Artwork: Billiard Ball
Artist: Chen Wei
Year: 2020
Media: Archival inkjet print, mounted on aluminium composite panel, non-reflective acrylic
Size: 80×64cm (×2 pieces)
Edition: 4/6+2AP
Price: USD 18,000
Chen Wei constructs personal narratives using found objects, fabricated props and staged scenes, all of which are meticulously constructed and assembled inside his studio. Evoking recurring motifs, memories and dreams, every image is a fiction and a story in itself. In the fictional scenes of objects, interiors and nocturnal cityscapes, Chen exposes the psychological and socio-political characteristics of contemporary China: collective yearning for betterment, disillusionment with consumerist desires, and a nostalgia for a haphazardly erased past.
About the Artist
Chen Wei
Chen Wei was born in Zhejiang in 1980, lives and works in Beijing. Initially a sound and performance artist, Chen Wei’s interest developed into photo, video and installation art. Staged mise-en-scène and scenario re-enacting are often seen in Chen Wei’s photography. In recent years, he has been working on the combination of stage setting and multi-media installation as an on-site extension in his work.
Recent exhibitions include: Chen Wei: Make Me Illusory, West Bund Museum, Shanghai (2021); Chen Wei: Good Night, HOW Art Museum, Shanghai (2021); Chen Wei: Goodbye, ShanghART, Shanghai (2019); Chen Wei: Drifting Along, Büro Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2019); Chen Wei: Where Are You Going Tonight, chi K11 artspace, Guangzhou (2018); Chen Wei: Falling Light, Galerie Rüdiger Schöttle, Munich, Germany (2018); Witness, Chen Wei etc., Pilar Corrias, London, U.K. (2018); The Club, Centre for Contemporary Photography (CCP), Melbourne, Australia (2017); Noon Club, programmed by Francesco Bonami, JNBY Art Space, Hangzhou (2016); In The Waves, chi K11 Art Museum, Shanghai (2015), The Stars in the Night Sky are Innumerable, Australia China Art Foundation, Sydney, Australia (2014) etc.
Chen Wei was awarded the Asia Pacific Photography Prize in 2011, and was a nominee of the Prudential Eye Awards for Contemporary Asian Art in 2015.
About the Gallery
ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing & Singapore)
Founded in 1996, ShanghART Gallery is one of the first contemporary art galleries established in China now maintaining spaces in Shanghai, Beijing and Singapore. For the past twenty years, ShanghART has kept devoting to the development of contemporary art in China and also kept close and long-term cooperation with more than 60 artists. Sustaining the highest-quality in presenting contemporary art exhibitions and projects, ShanghART regularly participates in the major international art fairs and collaborates with important art institutions in China and from all over the world.
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