Sheng Qi

No informed conversation about the development of Chinese performance art can bypass Sheng Qi, whose work remains unusual, brave and adventurous. By 1986 he had already thrown himself into a pioneering practice, working in symbolic locations including Peking University (1986), the Yuanmingyuan (1987) and on the Great Wall (1988). Those seminal events were important contributions to a young field, and looking back at their documentation, readers will feel Sheng Qi's passion for art and for the intense cultural transgression his works represented in their time. More recently, he has begun with portraits of children in a rigorous academic painting style, and through their "destruction" and "revision," constructed a painting language that explores the aesthetics of violence and criticism, and their commonalities.