Inside Out: New Chinese Art Curated by Gao Minglu in association with the Asia Society and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The last two decades have witnessed momentous economic, social, and political changes in mainland China and throughout the "Chinese world." Artists in urban centers and elsewhere in China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong (now a special administrative region of China) have responded to these changes with an explosion of diverse work that is simultaneously exhilarating and bewildering. Using a variety of media, from ink and oil painting to installation and performance art, many Chinese artists in the region and abroad are grappling with what it means to be Chinese in an age of economic globalization and transnationalism. Inside Out: New Chinese Art is the first major exhibition to present the dynamic new art being produced by artists in mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and by selected artists who emigrated to the West in the late 1980s. Including works dating from the mid-1980s to the present (some commissioned for this exhibition), Inside Out focuses on works of art that explore the complex relationship between culturally specific issues and larger developments of a modern/postmodern age. Within this context, artists are appropriating and transforming both conventional Chinese aesthetic idioms and contemporary Western vocabularies to negotiate the cultural differences between past and present, self and other. The decade-long perspective is intended to provide the viewer with a sense of the unprecedented pace of economic, social, and political change in the region. Organized thematically, the exhibition explores topics that are regionally specific-the reaction to consumerism and leisure culture in China in the 1990s or the quest for cultural identity in Taiwan-and issues that transcend physical borders, such as the viability of ink painting or the concern with language. Inside Out has been organized by the Asia Society Galleries and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and curated by Gao Minglu. The exhibition is being presented simultaneously at the Asia Society and P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center from September 15, 1998 through January 3, 1999. The Asia Society is located at 725 Park Avenue (at 70th Street) in New York City. Galleries hours are: Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday 11:00 A.M. - 6:00 P.M., Thursday, 11:00 A.M. - 8:00 P.M., and Sunday, Noon - 5:00 P.M. Admission is $4 for adults, $2 for students and seniors, and free to members. Free admission to all on Thursdays 6:00 - 8:00 P.M. Tickets to lectures and other events can be purchased at the Asia Society reception desk or by phone at (212) 517-ASIA. This expanded website on the exhibition includes: more than 20 images; a full checklist of every work in the show; information on two specially commissioned pieces by Cai Guo-qiang and Wenda Gu; a work in progress by the artist Xu Bing; a chronology of the development of contemporary Chinese art in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan; biographies of the artists; a selected bibliography citing more than 150 articles, books and catalogues; and information on related programs at the Asia Society and P.S. 1. We also point you to Chinese Type Contemporary Art (www.chinese-art.com), an online, nonprofit magazine published out of Beijing that profiles, in imagery, articles and criticism, the contemporary art of China; in September's issue visitors will find an essay from the exhibition catalogue by Gao Minglu: Toward A Transnational Modernity: An Overview of the Exhibition. The Catalogue is available online through secure server connection. For information on public programs we encourage you to sign up for AsiaSociety.org Digest, a weekly email we send out which alerts subscribers to upcoming events at the Asia Society, both in New York and at our regional centers in Australia, California, Hong Kong, Texas, and Washington DC. And to become a member of the Asia Society visit our membership section where you'll find information on membership levels and an online application with a secure server connection. Please send your comments or questions to [email protected].