SHENG QI B.1965

MEMORIES(ME)

MEMORIES(ME)

measurements note
150 by 100 cm. 59 by 39 3/8 in.

Signed Sheng Qi, dated 2000. This work is the first from an edition of five

Condition Note:

Between Past and Future-New Photography and Video from China, Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, International Center of Photography, and Steidl Publishers, 2004, cover and p. 69
Madness, Appropriation-Sheng Qi's body and other things, Beijing Red Gate Gallery, 2004, Cover and p.102

We are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described in our catalogue. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSION CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

EXHIBITED

Between Past and Future-New Photography and Video from China, exhibition tour: New York, International Center of Photography, June 11-September 4, 2004; Chicago, David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Art; October 2, 2004-January 16, 2005; London, Victoria and Albert Museum, September 2005-January 2006; Berlin, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, March-May 2006; Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, summer 2006

NOTE

Sheng Qi was one of the most influential performance artists from the mid-1980s. He was a key member of China's 1985 New Wave Art Movement that was inspired by rationalism and liberalism. In 1987 and 1988, Sheng participated in group performances entitled Concept 21 - The Great Wall and Taiji that laid foundations for the critical revolution in his career. It is in 1989, driven by despair and agony after the June 4th Tiananmen Square incident, Sheng cut off one of his fingers from his left hand and buried it in a flowerpot in Beijing. In 1990, Sheng left Beijing for Europe where he studied at the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London. After more than ten years of self-exile, Sheng returned to China and began to photograph his mutilated hand.

Memories (Me) is the signature image of Sheng's exploration into a personal and historical past and memories. The image of his left hand, which holds an image, must be regarded as one of the artist's most ambitious performance recordings - in its extraordinary disturbing power of representation, its extension of meanings and its search of a historical past.

In the center of the extreme close-up photograph of his mutilated left hand is the artist himself as a happy and innocent boy. "My hand is me. My signature," says Sheng. "I never expected I'd use it to make art. It was never my plan."[1] Sheng's left hand has become a stage for the placement of photographs from his childhood, his family portraits, Cultural Revolution poster images, historical figures, movie stars, pornographic images and news photos of past and recent political events. As Wu Hung commented: "Sheng Qi's interest lies in the historicity and vulnerability of printed images-and hence the existence and impermanence of the history and memory that they preserve."[2] Sheng's powerful representation of found images, whether private or public, personal or national, originals or reproductions, confront the viewer on many levels. As he resizes images and places them in his palm, he impresses the viewer with the sheer scale of the hand and the found image displayed in it. The image becomes larger than life, and Sheng's appropriations of found black and white images within his deformed hand turn the informative nature and historical recording into a cultural indicator of a dramatic and struggling past now far removed.

Reference:
[1] Gary Jones, "Red or Dead," Sheng Qi, Sheng Qi, Madness: Sheng Qi's body and other things, Appropriation, Beijing, Red Gate Gallery, 2004. p. 23.
[2] Wu Hong and Christopher Phillips, Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, New York: International Center of Photography and Asia Society, 2004. p.26