Wang Xingwei
Working in an astonishing array of styles, Chinese painter Wang Xingwei has built a dynamic oeuvre, one in which vividly imagined characters reappear across multiple canvases and encounter wild, fictitious situations. Disinclined to explain his imagery, Wang challenges his viewers to narrate scenarios and comprehend larger-than-life, nonsensical subjects, among them: penguin-luggage hybrids; an anxious nurse who appears alone in an aspen grove; a gangly, disproportionate running woman; and a couple whose heads have been swapped for potted flowers and a watering can.
Indeed, while Wang’s work is infused with a particular, somewhat whimsical sense of humor, his paintings are underlined by serious, subversive sentiments. Among his surreal cast of characters—golfers, pandas, airline attendants, and others—Wang depicts cartoonish politicians and openly engages in a critical dialogue with Western art. In so doing, Wang takes cues from Dadaist Marcel Duchamp and appropriates the distinct painterly approaches of individuals and historical movements alike.
Wang has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art and the Museum of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, both in Beijing. Selected group exhibitions include those staged at the Contemporary Arts Foundation in Miami, the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, the Swiss National Museum …
Working in an astonishing array of styles, Chinese painter Wang Xingwei has built a dynamic oeuvre, one in which vividly imagined characters reappear across multiple canvases and encounter wild, fictitious situations. Disinclined to explain his imagery, Wang challenges his viewers to narrate scenarios and comprehend larger-than-life, nonsensical subjects, among them: penguin-luggage hybrids; an anxious nurse who appears alone in an aspen grove; a gangly, disproportionate running woman; and a couple whose heads have been swapped for potted flowers and a watering can.
Indeed, while Wang’s work is infused with a particular, somewhat whimsical sense of humor, his paintings are underlined by serious, subversive sentiments. Among his surreal cast of characters—golfers, pandas, airline attendants, and others—Wang depicts cartoonish politicians and openly engages in a critical dialogue with Western art. In so doing, Wang takes cues from Dadaist Marcel Duchamp and appropriates the distinct painterly approaches of individuals and historical movements alike.
Wang has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art and the Museum of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, both in Beijing. Selected group exhibitions include those staged at the Contemporary Arts Foundation in Miami, the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, the Swiss National Museum in Zürich, the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp, among others.