Any Ball
Though starting out in an almost identical initial state, never having one of the tens of thousands of matches repeated itself - or, it has done so in a way that we were unaware of.
It is what happened in our stadiums, but its foundation is based on simple physical phenomena and mathematical principles: straight-line motion, elastic collision, momentum conservation, rigid body, potential energy, applied force, acceleration, the normal, and extension line. At this finite boundary, calculating, predicting, controlling, reacting, differentiating, extending, and penalizing, though always for the purpose of accuracy, cannot help us get rid of contingency.
The abstract concept of a mass point doesn't exist in the real world, but it can be imagined. Just like Quanta, which constitutes all the living things in the world, cannot be observed, but its trajectory can be described. Synapses of neurons tell you what to do by receiving and sending signals to your brain. However, we don’t know when exactly it happens. Compared with the universe, human beings are as small as pollen. Our destinies are intertwined.
Here in this stadium, the tools of the match cast an elongated shadow. The stadium is just like an ocean, the boundary of which is constantly changing while each player is like a drop of water. To look at the universe in another way, dusk might be a time when two celestial bodies bid farewell to each other, while stars themselves are nothing but a few stones on a kid's game board. We are under the same heaven no matter where we live, from the urban-rural fringe to millionaires’skyscrapers home.
The show itself runs counter to the basic mathematical models and the general rules of games. Here, you can experience a more complicated world through the depicts of our artists. Human beings are shaped by the outside world, in which accuracy meets with contingency.
The world has all along been an open ball competition.
About the curator
Liu Tian is a Ph.D. candidate from the Institute of Contemporary Art and Social Thoughts, School of Inter-Media Art, China Academy of Art and his focus is on artistic creation, curating theoretical research, and writing.
Since 2006, he has curated a series of academic exhibitions, including the followings:
(1) Why Not Ask Again, the 11th Shanghai Biennale (serving as a member of the curatorial group) and Theory Opera (as project manager) (2016);
(2) Zurich Dada 100 2016;
(3) Void: There Is Nothing More Left, But A Little Trace From Human Beings(2015);
(4) Memorandum for Gaia-The 1st PSA Emerging Curators Program (2014);
(5) West Bund 2013: A Biennial of Architecture and Contemporary Art (2013);
(6) What A Form：A Reportage (2013).
In 2010, he established Open Matter Institute, an artistic independent research, and creative project.
His current research focus is on ‘media reality’, with such programs right underway as Almost Anti Matter Material.
About the artists
Chen Zhe
Born in 1989, Chen Zhe now works and lives in Beijing. She graduated from Art Center College of Design in 2011 with a bachelor's degree in Photography and Imaging.
She constantly explores new ideas and conducts fresh research as a way to make new discoveries in the field of art. In her early work, she sought to exploit the inner world of herself and others. Since 2012, She has been expressing her thoughts on the function of media in Evening: Six Chapters, one of her long-term projects. The project uses the dusk as the main theme to discuss the relationship between the dusk and mankind through a series of visible and the verbal experiments.
Her recent exhibitions include:
(1) Dragon Liver Phoenix Brain, OCT Contemporary Art Terminal Shanghai (2016);
(2) Why Not Ask Again, the 11th Shanghai Biennale, Power Station of Art (2016);
(3) Linguistic Pavilion, Shanghai Minsheng Art Museum (2016);
(4) Chinese Photography, Twentieth Century and Beyond, Three Shadows Photography Art Center (2015);
(5) ON|OFF：China’s Young Artists in Concept and Practice (2013).
She is a recipient of Three Shadows Award (2011), the Inge Morath Award from the Magnum Foundation (2011), the Xitek New Talent Award (2015) and the Best Photobooks Kassel Fotobookfestival 2016 award.
www.zheis.com
Jiang Zhuyun
Born in Hangzhou, China in 1984, Jiang Zhuyun now works and lives in Hangzhou. Once a student of CAFA, He is now an artist, programmer, and musician. Jiang also dedicates himself to many different art forms, including Creative Code, web art, sound art, experimental music, AudioVisual, etc.
Liao Fei
Born in Jiangxi in 1981 and graduated from Shanghai Normal University in 2006, Liao Fei currently works and lives in Shanghai.
Liao Fei’s exploration began with doubts about the surrounding environment of mankind and himself as an individual. He tried to get closer to the essence of “things” through his own exploration. He attributes the cognitive progress he has achieved so far largely to scientific positivism.
Currently, the mainstream worldview is a materialistic concept based on dualism, that is, the material is an objective existence that does not depend on consciousness. This view undoubtedly is consistent with our desire to create a clear-cut division among different things. Science developed therefrom enjoys a clear, concise, and mechanical beauty. While harboring strong suspicions about such a view, Liao Fei also shows keen interest towards the aesthetics built on dualism. That explains why he began to use normal things as a clue for a creative purpose in 2011. Since then, he has been working on the system with dualism at its core.
Recently, Liao Fei used some everyday materials to show some internal problems with these things themselves through the external form of art. On the one hand, he interprets art from a rational perspective. On the other, he introduces sensitive emotions into logical thinking and abstract ideas. In his works, the well-balanced structure of math and physics is converted into visual expressions, from which we can truly have a face-to-face communication with logic and abstract terms.
Liao Wenfeng
Born in Jiangxi in 1984, and graduated from the China Academy of Fine Art in 2006, Liao moved to Berlin in 2012 and got his postgraduate degree there from the Course “Art in Context”, Berlin University of the Arts. His artworks combine videos, GIFs, photographs, and paintings with a view to building a visual world reflecting building, human bodies, and concepts in people’s daily lives.
www.liaowenfeng.com
Liu Yue
Born in 1981, and graduated from the School of Fine Arts, Shanghai University, Liu Yue now works and lives in Shanghai.
His recent exhibitions include:
(1) Maxim, ShanghART Gallery, Beijing, 2016;
(2) Heap, Space Local, Beijing, 2016;
(3) HOLZWEGE, ShanghART, Shanghai, 2016;
(4) Multiple Time-Suzhou and Histories of a Global Hub, the first Suzhou Documents, Suzhou Art Museum, 2016;
(5) The Green Light will eventually disappear, BETWEEN ART LAB, Shanghai, 2016;
(6) Nonfigurative, M21, Shanghai, 2015;
(7) Off the Shore, M Art Space, Shanghai, 2015;
(8) ←→ A Contemporary Opening Exhibition, A+Contemporary, Shanghai, 2015.
Nabuqi
Nabuqi’s contemplation on the ontology of objects is reflected in her sculptures: objects surrounding us exist independent of human perception. She graduated from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, in 2013. Her works have been exhibited in solo and group shows in Beijing and New York, as well as the Shanghai Biennial and Gwangju Biennale in 2016.
Born in Inner Mongolia in 1984, she currently lives in Beijing.
Bignia Wehrli
Born in Uster, Switzerland in 1979, Bignia Wehrli is now an artist based in Berlin. After studying art and getting her “Meisterschüler” degree from the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts (HfBK Dresden), she spent a year in the Total Art Studio at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou (CAA) on a DAAD scholarship and continued her post-graduate studies at CAA for another year in the calligraphy department. Her artistic practice engages with processes of visualization and with ways of capturing fleeting actions. She is interested particularly in devising methods of notation and inventing measuring devices which can be used to record ephemeral occurrences and performative actions, positioning them in new contexts and relationships. Often her work appears to be only the remains of something else, an encrypted trace, a sign or a hint of something real hidden within.
www.bigniawehrli.de
Zhao Yao
Born in Sichuan, China in 1981 and graduated from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in 2004, Zhao Yao now works and lives in Beijing. In 2005, Zhao Yao began to receive high attention from the modern art community. His exhibitions include:
(1) 51M²; 3# Zhao Yao, 2010, Taikang Space (Beijing, China);
(2) Zhao Yao: I am Your Night (solo), 2011, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China);
(3) You Can't See Me, You Can't See Me - Zhao Yao Solo Exhibition, 2012, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China);
(4) Spirit Above All (solo), 2013, Pace London (London (England), United Kingdom);
(5) Zhao Yao - Painting of Thought, 2015, Pace Hong Kong (Hongkong, China);
(6) The Last Egg, 2016, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China).
His works have been shown in many well-known museums and galleries, including: Tate Modern and Tate Britain (London, 2010), Fremantle Arts Centre (Austraia, 2011), Rubell Family Collection (Miami, 2013) , Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum (Michigan, 2013), PinchukArtCentre (Kiev, 2013), ZKM, or Center for Art and Media (Germany, 2013), Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (Beijing, 2013), Museum Boijmans van Beuningen (Netherlands, 2014), Palais de Tokyo (Paris, 2014) , and Whitechapel Gallery (London, 2015) .
Any Ball
Though starting out in an almost identical initial state, never having one of the tens of thousands of matches repeated itself - or, it has done so in a way that we were unaware of.
It is what happened in our stadiums, but its foundation is based on simple physical phenomena and mathematical principles: straight-line motion, elastic collision, momentum conservation, rigid body, potential energy, applied force, acceleration, the normal, and extension line. At this finite boundary, calculating, predicting, controlling, reacting, differentiating, extending, and penalizing, though always for the purpose of accuracy, cannot help us get rid of contingency.
The abstract concept of a mass point doesn't exist in the real world, but it can be imagined. Just like Quanta, which constitutes all the living things in the world, cannot be observed, but its trajectory can be described. Synapses of neurons tell you what to do by receiving and sending signals to your brain. However, we don’t know when exactly it happens. Compared with the universe, human beings are as small as pollen. Our destinies are intertwined.
Here in this stadium, the tools of the match cast an elongated shadow. The stadium is just like an ocean, the boundary of which is constantly changing while each player is like a drop of water. To look at the universe in another way, dusk might be a time when two celestial bodies bid farewell to each other, while stars themselves are nothing but a few stones on a kid's game board. We are under the same heaven no matter where we live, from the urban-rural fringe to millionaires’skyscrapers home.
The show itself runs counter to the basic mathematical models and the general rules of games. Here, you can experience a more complicated world through the depicts of our artists. Human beings are shaped by the outside world, in which accuracy meets with contingency.
The world has all along been an open ball competition.
About the curator
Liu Tian is a Ph.D. candidate from the Institute of Contemporary Art and Social Thoughts, School of Inter-Media Art, China Academy of Art and his focus is on artistic creation, curating theoretical research, and writing.
Since 2006, he has curated a series of academic exhibitions, including the followings:
(1) Why Not Ask Again, the 11th Shanghai Biennale (serving as a member of the curatorial group) and Theory Opera (as project manager) (2016);
(2) Zurich Dada 100 2016;
(3) Void: There Is Nothing More Left, But A Little Trace From Human Beings(2015);
(4) Memorandum for Gaia-The 1st PSA Emerging Curators Program (2014);
(5) West Bund 2013: A Biennial of Architecture and Contemporary Art (2013);
(6) What A Form：A Reportage (2013).
In 2010, he established Open Matter Institute, an artistic independent research, and creative project.
His current research focus is on ‘media reality’, with such programs right underway as Almost Anti Matter Material.
About the artists
Chen Zhe
Born in 1989, Chen Zhe now works and lives in Beijing. She graduated from Art Center College of Design in 2011 with a bachelor's degree in Photography and Imaging.
She constantly explores new ideas and conducts fresh research as a way to make new discoveries in the field of art. In her early work, she sought to exploit the inner world of herself and others. Since 2012, She has been expressing her thoughts on the function of media in Evening: Six Chapters, one of her long-term projects. The project uses the dusk as the main theme to discuss the relationship between the dusk and mankind through a series of visible and the verbal experiments.
Her recent exhibitions include:
(1) Dragon Liver Phoenix Brain, OCT Contemporary Art Terminal Shanghai (2016);
(2) Why Not Ask Again, the 11th Shanghai Biennale, Power Station of Art (2016);
(3) Linguistic Pavilion, Shanghai Minsheng Art Museum (2016);
(4) Chinese Photography, Twentieth Century and Beyond, Three Shadows Photography Art Center (2015);
(5) ON|OFF：China’s Young Artists in Concept and Practice (2013).
She is a recipient of Three Shadows Award (2011), the Inge Morath Award from the Magnum Foundation (2011), the Xitek New Talent Award (2015) and the Best Photobooks Kassel Fotobookfestival 2016 award.
www.zheis.com
Jiang Zhuyun
Born in Hangzhou, China in 1984, Jiang Zhuyun now works and lives in Hangzhou. Once a student of CAFA, He is now an artist, programmer, and musician. Jiang also dedicates himself to many different art forms, including Creative Code, web art, sound art, experimental music, AudioVisual, etc.
Liao Fei
Born in Jiangxi in 1981 and graduated from Shanghai Normal University in 2006, Liao Fei currently works and lives in Shanghai.
Liao Fei’s exploration began with doubts about the surrounding environment of mankind and himself as an individual. He tried to get closer to the essence of “things” through his own exploration. He attributes the cognitive progress he has achieved so far largely to scientific positivism.
Currently, the mainstream worldview is a materialistic concept based on dualism, that is, the material is an objective existence that does not depend on consciousness. This view undoubtedly is consistent with our desire to create a clear-cut division among different things. Science developed therefrom enjoys a clear, concise, and mechanical beauty. While harboring strong suspicions about such a view, Liao Fei also shows keen interest towards the aesthetics built on dualism. That explains why he began to use normal things as a clue for a creative purpose in 2011. Since then, he has been working on the system with dualism at its core.
Recently, Liao Fei used some everyday materials to show some internal problems with these things themselves through the external form of art. On the one hand, he interprets art from a rational perspective. On the other, he introduces sensitive emotions into logical thinking and abstract ideas. In his works, the well-balanced structure of math and physics is converted into visual expressions, from which we can truly have a face-to-face communication with logic and abstract terms.
Liao Wenfeng
Born in Jiangxi in 1984, and graduated from the China Academy of Fine Art in 2006, Liao moved to Berlin in 2012 and got his postgraduate degree there from the Course “Art in Context”, Berlin University of the Arts. His artworks combine videos, GIFs, photographs, and paintings with a view to building a visual world reflecting building, human bodies, and concepts in people’s daily lives.
www.liaowenfeng.com
Liu Yue
Born in 1981, and graduated from the School of Fine Arts, Shanghai University, Liu Yue now works and lives in Shanghai.
His recent exhibitions include:
(1) Maxim, ShanghART Gallery, Beijing, 2016;
(2) Heap, Space Local, Beijing, 2016;
(3) HOLZWEGE, ShanghART, Shanghai, 2016;
(4) Multiple Time-Suzhou and Histories of a Global Hub, the first Suzhou Documents, Suzhou Art Museum, 2016;
(5) The Green Light will eventually disappear, BETWEEN ART LAB, Shanghai, 2016;
(6) Nonfigurative, M21, Shanghai, 2015;
(7) Off the Shore, M Art Space, Shanghai, 2015;
(8) ←→ A Contemporary Opening Exhibition, A+Contemporary, Shanghai, 2015.
Nabuqi
Nabuqi’s contemplation on the ontology of objects is reflected in her sculptures: objects surrounding us exist independent of human perception. She graduated from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, in 2013. Her works have been exhibited in solo and group shows in Beijing and New York, as well as the Shanghai Biennial and Gwangju Biennale in 2016.
Born in Inner Mongolia in 1984, she currently lives in Beijing.
Bignia Wehrli
Born in Uster, Switzerland in 1979, Bignia Wehrli is now an artist based in Berlin. After studying art and getting her “Meisterschüler” degree from the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts (HfBK Dresden), she spent a year in the Total Art Studio at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou (CAA) on a DAAD scholarship and continued her post-graduate studies at CAA for another year in the calligraphy department. Her artistic practice engages with processes of visualization and with ways of capturing fleeting actions. She is interested particularly in devising methods of notation and inventing measuring devices which can be used to record ephemeral occurrences and performative actions, positioning them in new contexts and relationships. Often her work appears to be only the remains of something else, an encrypted trace, a sign or a hint of something real hidden within.
www.bigniawehrli.de
Zhao Yao
Born in Sichuan, China in 1981 and graduated from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in 2004, Zhao Yao now works and lives in Beijing. In 2005, Zhao Yao began to receive high attention from the modern art community. His exhibitions include:
(1) 51M²; 3# Zhao Yao, 2010, Taikang Space (Beijing, China);
(2) Zhao Yao: I am Your Night (solo), 2011, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China);
(3) You Can't See Me, You Can't See Me - Zhao Yao Solo Exhibition, 2012, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China);
(4) Spirit Above All (solo), 2013, Pace London (London (England), United Kingdom);
(5) Zhao Yao - Painting of Thought, 2015, Pace Hong Kong (Hongkong, China);
(6) The Last Egg, 2016, Beijing Commune (Beijing, China).
His works have been shown in many well-known museums and galleries, including: Tate Modern and Tate Britain (London, 2010), Fremantle Arts Centre (Austraia, 2011), Rubell Family Collection (Miami, 2013) , Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum (Michigan, 2013), PinchukArtCentre (Kiev, 2013), ZKM, or Center for Art and Media (Germany, 2013), Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (Beijing, 2013), Museum Boijmans van Beuningen (Netherlands, 2014), Palais de Tokyo (Paris, 2014) , and Whitechapel Gallery (London, 2015) .
