Sculpture, paintings, photographs, digital and video art, created by some of China’s most recognized artists working today, will go on display in Cress Gallery on Tuesday.
The show, “China’s Surging Creative Tide,” was curated by Patricia Karetzky, professor of art history at Lehman College and the O. Munsterberg Chair of Asian Art at Bard College. Assisting her was Ruth Grover, director and curator of Cress Gallery.
According to Karetzky, the cultural revolution that followed the death of Chairman Mao allowed artists to explore a variety of subject and media for the first time. Initially, their art reflected years of cultural repression, but eventually they felt comfortable enough to look to the previously forbidden art of the West and contemporary trends.
“Now, several decades later, artists seek to incorporate Chinese cultural and social values in their art,” said Karetzky. “Thus, the artists in this exhibition individually address the varied issues of their artistic, social and political milieu and explore the international problems of our global society.”
Karetzky will give a lecture concerning contemporary art in China at 5:30 p.m. Nov. 28 in Room 356 of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga’s Fine Arts Center.