ââåart Postinternetã¢â❠for the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing

UCCA Center for Gimmicky Art (UCCA)

UCCA尤伦斯当代艺术中心
Façade and entrance of UCCA Center for Gimmicky Fine art, Beijing, May 2019
Former name	Ullens Center for Gimmicky Fine art
Established	November 2007
Location	798 Art Zone, Beijing
Coordinates	39°59′21″Due north 116°29′17″Due east  /  39.989057°N 116.48793°Due east  / 39.989057; 116.48793
Visitors	385,295 (2020) [ane]
Founder	Guy and Myriam Ullens
Director	Philip Tinari
CEO	Philip Tinari
Website	www.ucca.org.cn/en

UCCA Center for Contemporary Art or UCCA (simplified Chinese: 尤伦斯当代艺术中心; traditional Chinese: 尤倫斯當代藝術中心; pinyin: yóu lún sī dāng dài yì shù zhōng xīn ) is a leading Chinese independent establishment of contemporary art. Founded in 2007. Located at the heart of the 798 Art District in, Prc,^[2] it welcomes more than 1 million visitors a year.^[three] Originally known equally the Ullens Middle for Contemporary Art, UCCA underwent a major restructuring in 2017 and now operates every bit the UCCA Group, comprising ii distinct entities: UCCA Foundation, a registered non-profit that organizes exhibitions and research, stages public programs, and undertakes community outreach; and UCCA Enterprises, a family of art-driven retail and educational ventures. In 2018, UCCA opened an additional museum, UCCA Dune, in Beidaihe, a seaside resort town close to Beijing. The museum had 385,295 visitors in 2020, and ranked 55th in the Listing of most-visited art museums in the globe.^[1]

History [edit]

In November 2007,^[2] out of a commitment to bring Chinese contemporary fine art into global dialogue, Belgian fine art collector Guy Ullens and his wife Myriam Ullens invested major resources in the founding of UCCA. UCCA's opening exhibition, curated by Guy and Myriam Ullens, aslope Foundation manager and veteran of the Chinese avant-garde Fei Dawei, was entitled "'85 New Wave: The Nascency of Chinese Contemporary Art," and was the first museum show to explore this artistic motility of the 1980s. In 2008, French critic and curator Jérôme Sans arrived as UCCA's beginning managing director, taking steps to open the middle to a larger public with assuming, popular exhibitions by cardinal Chinese and international figures including Yan Pei-ming, Mona Hatoum, Qiu Zhijie, Olafur Eliasson, Liu Xiaodong, and Wang Jianwei.

In 2012, UCCA began its second affiliate nether the joint leadership of May Xue and Philip Tinari, focused on bringing the institution closer to its public and honing its operational model.^[4] Together, they introduced initiatives such as the Patrons Council, the start donor grouping of its kind in China, and the annual Gala and Benefit Sale, which quickly became a key source of support for UCCA's ongoing development. The exhibition program continued to grow in calibration, featuring internationally recognized artists including Gu Dexin, Tino Sehgal, Xu Zhen, Liu Wei, William Kentridge, Robert Rauschenberg, and Zeng Fanzhi, every bit well as periodic research-based surveys and an ongoing series of project-based solo exhibitions focused on young Chinese artists.

In June 2017, a group of China-based investors came together to restructure UCCA, separating its commercial and non-turn a profit functions, ensuring its long-term presence in the 798 Art District, and securing its future vision. In 2017, UCCA Director Philip Tinari served every bit guest co-curator for the Guggenheim exhibition "Art and Red china later 1989: Theater of the Earth," alongside Alexandra Munroe and Hou Hanru. The exhibition is the most comprehensive institutional survey show of Chinese art mounted to date in the United states, and a corrective to what Tinari views as narrow, American views of Chinese Contemporary Art.

In 2019, UCCA announced plans to open a third location along Shanghai'southward Suzhou Creek in early 2021, in partnership with the Hong Kong-headquartered property conglomerate K. Wah International.^[five]

Site and space [edit]

UCCA spreads across the original chambers of Mill 798, which is now Beijing's 798 Art Commune, designed by Due east German architects from the Dessau Design Establish—the postwar institutional successor to the Bauhaus—and first opened in 1957. UCCA'due south spaces maintain traces of their industrial past. Fully renovated past architects Jean-Michel Wilmotte and Qingyun Ma in 2007, UCCA occupies a full area of viii,000 square meters, including a Peachy Hall of 1,800 foursquare meters, other exhibition halls of unlike sizes, a 150-seat auditorium equipped with motion-picture show projection and simultaneous interpretation facilities, a shop, a children's education center, and further areas for gatherings, meetings, and events.^{[6] [vii]} In 2018, UCCA enlisted the aid of Dutch architectural firm OMA to redesign its spaces, adding a new café and a completely upgraded entrance surface area and exhibition halls. The basic regeneration was completed in 2019, and the museum plans to add together a library and archive.

Highlights [edit]

The centre has presented more than a hundred exhibitions and attracted more than iv meg visitors. Beginning its curatorial program with "85 New Moving ridge: The Birth of Chinese Contemporary Art", it has presented large-calibration group shows "Breaking Forecast: eight Fundamental Figures of China's New Generation Artists" (2009), "ON | OFF: Mainland china's Young Artists in Concept and Practice" (2013), and "Hans van Dijk: 5000 Names" (2014); forth with solo exhibitions "Liu Xiaodong: Hometown Male child" (2010), "Wang Jianwei: Yellow Bespeak" (2011), "Gu Dexin: The Important Thing Is Not The Meat" (2012), "Wang Xingwei" (2013), "Xu Zhen: a MadeIn Company Production" (2014), "Liu Wei: Colors" (2015), and "Cao Fei: Staging the Era" (2021).^[8]

It has besides presented the international surveys "Inside A Volume A House of Aureate: Artists' Editions for Parkett" (2012), "Indian Highway" (2012), "DUCHAMP and/or/in Red china" (2013), and "The Los Angeles Project" (2014). It has served every bit a platform for the works of Olafur Eliasson, Tino Sehgal, Tatsuo Miyajima, Taryn Simon, and Sterling Red, introducing China to these significant figures in contemporary art.

On the 11th of Feb 2017, the Ullens Heart for Gimmicky Fine art received the 2016 Global Fine Art Awards for Best Contemporary / Postwar / SoloArtist "Rauschenberg in China".^{[9] [10] [11]}

Public programs [edit]

Events include lectures, panel discussions, film screenings, performances, workshops, festivals, and community initiatives.

Research [edit]

UCCA's enquiry department focuses on organizing scholarly programming around UCCA exhibitions, and on organizing the ten years of archival textile that the institution has already produced, with the aim of making it hands attainable online to students and researchers. In 2019, it will open a library and inquiry space on its bounds, featuring an all-encompassing collection of concrete and digital materials focusing on the three areas of UCCA's own history.

UCCA Dune [edit]

Opened in 2018,^[12] UCCA Dune is UCCA's 2nd museum, housed in Aranya, a seaside resort evolution in Beidaihe, approximately 300 kilometers from Beijing on the coast of the Bohai Sea. An award-winning design by Chinese business firm OPEN Architecture integrates the museum into the sands of the beach it sits on.^[13] UCCA Dune'southward curatorial program frequently emphasizes the relationship betwixt nature, humanity, and art.

Controversy [edit]

In May 2014, Chinese artist Ai Weiwei accused UCCA of cocky-censorship when curators decided to omit his name from a public newsletter announcing the opening of an exhibition in retentiveness of creative person/curator Hans van Dijk.^[14] Ai had originally contributed 3 works to the exhibition, including the outset piece he e'er exhibited in Europe as part of an exhibition curated by van Dijk in 1993, but removed the works during the opening ceremony, "in defiance of UCCA'southward portrayal of Chinese gimmicky art."^[15]

In September 2017, the Guggenheim decided to pull three major works from "Art and Cathay After 1989: Theater of the Globe," co-curated past Philip Tinari, afterward concerns over beast welfare sparked threats of violence.^[16] When the exhibition toured to Guggenheim Bilbao in May 2018, two of the works in question were exhibited.^[17] The 3 works were not shown at SFMOMA when the exhibition opened at that place in November 2018.^[eighteen]

References [edit]

1. ^ ^{a b} The Art Newspaper, March xxx, 2021
2. ^ ^{a b} Kennedy, Randy (July 26, 2007). "A Belgian Couple Will Give Beijing a New Dwelling for Contemporary Art". New York Times . Retrieved October 30, 2012.
3. ^ Everett-Dark-green, Robert (October 24, 2012). "Is China edifice too many museums likewise fast?". The World and Postal service . Retrieved Oct thirty, 2012.
4. ^ Greenberger, Alex (2017-04-17). "Ullens Center for Contemporary Fine art CEO May Xue Resigns". ARTnews . Retrieved 2017-10-06 .
5. ^ Lisa Movius (Nov 4, 2019), UCCA Center for Contemporary Art to open space in ShanghaiThe Art Newspaper.
6. ^ Mu, Xuequan (November 2, 2007). "Ullens art center to debut in Mainland china". Xinhua. Archived from the original on November 3, 2007. Retrieved v November 2012.
7. ^ "About Alphabetize | UCCA". ucca.org.cn. Archived from the original on 2014-05-24.
8. ^ "Cao Fei, a Chinese multimedia artist, gets a career retrospective". The Economist. 2020-xi-17. ISSN 0013-0613. Retrieved 2021-03-24 .
9. ^ "Winners of 2016 Global Fine Art Awards Revealed".
10. ^ "Rauschenberg in China - UCCA". eleven December 2015.
11. ^ "2016 Award Winners ‹ Global Fine Art Awards". globalfineartawards.org.
12. ^ Yi-Ling, Liu (February 9, 2019). "An art gallery buried on a Chinese beach". The Economist . Retrieved July 29, 2019.
13. ^ "Open's UCCA Dune Fine art Museum wins 2019 AZ Awards". artdaily.com . Retrieved 2019-07-29 .
14. ^ "Ai Weiwei accuses UCCA of self-censorship, tells managing director not to 'ruin' himself with 'Chineseness'".
15. ^ "Ai Weiwei Pulls Piece of work from Hans van Dijk Show". www.randian-online.com.
16. ^ "Statement Regarding Works in "Art and China after 1989: Theater of the World"". Guggenheim. 2017-09-26. Retrieved 2019-07-29 .
17. ^ "The Guggenheim Bilbao Will Show Two Controversial Animal Works That Were Pulled From Its Chinese Fine art Survey in New York". artnet News. 2018-04-thirty. Retrieved 2019-07-29 .
18. ^ "SFMOMA Won't Prove the 3 Works That Sparked Animate being-Rights Outrage at the Guggenheim'due south China Show". artnet News. 2018-06-27. Retrieved 2019-07-29 .

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