China, the Empire of Art ?
Being an artist in China today can be very lucrative… as long as you hopped on the bandwagon at the right time! This film gets inside an art system, as it penetrates Chinese creators’ identity : What does it mean to be an artist in today’s China? Or to be Chinese when you decide to be an artist? What is the price to pay to preserve art’s independence?
Type (Documentaire / Documentaire fiction / Série documentaire)DocumentaryGenre en anglaisArts & Culture Written byEmma TassyDirected by Emma Tassy, Sheng ZhiminSupported by ANGOA, Centre Pompidou, CNC, ProcirepDistributed by Cinema GuildFestival(s) Sélection officielle, Festival International du Film sur l’Art (Montréal, 2010) / Sélection officielle, Artecinema Festival (Naples, 2010)Year2009Duration56min
“The East is a creation of the West”, said Edward Saïd.
This joint realisation French/Chinese was created to carry out this investigation, taking into account all the different points of view.
The press is talking about it
Through a visit to an imaginary museum, this film tells us a fascinating story. In thirty years, Chinese art has evolved from the creation of statues of the Great Helmsman to industrial production for Western galleries (...). An exciting stroll.
Le Nouvel Obs
"China, the Empire of Art?" brilliantly elevates its scenes to a broader reflection on the overall position of contemporary Chinese art, starting from the political constraints within which the artists asserted themselves, leading to the decisive moment that brought them to the forefront and projected them into the future.
Jing Daily
How this clandestine avant-garde quickly transitioned into the market economy. How former performers from Beijing became stars of museums (Yan Pei-Ming) or New York auctions (Yue Minjun). At the heart of this "turning point," there is an ambiguous relationship with the West, which is addressed here with relevance...
Télérama
A vast collection of images of contemporary Chinese artworks created in the wake of Tiananmen shows exactly what this youth is missing, as well as the easy slope that could make them forget the knowledge of their cultural development. Superb.
Now Toronto
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