Six years ago, Yang Fudong left a well-paid job for the insecurity of making videos about what interested him. He reveals his journey from an art school graduate to one of the six nominees for the Hugo Boss Award.
The dream, for many young people, is to be average -- get a decent job, with a fixed income, pay a monthly mortgage, and plan for retirement. Yang Fudong lived the dream for a while, but six years ago he found a bigger, better yet much less comfortable dream.
In 1998, the former white-collar worker decided to shoot a video he wanted to make. It was an idea that sounded, to his colleagues, as if he was bordering on lunacy. But this year, Yang's nomination for the Huge Boss Award, an honor given to six outstanding contemporary artists selected from throughout the world which will be announced in October, has silenced his critics.
Sitting in his small apartment, which is crammed with video tapes and photos, Yang, in his loose T-shirt and trousers, looks pretty much like the stereotypical artist. "I am not a person with plans," says the Beijing native, 33, a cigarette dangling between his fingers. "Sometimes even I question that -- how can I survive without plans in today's fast-paced society?" A graduate of the oil painting department at the Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts (now China Academy of Fine Arts) in Hangzhou, Yang traces his current career back to that picturesque city nestled by the West Lake. "Our academy is considered the cradle for contemporary Chinese art, and perhaps the relaxed and casual aura there unwittingly influenced my later life and career."
Born in 1971, Yang belongs to the generation whose childhood coincided with the turbulent mid-1960s and whose university days coincided with the reform and opening-up policy. The characters of these young people are normally stamped with a mixture of tradition and rebellion, of bewilderment and insight, and Yang is no exception.
Upon graduation, Yang worked part-time for advertising and design companies, until he decided to step into the nine-to-five world. "I worked as a computer graphic designer at a French company and was well paid," Yang recalls with a smile. "To be frank, my workload was not so heavy. I had plenty of time to spend chatting on the Internet and playing computer games." But soon, the man got bored. Even then, though, the good pay and security of a steady job kept him at the French firm for another three years, until he decided to shoot his maiden film, An Estranged Paradise, in 1997.
The 76-minute experimental movie records a young man's messy life, caught between his wife and his lover. Thanks to this film, Yang finally found his own paradise. He quit his job and started a new career as a video artist -- which came with its own set of challenges. Unlike the movies screened in cinemas, experimental films are mostly seen at exhibitions. The difficulty of being a video artist in China is its lack of audience, financial help and recognition from the mainstream. "But I didn't care, I wanted to stick to my beliefs," he adds.
Yang's production of City Light, Seven Intellectuals, Liu Lan and Utopia Station in the following years gradually made him a name on the international art stage. Aside from An Estranged Paradise, his first realistic depiction of a young man's internal struggles, the style of his later renderings are more obscure, reflective and mature. Liu Lan, for example, is a lament on love that centers on a city man and a countryside girl who fall in love at first sight, but have to say farewell.
"It's a very simple story and shot poetically," Yang explains. "There is a kind of love in life that doesn't need a beginning or an ending." Despite his deep knowledge of affairs and short-term love, Yang is happily married. His wife, a former fashion magazine editor, now writes scripts for his videos. Yang's three years of experience as a white-collar worker also helped him accurately explore the psychology of office workers. City Light weaves the incredible fantasies of a group of office workers, while S10 reveals the depression and repetition in the office.
"I never expected that I would be able to continuously shoot what interested me," he says. "I knew, from the beginning, that money might be a big problem." Yet with the exception of his first movie, which was funded from his personal savings, Yang has been able to finance his videos with funding from overseas organizations. "The more your videos are on display at overseas exhibits, the bigger chance you'll get the financing."
In recent years, Yang has been on the road to a good deal, giving his videos the exposure they need. Yesterday he was in Venice; tomorrow he will head to the United States. But jet-setting holds no appeal. "I really hate to travel a lot, sometimes I don't even have time to adjust to the time difference before I'm off on another trip," Yang complains. "For me, traveling is no fun. It's just a physical switch from one city to another." And while all that traveling is necessary for Yang to finance his pictures, he admits that his budget for shooting is still far from enough, meaning that he often has to cover responsibilities like directing, camera work, music and editing. "My peers always joke that my work is not done until the very last minute," he says.
When he's not making movies, the video artist reveals that he likes to watch Chinese soap operas. "When I am sitting in front of the television, I can almost forget about all the technical details that go into making a show," he says. "I become one of the audience, just watching the story." Yang's next movie, the sequel of The Seven Intellectuals, is now on the top of his priority list, and he is busy selecting actors and settings. "I am a perfectionist, but I have to save every penny due to the limited budget," he notes. "You know, filming is actually a teamwork, and the good news is that I am starting to build up a team of my own." Suggest to Yang that perhaps winning the US$50,000 Hugo Boss Award will end his penny-pinching woes, and Yang laughs heartily. "If I win, I will invite you for dinner, and find a more beautiful girl to star in my next movie!" But otherwise, everything will remain the same: Yang will continue to make videos about what interests him.
Liu Lan (video)
2003.1. Shanghai
35mm Black and white Film, 14 Min (video source: www.shanghart.com)
Lyrics:
The reed flowers on the west hill have bloomed.
The reed flowers on the west hill have faded.
by the east lake the little girl has grown up.
with arched eyebrows and long long hair .
clever in mind and nimble in hand.
she plays with birds in the sky,
And fishes in the water.
But who can tell me,
what's in her mind?
Biography:
1971.10. Born in BeiJing .
1991 Graduated from Middle School Attached Centre Acadmic of Fine Arts.
1995 Graduated from China Academy of Art. (Oil painting department).
Lives and Works in Shanghai
Selected Exhibitions
2004 Yang Fudong at TRANS>area, New York, USA, Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist
An evening with Yang Fudong, MediaScope, New York, USA
China Now, Gramercy Theater MoMA, New York, USA
2003 Drei Filme, Gesellschaft fur Aktuelle Kunst, Bremen, Germany
City_net Asia 2003, Seoul Museum of Art, Korea
Happiness: A Survival Guide for Art and Life, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Film/Video Works, The gallery sketch, London, UK.
Left Wing, An exhibition of Chinese Contemporary Art, Left Bank Community,Beijing
S10, Shanghai Siemens Business Communication Systems ltd., Shanghai
YANG FUDONG: Seven Intellectuals in Bamboo and Selected Works on Video (Curator: Hans Ulrich Obrist ), The Moore Space, Miami, Florida
Yang Fudong at BüroFriedrich, Berlin, Germany
Avicon (Asia Videoart Conference Tokyo), Videoart Center Tokyo, Japan
Alternative Modernity: An Exhibition of Chinese Contemporary Art, Beijing X-Ray Art Center, Beijing
"Zooming into Focus" - Chinese Contemporary Photography from the Haudenschild Collection, San Diego State University & San Diego Museum of Art
Outlook - International Art Exhibition, Technopolis, The Factory & Benaki Museum, Athens, Greece (24/10/03 - 25/01/04)
Under Pressure, Galerie Analix, Geneva, Switzerland
Out of the Red - La generatione emergente,Trevi Flash Art Museum, Italy
The Paradise [12], The Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin, Ireland
50th Biennale di Venezia, Chinese Pavilion (Flutter Flutter Jasmine Jasmine)
and
Utopia Station (Seven Intellectuals In Bamboo Forest - Part 1)
+System, Short videos from the world 2002-2003, BizArt Art Center, Shanghai
The minority is subordinate to the majority, BizArt Art Center, Shanghai
Alors la Chine? Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
Movie night at MK2, Paris, France
Lifetime, Beijing Tokyo Art Projects
Camera, Musee del' Art moderne, Paris (Liu Lan, Honey)
2002 Urban Creation, 4th Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai
Fan Mingzhen & Fan Mingzhu - Glad to meet you (Twin exhibition), Jin Sha Jiang Rd., Shanghai
The First Guangzhou Triennial, Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou
There's No Accounting for Other Peoples Relationships, Ormeau Baths Gallery, Belfast, N. Ireland
Videoart Channel, Videoart Centre, Tokyo, Japan
Paris-Pekin, Espace Pierre Cardin, Paris
Site + Sight, Earl Lu Gallery, Singapore
Documenta 11, Kassel, Germany
VideoROM Le Toit du Monde, Centre Multidisciplinaire Pour la Culture Actuelle Vevey. Switzerland
VideoROM 2.0, Giancarla Zanutti Gallery, Milan, Italy
Art in General, 4th Annual Video Marathon, New York, USA
2001 The First Valencia Biennal, Valencia, Spain
Psycho- Bobble, Galleria Raucci / Santamaria, Napoli, Italy
Living in Time, Contemporary Artists form China, Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin, Germany
Yokohama Triennale, Yokohama, Japan (Xu Xiaoxiao: video installation)
Istanbul Biennale, Istanbul, Turkey (Tonigh Moon, video installation)
Homeport, Fuxing Park, organized by Bizart and Homeport, Shanghai
Mantic Ecstasy- Photography and Video, Hangzhou; Shanghai; Beijing
ARCO, Asian Party, Global Game (curated by Hou Hanru), Madrid, Spain
2000 Useful Life, (together with Yang Zhenzhong and Xu Zhen), Shanghai
Uncooperative Approach, (Fuck Off), Shanghai
Multimedia Art Asia Pacific ( MAAP) Festival, Australia
Home, Shanghai
Exit, Chisenhale Gallery, London, UK
Out of Desire, Painting Exhibition of Six Shanghai Young Artists, Liu Haisu Art Museum, Shanghai
CITYZOOM, Germany
1999 Love-Tokyo Art Festival, Japan
Hanover Film Festival, Germany
The Brilliance of City, Invitational Exhibition of Shanghai, New-figurative paintings
"Wu Shi Ren Fei" (The Same but Also Changed) Photography Exhibition, 859 Tian Yao Qiao Road, Shanghai
Exhibition of Shanghai Young Artist Oil Painting
Art for Sale, Shanghai
(sources include eastday.com and shanghart.com March 4, 2004)
