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comment by thenewgreen
thenewgreen  ·  1415 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: COMBOPOST || PIL singing Public Image + Head On by Cai Guo-Qiang

Just showed my 10 year old daughter. She looked for a bit and said, “it’s cool but it’s weird.”

Exactly!





bhrgunatha  ·  1415 days ago  ·  link  ·  

It is cool.

I went to a Cai Guo-Qiang exhibition (about 2010 maybe) which included Head On and it is amazing. I stayed in the room for about 30-40 minutes checking it out from every vantage point. One obvious part of the experience for me was in looking at it from different angles - walking under the cascade following the wolves trajectory and looking up evoked some surprisingly strong and strange feelings.

By far the most interesting part was watching how other people viewed and interacted with it though, with most spending just a minute or two walking through and glancing.

I knew I was in for a treat though when I first entered the building because Inopportune Stage One was installed at the building's entrance. That's quite the opening statement for an exhibition I can tell you.

thenewgreen  ·  1415 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Now I really want to see it. That was a compelling description. I enjoy art that changes based on where/how you receive it. Is that the Guggenheim?

bhrgunatha  ·  1415 days ago  ·  link  ·  

No it was during a wordwide tour - I checked and it was 2010 but can't find more details about where else it toured.

Another piece that really struck deep was funnily enough titled Reflection - the husk of a wooden boat on a sea of broken porcelain. The description mentioned the artist had given detailed instructions about the reconstruction and display and it set me wondering about the nightmare logistics and challenges of taking an exhibition like that around the world. I would never ordinarily think about those details.

The only bad thing about the exhibit was the videos of his pyrotechnic works (which I think were all performed and filmed in China). Not that they were bad just that I would have given anything to have been there to see one of them.

goobster  ·  1412 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I saw them when they were here in Seattle. Can't find my photos from when I was there, but here's an article: https://kuow.org/stories/sam-cars-are-coming-down/

bhrgunatha  ·  1412 days ago  ·  link  ·  

If you do find those photos I'd love to see some of them!