LOVE AIJING: Solo Exhibition curated by Chen Lusheng, China Art Museum, Shanghai, China

"LOVE AIJING"

Itinerant exhibition of Ai Jing's complete works at China Art Museum of Shanghai, China

1.     Opening ceremony of itinerant exhibition "LOVE AIJING"

On May 25, 2014, the itinerant exhibition "LOVE AIJING" opened at the China Art Museum of Shanghai. This exhibition lasted from May 25, 2014 to June 29, 2014 and was curated by Chen Lusheng. One year after her solo exhibition "I LOVE AIJING" at the National Museum of China on November 19, 2012, Ai Jing created new works as a sublimation following her installation "My Mother and My Hometown", this exhibition focused on her new easel painting "I LOVE COLOR" series which was closely related to the former. Ai Jing combine painting technique with concept, which is a brave probe; Painting language is used in the symbol "LOVE" while blazing colors gave a musical rhythm to the work. Ai Jing realized a lot during the creation process and further explored her talent and artistic nature. For her, it was the rarest treasure to be brave in her artistic expression, and as imaginative as a child. Another series of easel work "Mr. R" is an intricate expression of color blocks, this series is Ai Jing's tribute to Mark Rothko whom she admire. However she found that "color blocks are dangerous" and would not try again, because Rothko is the one and is unsurpassable.

Ai Jing's new installation "Once upon A Time in Yanfen Street" was also exhibited. This work reconstructe Ai Jing's childhood home in Shenyang city, where she spent her childhood. She played games with friends and sang for neighbors, there was her first stage; Ai Jing says, "It is where my dream started". This installation is imprinted with the trace of time when people sang boldly "Unity is power". Twenty years before, Ai Jing wrote a song called "Once upon A Time in Yanfen Street" and told her childhood's story in this street. Today, she presents this visual image with an installation. It was like two sisters echoing with each other across the river of time.

This exhibition at the China Art Museum was supported by the Shanghai authorities. Director Shi Dawei said, Ai Jing's rambling among painting, installation, music, architecture and literature and her transition of identity showed the comprehensiveness of her art. Visual-audio experience and participation during the exhibition expanded the means of expression and created new change for viewer-art relationship; This is what China Art Museum proposes, by using various ways of expression and communication, art become tridimensional and integrated, and more artistic experiences was then transferred to the public. Art is becoming a life style for the public.

The press conference of "LOVE AIJING" took place at the China Art Museum. Special guests in attendance included Chen Lusheng, the curator of the exhibition and Vice-Director of the National Museum of China; Ding Zonghao, Deputy Chief of the Publicity Department of Liaoning Province; Li Sheng, Deputy Director of the China Art Museum, among others. The opening performance received the utmost support and leadership from the Director of the China Art Museum, Mr. Shi Dawei, he proposed using the theme of "reviewing the past and understanding the present" in order to connect Ai Jing's long experiences in musical creation and her visual art works of today, bringing together new and old friends. Under the direction of Director Shi Dawei, the theme of the opening ceremony has been set as "Ai Jing and Her Friends". The opening performance was  thrilling, supported by Li Shou-Chuan, a Taiwanese producer, Zhang Peiren, the founder of Moyan (a recording label), and the musician San Bao. Musicians who also played important roles included Gu San'er, Zhang Yongguang, with Zhang Ling on the bass guitar, Kong Hongwei on the keyboard, and Eiddie as the guitarist-all major talents in the world of music. Especially worth mentioning was that Gu San'er and Eiddie once took part in the entire process of musical recording for Ai Jing's first feature album My 1997. In the short film for the opening, the actor Hao Lei was the voiceover, the short film was then followed by three performances for the opening ceremony. The first was Wu Qingfeng and other guitarists of Sodagreen performing an early work by Ai Jing, "The China Girl in a Tokyo Restaurant". The second performer was Quan Zhendong, a singer from the Voice of China along with Kong Hongwei on the piano playing the song "Lovers", also by Ai Jing. Finally, Ai Jing and her musician friends performed a moving song that had changed her artistic direction. The opening performance was conducted by an experienced directing team along with sound engineer Jin Shaogang-all this fully manifested Ai Jing's untiring efforts and dedicated pursuit in the realm of art.

On the day of the ceremony, Chen Dong, the Vice Director of the Publicity Department of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the CCP personally attended the art exhibition along with Hu Jinjun, the Vice Secretary and the Director of Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture, Radio broadcasting, Film & Television. And also, Teng Junjie, the Art Supervisor of the Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture, Radio Broadcasting, Film & Television attended as well. The following guests at the opening ceremony were: Lu Zhangshen, the Director of the National Museum of China; DSL Collection co-founder Dominique Levy along with the sculptor Anna Chromy, representatives and special guests from the Shanghai Art Fair, Christie's and other art organizations.

2.     Public Events

This exhibition ran from May 25 to June 29. Within this month-long exhibition, four public events were presented every Saturday within Ai Jing's exhibition. These four public events took in different angles of visual art, public art, art of the body, arts of literature, art of space, music, and architecture so that Ai Jing's cultural journeys in the East and West in recent years as well as her explorations, endeavors, reflections, and inter-disciplinary confrontations with all manners of artistic forms were presented fully and vividly.

The first public event "I Love Color: Little Genius Painting Competition" took place on May 31. Nearly one hundred works were exhibited for one week. "Every child is a genius, and we should find them before they grow up" this was Ai Jing's slogan as the initiator of this competition. She believes that when we are children, we possess a lot of talent and energy to be released and discovered, but as we grow up we are toughened by life and gradually lose our courage. Ai Jing thinks that helping children is helping ourselves, as each artist should retain a childlike nature in order to create and move on. The jury consisted of Ai Jing（artist） Wang Jiaming (Head of People's Fine Art Publishing House), Huang Zhiyang (artist), Liu Baoliang (artist), Li Tianyuan (Associate Professor of Drawing at Tsinghua University, and Yin Ran (Editor-in-Chief of People's Fine Art Publishing House)

On June 7th, Ai Jing collaborated with the National Ballet of China and invited ballerinas Wang Sizheng and Chen Zhiyao to perform at the exhibition in front of Ai Jing's iconic work My Mom and My Hometown. The ballerinas used their body language and rhythm to express colors, and the background piano music of the performance was Blue, composed by Ai Jing's sister Ai Dan when she was studying in Japan in the 90s. The word blue is pronounced the same way as love in Japanese, and this piece expresses one's desire and struggle with love. Ai Jing becomes teary every time she listens to it. She says, even though everyone has different dreams and different life experiences, we have the same kind of faith in love as we move along different paths, missing or meeting one another.

On June 14th, Ai Jing's new book Struggle was launched at her comprehensive exhibition at the China Art Museum in Shanghai. Experienced journalist and Senior Visiting Scholar at Tsinghua University Cao Jingxing, Ai Jing, and President of People's Fine Arts Publishing House Wang Jiaming had a lively and interesting discussion with the two editors Yin Ran and Hu Xiaohang about the new book. Struggle consists of three chapters: "Once upon a Time of Music", "Art, Life and Struggle", and "When Love Becomes Faith", totaling 70,000 words. Struggle is part of the series "We are Beautiful because of Art" by People's Fine Arts Publishing House, and it is intended to provide insight into how a contemporary artist is born.

On June 24, Ai Jing invited Japanese master architect Kengo Kuma to join "When Ai Jing Meets Kengo Kuma", the last event in the exhibition timeline. This event lasted for six days and China Art museum was redecorated for this exhibition. Kengo Kuma made thousands of cubes of 50 centimeters in square and 12 centimeters thick of embossment. They were assembled into superimposed spatial form with Ai Jing's "My Hometown" "Tree of Life" and "Pieces" installed within, creating a harmonious consonance of space and art. Ai Jing said, "It is a wonderful feeling that I felt Kengo as my master even before I met him. I feel the natural and tranquil atmosphere in his design, just like a baby in its mother's womb. His design can embrace my works. My work, in turn, seems to be looking for a space just like his."

3.     Closing Seminar

At 3 p.m. in the afternoon of June 29, "LOVE AIJING" closed with a seminar. Based on this exhibition and related public events, this seminar discussed the interaction between gallery and viewers. Chen Lusheng, Vice President of National Museum of China and curator of this exhibition, Li Sheng, Party Secretary and Vice Director of China Art Museum, Kengo Kuma, Japanese master of architecture, Dr. Fu Mali, Vice Director and Dean of Oriental Institute of Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Robert C. Morgan, Chief Editor of Asian Art News were brought together to share ideas about the public events of Ai Jing's exhibition, the gallery - viewer interaction and its social influence. Celebrated hostess Liu Fangfei moderated the seminar. 

Chen Lusheng Vice-Director of the National Museum of China, Artist Ai Jing, Shi Dawei Director of National Art Museum of Shanghai

Speech by Chen Lusheng, Vice-Director of the National Museum of China

May 25th, Opening Ceremony

Opening speech by artist Ai Jing