Zhang Chong
Born in 1988, graduated in 2013 from the Sculpture Department of the Shanghai Visual Arts Institute, received master’s degree in 2018 from Germany’s Alanus Arts School, where he studied under Professor Jochen Breme.
Zhang Chong’s art is rich and varied, using sculpture, installation, and sound, among other media as his main creative techniques. His works cover a wide range of media applications: origami, newmedia, installation, lighting, stone carving, metal welding, glass, collage, and even many natural plants and materials. Artists constantly try to make use of various possibilities of space, so work is not limited to a single exhibition form. The consideration of the environment also deepens the locality of the work. Additionally, many past experiences in the field at home and abroad have made the artist confront local humanistic society, sensitive to the climate of the environment and stimulating more new inspiration during the adaptation process. Works are mostly based on historical explanation, combined with natural resources, and reflect on the purpose of human existence under analternate time and space.
In 2019, Points Center for Contemporary Art has cooperated with Taipei Artist Village | Treasure Hill to hold across-straits artist exchange residency project. Shanghai-based artist Zhang Chong was selected to enter Treasure Hill. From August 3rd to September 30th, Zhang Chong explored with a delicate sensibility the history of Taipei and the Treasure Hill residency.
On September 8th, he opens his exhibition “Pure Land" in the air raid shelter of Treasure Hill Art Village. In the nearly one-month exhibition period, the artist will present both the “The Dying Away of Ice” and the “Fire of Rebirth” in the exhibition, which will make a dialogue between the opposing elements of ice and fire, presenting an extra-ordinary experience for the audience.
Zhang Chong Pure Land
Formerly known as the Stone Wall Temple, the “Stone” is the name of a temple in southern Fujian. It has experienced periods of flourishing as well as the period of Japanese occupation. After it was recovered, it fell under military management and experienced and relocation. Later, various public figures and groups promoted a series of settlement preservation movements. Up to the present day, the Treasure Hill Art Village settlement has witnessed the development history of many Taiwanese regions.
Zhang Chong combines the Buddhist concepts of the lotus and offering of flowers before the Buddha, as well as some of his own sentiments. He uses flowers to link together the threads of "Pure Land", combining some of the residency’s humanistic environment, as well as the local study of and exchanges in Taipei in order to show the audience another way of looking at the past and ways of leaving.
“There are some Buddhist and Taoist-compatible faith activities in Taiwan, whether people are praying to the gods or celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival, or when they are paying homage to their ancestors. They believe that burning is a way of returning to the ancestors and their own spirits or a way of communicating with the gods.”
In the first year of the Yixi era of Eastern Jin Dynasty Emperor An (405 CE), Tao Yuanming abandoned his official post return to the fields and made a poem “Returning”. Returning is a kind of attitude towards life. It is a kind of confrontation, that is, after release and epiphany, it is the end and the rebirth. Rebirth after demise still retains the memory of the past. As time goes by, life continues to reincarnate, and the artist uses a deep visual language to cause people to think about it. Although on the surface it is about disappearing and separation, in reality, it is to express the warmth of gathering before a disappearance and separation, as well as the expectation and confusion of the unknown new journey.
Just like the artists who participated in the residency project, they came from all over the world, left their familiar environment, and shared their dreams and different life experiences. They gathered here, created and communicated together, and went back here separately. “Here” is a free harbor, a dream pursuit, and a journey in life. As the artist said, although we will eventually face differences, the encounter still makes sense.
“I used the concept of reborn flowers, setting flowers on fire, but they were made into charcoal. When the flower that fades be comes the eternal charcoal, we in turn have another sentiment about theim permanence and perishability of life, including rebirth.”
Additionally, an artists’ open studio day and another interactive exhibition “Leave” were prepared by the artist for the audience. The audience can make musical playing cards according to personal preference and put them into the artist's home made music booth, but each card can only be played once, and after it has been played, the finished music card will be automatically shredded by the shredder hidden in the music booth.
At the same time, there will be a nymphicus hollandicus from Taipei’s Bird Street that will learn to whistle music. Zhang Chong will live with the parrot for a period of time, and will hold a separate ceremony on the evening of the opening day of the studio, giving the parrot who has no choice from birth but to become a human pet, once again re-electing to return to nature or stay with human life. In addition to the differences arising from the choices, in this action also lies in a discussion of freedom, choice, and post-natural issues.
“Because we are alone, we are looking for a partner, keeping pets, we are eager to communicate, and we are eager to be understood. However, things in the world will eventually face disappearance and separation, but the encounter still makes sense.”
“There are two movies that I like very much: The Truman Show and The Legend of 1900. Two people, two situations, have the same pursuit of freedom, but their attitude and ways are completely opposite. One must go out; even if everything is unknown outside, there may even been expected encounters.
Another person will stay, because the ship is his freedom; the outside world is too big, everything is there, there is no end, for which he would rather give up life. So what is freedom? I think many people have faced these two situations more or less in their lives.”
The changes in and progression of nature during this Treasure Hill residency have stimulated the artist's thoughts about the time and space of historical change, like the memory of an animal living together with humans and the "Pure Land" of humanity to nature, what impact or change will it bring to itself and this nature? Separation may be an end, or it may be a resumption; it may be a sadness, or it may be an obsession with the pursuit of freedom. It’s also a fire.