Exhibition Proposal
Exhibitions in museums and galleries play a significant role in the art world. They serve as a point of contact between the institution and the general public, and they frequently have a big impact on the reception of a particular artist, movement or concept in art history, or a more general aspect of human experience. With the aid of supplemental materials like gallery labels and exhibition catalogues, exhibitions often seek to create a narrative around a theme or issue that is communicated through the chosen artworks. The exhibition’s arrangement, texts, and artworks determine its critical reception and serve as its legacy long after the exhibition has been taken down.
This exhibition proposal assignment is a term-long project that asks you to think expansively and creatively about the history of modern and contemporary Chinese art. In this assignment you are playing the role of a curator, imagine that you have been invited to curate an exhibition in a gallery/museum (or any other unconventional venue that is meaningful to the exhibition). It is an opportunity to delve deeper into topics explored in the context of modern and contemporary Chinese art that you find particularly interesting and/or important, while building skills in effective art historical research and critical analysis.
Instructions:
Title & Brief Statement: Before composing a title, your starting point for this assignment is identification of the theme or topic on which you will focus, around which you will craft your proposal. The exhibition topic you choose to work on should be specific enough, and possible to explore from a range of perspectives. Topics might focus on a specific artist, movement, region and time period, or social and political issues in the context of modern and contemporary Chinese art. Sample topics are listed below for your reference; please note they represent just a small sampling of possibilities, and are meant to help and inspire but not in any way limit you. While these topics are broad, your exhibition should frame a specific aspect or point of view on that topic.
Sample Topics/Themes:
• Art as a reflection of Chinese class struggle
• Post-humanity in Chinese New Media Art
• Abstraction in the history of Chinese art
• The exploration of Daoism in Contemporary Art
• New literati painting in China
Once your topic is chosen, you should also propose a working title for your exhibition. The exhibition’s topic should be revealed in the title, which should also pique potential audiences’ curiosity. In addition, the title should indicate the perspective on the topic you plan to explore in the exhibition. For your reference, a list of sample titles is provided below; again, these titles are provided just to inspire.
• Ai Weiwei: According to What? (Art Gallery of Ontario)
• Unscrolled: Reframing Tradition in Chinese Contemporary Art (Vancouver Art Gallery)
• River Pulses, Border Flows (Guangdong Times Museum)
• Shanshui: Poetry without Sound? Landscape in Contemporary Chinese Art (Museum Rietberg)
• Through the Body: Lens-based works by Contemporary Chinese Women Artists (University of Toronto Art Centre)
• Art and China after 1989: Theater of the World (Guggenheim Museum)
Along with the working title, now you will compose a brief statement (150-200 words) of the basic idea that underlines the exhibition, the response you might give to someone who asked, “What this exhibition is about? What were the curatorial aims of the exhibition (the big idea)? What experience would you like your audiences/visitors to have from viewing the exhibition?” This brief statement gives the gist of the concept of the exhibition. Here is an example from the exhibition Unscrolled: Reframing Tradition in Chinese Contemporary Art, which appears on the website of Vancouver Art Gallery:
Tradition in Chinese contemporary art is transformed by individual experiences, contemporary challenges and present-day concerns. Unscrolled features three generations of Chinese artists who have been trained in both Western art history and Chinese tradition and who engage with their cultural past as a continuation into the contemporary. The exhibition moves from literal depictions of traditional culture to more ambiguous representations that are equally influenced by Chinese heritage. From new media forms such as digital animations to site-specific installations, it features work by artists Ai Weiwei, Chen Shaoxiong, Ji Yun Fei, Liu Jianhua, Jennifer Wen Ma, Xu Zhen (produced by MadeIn Company), Qiu Shihua, Sun Xun, Xu Bing and Zhang Enli. Defining tradition as an evolving concept, Unscrolled examines and questions its influence on visual culture in present-day China.
This exhibition presents a diverse selection of Chinese contemporary artists whose practices are informed by their cultural heritage. Re-working traditional aesthetics in conceptual ways, featured artists use new forms and media—such as digital animations and site-specific installations—to provide a myriad of means to understand and examine tradition’s influence on visual culture in present-day China.
In terms of exploring and developing your topic, please check the webpage below. It is a reference guide which includes many extensive and well-maintained websites that announce and archive upcoming, current and past exhibitions of Chinese art: https://www.chinaartlover.com/best-chinese-contemporary-art-platforms
Annotated Bibliography: Create an annotated bibliography of 8-10 scholarly sources to provide background research for the exhibition (include scholarly monographs, exhibition catalogue, and articles). You will reevaluate and refine your initial theme/topic through examination of these scholarly sources related to your theme. You will summarize and critique each of these sources and the perspectives on your theme they lend in the form of an annotated bibliography. This document should list publication information for each source, formatted according to Chicago Manual of Style guidelines. Each bibliographic entry should include an annotation, consisting of 2-3 paragraphs summarizing the source’s content and position/argument, and addressing its relation to the thesis of your exhibition.
Exhibition Checklist & Final Exhibition Proposal: Using your bibliographic research as background, create an exhibition checklist and write an 600-900 word proposal for the exhibition.
From the previous two steps you have probably already done some exploring on the possible artists and their artworks. In the phase of creating your exhibition checklist, you will focus on considering what artworks/objects to include in your exhibition. Here are some questions to consider as you look over potential exhibition material. Use the questions to generate your exhibition checklist:
A. How does the artwork/object relate to the big idea (the thesis of your exhibition)?
B. What does the artwork/object tell us?
C. How will the artwork/object fit into the exhibition?
D. How will it look with the other material in the exhibition?
The checklist should consist of 15-20 artworks/objects (of any type) that relate to your theme. In this list, you want to begin to think about the potential relationships between artworks, and about the different ways artworks individually or in combination support different aspects of your topic.
Formatting: The checklist should be presented as a numbered list, and include the following information for each artwork: Artist name, title of work, date, medium, dimensions. Please follow the example below for the structure of your checklist.
Title: Ten Thousand Mountains Bathed in Red
Date:1964
Artist: Li Keran
Dimensions: 79.5cm x 49cm
Media: ink and color on paper
Title: Ten Thousand Mountains Bathed in Red
Date:1964
Artist: Li Keran
Dimensions: 79.5cm x 49cm
Media: ink and color on paper
No. Artwork Info Image
In your final exhibition proposal, you will explain both the proposed exhibition’s context and organization. Be sure to include a title, overview of the general theme: scope, chronological period, and geographic region. Also, write a general justification for the topic (current relevance, lack of coverage in previous exhibitions, audience interest) and a description of each thematic section (if applicable). You can also include a description of and justification for any supplementary materials you would like to include in the exhibition: maps, diagrams, background music, interactive digital tools (within reason), etc
If you are more comfortable with the layout of PowerPoint other than editing both images and texts in Word, you can submit two files instead: one separate exhibition checklist in the format of a PPT portfolio, and your final exhibition proposal in the format of Doc/Docx.