opening: Saturday, March 30, 2002 2pm-5pm
Symposium: Sunday, March 31, 2002 1pm

Guest speakers:
Li Xiaofeng, Wu Liang, Gu Chenfeng, Robert Morgan, Sebastián López

Robert Morgan teaches at Pratt Institute and The School of Visual Arts in NY, He was formerly professor of art criticism at The Rochester Institute of Technology and recently published the book, 'The End of the Art World' . He has published numerous articles and essays for Art in America, Terma Celeste and many other publications and institutions.

Sebastián López is the director of the Gate Foundation in Amsterdam. The Gate Foundation is a podium for non-western art that extends its activities to exhibitions, symposiums, and lectures in Amsterdam and abroad in the hope of furthering a greater appreciation for art and to reach a broader audience.

This project could be realized with the generous support of the Mondriaan Foundation, Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds, Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development and the Stichting Fonds voor Beeldende Kunsten.

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