Rockery Prospect Sculpture 3975×150×228.5cm 2008
Text|Huang Danlu.
Zhan Wang's "Rockery" has evolved from a mere sculpture to an installation or public art. Its purpose is to replace and integrate the artificial stone art in the gardens of Suzhou, China with Western modern and contemporary landscape art and public art. Suzhou's rockery art is to reconstruct the natural stone to form a beautiful "stacked stone art". "Rockery" is made of hollowed-out stainless steel to grind into the shape of rockery, which is actually a re-creation of Suzhou's stacked stone art. This kind of media transformation is actually the appropriation, dissolution and reconstruction of traditional classical art, and it is also a witty continuation and cultural reflection on Chinese garden art, which is "made by man, just like the opening of heaven".
Zhan Wang's selection of artificial mirror stainless steel materials, using its shiny and flashy characteristics, to reproduce and transform the natural rockery, providing a unique image for the new dream of contemporary literati. He rubbed the rockery with stainless steel plates, and then threw it into a mirror, forming a metallic, shiny, dreamlike landscape, so that the nobility of life and imagination can be continued. Transcendent meditation melts into a wonderful world of art, both traditional and contemporary. Stainless steel has an uncertain color and adaptability that can change with the environment. All the light and symbols reflected on it are released in a psychedelic mirror, and new hope is born. "Rockery" copies the natural stone with a beautiful, brilliant and colorful appearance, and its essence is to reconstruct nature by dissolving nature. "Rockery" is also a mirror image, so you can see the deformed environment around you. As an industrial product, this natural mirror image reflects the romantic feelings of the literati.
Rockery is an imaginative metaphor that points directly to the home of the human soul and is an upgraded experiment in traditional culture. In this way, humanity has found its home to return to – nature. "Rockery" shows people a wonderful sense of beauty and the intersection of past and future, forming an illusion of nature, change and eternity. "Rockery" is a strong conceptual reflection on social issues, an irony and simulacrum of "cultural facts", which can be called a model of Chinese postmodern art.
This article is excerpted from the Collection of the National Art Museum of China
Edited by Wu Weishan, Director of the National Art Museum of China and published by Culture and Art Publishing House, the National Art Museum of China Collection was officially launched on May 23, 2023. Co-authored by 94 staff members of the National Art Museum of China and postdoctoral fellows at the station, the book tells the stories behind the 230 classics in the museum's collection.
May 23, 2023 marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the National Art Museum of China. On the same day, China Post issued a special stamp of "National Art Museum of China". At the same time, the National Art Museum of China selected 10 representative works from the museum's collection of more than 130,000 pieces to customize personalized stamps.