Red Gate Gallery, Beijing, China

More images from Shilihe

Shilihe Market, cricket section

Wow, hit the singing insect jackpot today [Tues], which was great. Kelly, the Red Gate translator came with me to Shilihe Market [which I had not been able to find on my own] and here amongst the imitation Qing buildings were all the cricket sellers and buyers. All sizes of insects were for sale, in small what looked like adapted tins cans with lids. Groups of men gathered around them and poked at the creatures inside to hear their songs. One group of men were encouraging two crickets to fight. The paraphernalia associated with cricket rearing is really quite exquisite and detailed – I bought myself one clay cricket pot. There are what look like paint brushes with about 3 hairs at the end which are unceremoniously poked at the cricket to encourage a song. There is food plus tiny ceramic patterned food bowls to eat from – similar in size to doll’s house objects. I considered buying one, but their life span is 100 days, longer than I will be here in Beijing now. This is longer than they generally live for. The idea of having a pet cricket is to still hear their song during autumn and even early winter – a gesture that prolongs the sounds of summer. I must say that there is not much consideration of the need for leaves or soil or anything natural in these set-ups. Probably not much fun for the pet cricket. Kelly told me that in her opinion it is only ‘old Beijing men’ who are interested in these creatures, no one younger, and I don’t think it was the highlight of her week to go there with me! There were a few women selling the creatures, and also some younger men listening and buying.

The crickets I identified with Kelly’s help were the qu qu – the dark coloured fighting crickets [Velarifictorus asperses], the guo guo – which are katydids and big [Gampsocleis gratiosa], and also the zhu ling – the bamboo bell [Oecanthus longicauda].

Laurens had his opening at Imagine Gallery, Bei Gao, yesterday [Sunday]. Interesting, highly polished work that looks at toys and gaming and global influences on local culture. For this show, he has done some work in 3d software inspired by the Beng Beng, the illegal taxis here in Beijing that are peddled by the owner [some have motor power]. He has also been looking at local traditional toys, which are likely to be less popular these days as kids, here as everywhere, have so much choice now. While much of the work is presented as 2d digital imaging plus an animation, he has cast some of his Beng Beng interpretations in reality [based on the 3d manipulations] and is hoping to realise a life size functioning version in the future.

Platform China, Caochangdi Village

Found my way to Platform China an art space in Caochangdi Village today. Rather difficult to find [which doesn’t surprise me anymore] – further NE than 798 towards Bei Gao. From four lane expressways to wandering down lanes with high grasses either side, you suddenly find yourself faced with a large and impressive contemporary art space [or two]. Chatted with Xian Lei, the project manager, who kindly showed me around the space. The show on at the moment is Xu Ruotao – abstract paintings, quite interesting – working with digital and manual techniques. Platform China is more of an institute, Lei told me, rather than just a gallery. This village is where the cutting edge spaces are now located, with 798 being rather commercial these days in contrast. I asked about different media and she said they are interested in other art forms, and have shown a lot of video in particular, and plan to set up a Chinese video art library. I asked about the apparent absence of women in the Chinese contemporary art scene, and she said that, yes of course there are many female artists but often their work is not up to standard or tends to be about gender issues, which can get repetitive. This isn’t a terribly good explanation I don’t think, but of course things do get lost in translation, so it can be hard to tell. So far, there does seem to be a lot of evidence of [a] painting being the preferred medium [the most commercial of media, of course, a tradition that the West may just have shaken off by now] and [b] the idea of the ‘male’ ‘genius’, which seems to have a considerable hold over things.

Lei was on her way to an opening at the 798 site of Platform China and invited me along. The show opening was ‘Water Division’ by Jin Shan, some video and photographic work [not painting!]. The work was interesting, experimental but narrative performance work and seemed to be considering the influence of the West on China via religion and various philosophical texts. The photographs were stills of the performance/s. Unfortunately the sound of the two videos noticeably interrupted each other, a faux pas when presenting any kind of work with sound.

Today I spent a very interesting and rewarding morning with Professor Ai-Ping Liang, Vice Chair of the Division of Systematic & Evolutionary Zoology at the Institute of Zoology in the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He kindly agreed to listen to my recordings and identify the insects singing. There were mainly instances of the common Beijing cicadas, ie Cryptotympana Atrata [Hei Za Chan in pinyin – noisy black cicada] and Platypleura Kaempferi [Hui Gu – dedicated cicada]. Ai-Ping emphasised that these were his rough translations of the Chinese. He is not entirely sure about the crickets, and his colleague, a cricket specialist, Liu Chun Xiang is currently on a field trip so he suggested returning soon to meet her. He also suggested returning to look at the insect collection they have on campus – I am interested in high resolution images of these insects as well. Ai-Ping mentioned MS Moulds, the Australian expert on cicadas, whose book I own and refer to frequently.

Ai-Ping offered to take me to lunch, which was very good, and then to take me to the Bird’s Nest and Ice Cube [or is it the Water Cube – anyway the Olympic stadiums]. I had asked about them as I knew the Institute of Zoology was fairly nearby. It is not easy access to the Olympic Park at the moment as it is basically a building site, but Ai-Ping talked to the guard on duty and in we went. Quite amazing to see these buildings, and pretty close up too. They look quite astounding and are a great feat of engineering and design, great. Again, the workers live on site amongst the heat and dust – though not in tents here but pre-fab units.