Bingyi 冰逸

Biography

b. 1975, lives and works in Beijing

An artist, architectural designer, curator, cultural critic, and social activist, Bingyi (b. 1975, Beijing) has developed a multi-faceted practice that encompasses land and environmental art, site-specific architectural installation, musical and literary composition, ink painting, performance art, and filmmaking. Adopting a non-anthropocentric perspective and channeling nature’s creative agency, her work is centrally concerned with the themes of ecology, ruins, rebirth, and poetic imagination. After pursuing university-level studies in biomedical and electronic engineering in the United States, Bingyi earned a Ph.D. in Art History and Archeology from Yale University in 2005 with a dissertation on the art of the Han Dynasty.

In her large-scale ink paintings, Bingyi uses ink as "dark light" —carbon, an absolute absorber of light, in water, nature's universal translucent solvent—to illuminate the usually invisible and transient physical processes that enable ordered patterns and forms to arise from chaos. Over months or even years, she collaborates with the environmental conditions of a specific site to capture a reality-scaled record of the climatic and topological forces shaping a natural or urban landscape. She then uses installation and performance to recuperate these forces in the live embodied experience of the viewer.

In October 2013, she occupied the center of Toronto's city hall to create a 1,800 square meter ink painting over the course of a twelve-hour outdoor public performance entitled Metamorphosis: To the Non-earthlings. Less than three months later, she created Epoché, a huge public performance and installation commissioned by the Shenzhen Bao'an International Airport. Working with the conditions of suspension, gravity, land, and wind, she bombarded an airfield with 20-kilogram oil-and-ink "missiles"—500 kilograms of material in total—at different heights from a helicopter. The resultant monumental canvas, a record of the performance and event, was hung centrally in the airport for a month. Nicknamed modan or "ink bomb," the piece became an internet sensation.

In her March 2015 solo show at Ink Studio, she created a two-floor immersive environment with her massive 2013 work Wanwu. Wanwu is the most recent in her series of land and weather works created at sacred mountain sites in China that register the effects of wind, sun, humidity, air pressure, and terrain with ink and water on bespoke xuan paper. Installed again in a different manner for the Encounters public program of Art Basel Hong Kong 2016, Wanwu was a highlight of the art fair and was centrally featured in a variety of media outlets, including being selected as one of the top fifteen booths by Artsy. Recently, Bingyi has extended her nature paintings to incorporate the agencies of ice and sound waves.

At the other end of her practice, Bingyi explores the microscopic origins of organic life in intimate, small-format paintings, in which her minute and meticulous brushwork paradoxically reveals a profoundly creative, gestural, and "calligraphically expressive" quality drawn from her daily calligraphy routine. Through her hypnotic, obsessive endurance and execution both painstaking and nuanced, one senses the loving power of nature itself as it crafts animate life from inanimate matter. Her encyclopedic series Fairies are "catalogues" of the endless virtual forms assumed by organismic life, each with an associated personal anecdote or poetic fantasy.

In recent years, she has turned her attention to film-making. Part of a larger project documenting the disappearance of Beijing hutong, her narrative film trilogy Ruins will premier at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in spring 2019.

Bingyi has exhibited internationally at Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art (2016); Istanbul Modern (2016); Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Alicante, Alicante, Spain (2014), St. Johannes-Evangelist-Kirche, Berlin, Germany (2012), Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA (2010), Galerie Erna Hecey, Brussels, Belgium (2009), Contrasts Gallery, Shanghai, China (2009), and Max Protetch Gallery, New York, USA (2008). Her works have also been included in Surveyors, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, USA (2011), and Yipai, the Opening of the New Wing, Today Art Museum, Beijing, China (2009), and featured at The 7th Gwangju Biennale, Annual Report: A Year in Exhibitions, Gwangju, South Korea (2008).

Bingyi's works can be found in the White Rabbit Contemporary Chinese Art Collection, Sydney, Australia; and the collections, among others, of, the Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA; Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Alicante, Alicante, Spain; and Museum of Chinese Women and Children, Beijing, China. She has been the subject of three documentaries: The Enduring Passion for Ink—A Series on Contemporary Ink Painters: Bingyi's Madness, on Bingyi's process as an ink painter, filmed by Richard Widmer and directed by Britta Erickson; Shape of the Wind, on Bingyi's land and weather art, and Epoché, on Bingyi's Shenzhen airport performance/event, both filmed and edited by Richard Widmer.

To: Artist's Website

Works

1975						Born in Beijing, China


EDUCATION
2005						PhD in History of Art, Yale University, New Haven, USA
2001						Master of Arts, Yale University, New Haven, USA
1998						Bachelor of Arts, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, USA


SOLO EXHIBITIONS AND PROJECTS
2015						Bingyi: Intensive/Extensive, Ink Studio, Beijing, China
						Inside the Wall, Alvaro Alcazar, Madrid, Spain
2014						Epoché, Shenzhen Bao'an International Airport, Shenzhen, China Toronto Project: To the Non-Earthlings, Center Platform of Toronto City Hall, Toronto, Canada Bingyi: Metamorphosis I, Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Alicante, Alicante, Spain Bingyi: Metamorphosis II, Art Gallery, Miguel Hernández University of Elche, Elche, Spain Bingyi: Wanwu, Galeríe Charpa, Valencia, Spain
2013						Bingyi: Heaven in the Cave, The Emperor Beijing Qianmen, Beijing, China (a collaboration with ASAP Design New York)
2012						Gestalt of the Wind, St. Johannes-Evangelist-Kirche, Berlin, Germany
2011						Rhapsody of Four (Performance), Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, USA and Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA
2010						Cascade, Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA
2009						Seamlessly Lost, Gallerie Erna Hecey, Brussels, Belgium Skin: Bingyi Solo Exhibition, Contrasts Gallery, Shanghai, China
2008						I Have Four Rooms: One Room Aches, One Room Breaks, One Room Meanders, One Room Hangs, Tang Contemporary, Hong Kong S.A.R., China Six Accounts of A Floating Life, Max Protetch Gallery, New York, USA Bingyi: Invisible Rivers Invisible Towns, projects staged in various outdoor locations, as published by Art Map, Beijing, China
2007						Dawns Here Are Quiet II, Ethan Cohen Fine Arts, New York, USA Dawns Here Are Quiet I, Center for the Arts, Buffalo, USA Between Omnipresence and Reminiscence, Sanshang Gallery, Beijing, China


SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2016						Till It's Gone: An Exhibition on Nature and Sustainability, Istanbul Museum of Modern Art, Istanbul, Turkey Humanistic Nature and Society (Shan - Shui 山水) - A People's Biography, Shanghai Himalayas Museum, Shanghai, China
2013						Shadow of Dust, When the Sun Blooms, WiE Kultur, Berlin, Germany Chinese Female Artists Exhibition, Xi'an Art Musem, Xi'an, China and Museum of Chinese Women and Children, Beijing, China
2012						Original Forms of Chinese Water Ink Painting, Sanchuan Modern Art Museum, Nanjing, China
2011						Decade of The Rabbit, White Rabbit Gallery, Sydney, Australia Surveyors, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, USA Half of the Sky: Women in the New Art of China, National Museum of Art of China, Beijing, China and Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA
2010						Wild Things, Kunsthallen Brandts, Odense, Denmark Ten Years at the White Rabbit, White Rabbit Art Gallery, Sydney, Australia
2009						Yi Pai-Century Thinking, Today Art Museum, Beijing, China Opening Exhibition, The White Rabbit Collection, Sydney, Australia Dress Codes: Clothing as Metaphor, The Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, USA
2008						The Yi School: Thirty Years of Chinese Abstract Art, CaixaForum Madrid, Madrid, Spain The 7^th Gwangju Biennale, Annual Report: A Year in Exhibitions, Gwangju, South Korea State of City, Rochester Contemporary Art Center, Rochester, USA The New Chinese Paintings, The Deutsch Bank Gallery, New York, USA
2007						City, New Landscape: Contemporary Urban Architecture Biennale (a sub-exhibition of "The 2^nd Shenzhen Biennale: 07 Shenzhen-Hong Kong City and Architecture Biennale), Chongqing Urban Planning Exhibition Hall (main location), Chongqing, China Seduction and Confusion, Keumsan Gallery, Beijing, China and Seoul, South Korea


SELECTED COLLECTIONS
White Rabbit Art Gallery, Sydney, Australia Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Alicante, Alicante, Spain Museum of Chinese Women and Children, Beijing, China Brooklyn Museum, New York, USA Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, MA, USA

Last Updated: December 2018

Documents

Exhibitions

News

Art Fairs

Bibliography

PUBLICATIONS AND REVIEWS

Apfelbaum, Polly & Burkard, Lene. Chapter on Bingyi. In Wild Things. Odense: Kunsthallen Brandts, 2010.

Artron Fearture 雅昌艺术网专稿. "Yin: Heiguang 2014 Bingyi chuangzuo xibanyasandizhan""囙：黑光"2014冰逸创作西班牙三地展 (Blacklight: 2014 Huang Bingyi's Three Exhibitions in Span). Artron, July 2, 2014 (http://auction.artron.net/20140702/n624386.htm)

Chao, Albert. "A Look at China's Sacred Sites." The Artvoice, April 11, 2007.

Craham-Dixon, Andrew. "The Art of China." BBC Four Documentary Series, Episode II and III, aired on August 6 and 13, 2014.

Feng Tang. "A Note to Shitao, on Seamlessly Lost." In Luan (Seamlessly Lost): Projects by Bingyi. Brussels: Erna Hecey Gallery, 2009.

Gao Minglu 高名潞. "Zhongguohua de lishi yu weilai" 中国画的历史与未来 (The Past and Future of Chinese Ink Painting). In Shuimo yuanxing 水墨原形 (The Original Forms of Ink Painting). Nanjing: Jiangsu meishu chubanshe 江苏美术出版社 (Jiangsu Fine Arts Publishing House), 2012, pp. 217 - 231.

Gao Minglu 高名潞. "Su: Bingyi de jinzuo" 宿：冰逸的近作 (Home: Bingyi's Recent Paintings). In Su 宿 Home. Hangzhou: Zhongguo meishu xueyuan chubanshe 中央美术学院出版社(China Academy of Fine Arts), 2007.

Goodman, Jonathan. "Bingyi Huang at Max Protetch." Art Critical, March 3, 2008

(http://www.artcritical.com/goodman/JGBingyi.htm).

Guest, Luise. "The Postmodern Literati: the Performative Practice of Bingyi." Creative China, August 17, 2014 edition

(http://www.creative-asia.net/content/postmodern-literati-performative-practice)

Guest, Luise. "Between Heaven and Earth, Bingyi's Meditative Ink Painting." The Culture Trip, 2013 (http://theculturetrip.com/asia/china/articles/between-heaven-and-earth-bingyi-s-meditative-ink-paintings/)

Hu Jiujiu. "The Ants Colony, an International Experiment, on Bingyi's Project on Abandoned Houses in Buffalo New York." New Weekly Magazine, Volume 275, July 28, 2008.

Ikegami, Hiroko. "Emotions Are Beautiful: Bingyi's 'Unfashionable' Faith in Painting." Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, Volume 6, No.3, September 2007.

Li Chuxiao. "Bingyi's Gathering at the Temple." Time Out Magazine, Beijing, March 5, 2014, p. 16.

Li Ruoyu. "Water in the Royal City, Discovering the Qianmen Project." Architecture Digest, April 2014, pp. 49 - 51.

Li Zhou 李舟. "Bingyi: yunyou zhi suo" 冰逸：云游之所 (Bingyi: Wandering Place). Bu yishu 不。艺术 (No Art), vol.1, October 2014, pp. 116 - 122.

Liu Lei 刘磊. "Bingyi: wenhua tutechan de jiben guize" 冰逸："文化土特产"的基本规则？(Bingyi: Basic Rules of Cultural Local Products?). Dongfang yishu 东方艺术(Oriental Art), vol. 17, 2013, pp. 58 - 59.

Macdonald, John. "The Decade of the Rabbit, The White Rabbit Gallery." The Sydney Morning Herald, March 26, 2011

(http://johnmcdonald.net.au/2011/decade-of-the-rabbit/)

Marselli, Lorenzo. "Who Has Seen the Dragon? " Naked Punch Online, Summer Edition, 2006.

Rafferty, Rebecca. "Constant Shift, on State of the City." Rochester City Newspaper, September 2008.

Saussy, Haun. "Rolling the River, on Bingyi's painting Thousand Li of Rivers and Mountains." In Bingyi. Beijing, Bangkok and Hongkong: Tang Contemporary Art, 2008.

Shiner, Eric. "Dawns Here are Quiet: On Bingyi's Recent Paintings." In Dawns Here are Quiet: Bingyi's Recent Paintings. New York: Ethan Cohen Fine Arts, 2007.

Sohu Feature 搜狐文化网专稿. "Xin fuchunshanju tu chusheng: yishujia Bingyi tantao huimie yu jianshe zhuti" 新《富春山居图》出世：艺术家冰逸探讨"毁灭与建设"主题 (New Dwelling in the Mt. Funchun: Bingyi's Discussion on Destruction and Construction). Sohu, Vol. 46, May 29, 2012

(http://cul.sohu.com/s2012/diyixianchang46/)

Stanger, Ilana. "Interview with Visual Artists: Bingyi Huang." New York Foundation for the Arts, 2004 (http://www.nyfa.org/level4.asp?id=136&fid=1&sid=51&tid=167)

Vine, Richard. "Half the Sky: Chinese Women Artists in Philadelphia." Art in America, October 31, 2011 (http://www.artinamericamagazine.com/news-features/news/half-the-sky/)

Wang Min'an. "Plants and Accidents, on Bingyi's Painting." In Bingyi. Beijing, Bangkok and Hongkong: Tang Contemporary Art, 2008.

Wei Xing. "The Metamorphosis of Water: Bingyi's Cascade." Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, Volume 10, No. 4, July/August, 2011, pp. 67 - 74.

Wei Xing 魏星. "Wendao zhi shui de lunhui: lun Huang Bingyi de xinzuo" 问道之水的轮回：论黄冰逸的新作<囦> (Transmigration of the Water Seeking Dao: Huang Bingyi's New Work). Yishu yu touzi 艺术与投资 (Art and Investment), Volume 10, 2011, pp. 104 - 107.

Wilson, Ashleigh. "Dreams of Modern China: A New Private Museum Hosts An Impressive Collection of Contemporary Chinese Art." The Australian, July 31, 2009.

Wu Hung. "Transcening the East/West Dichotomy: A Short History of Contemporary Chinese Ink Painting." In Ink Painting, Past as Present in Contemporary China, edited by Maxwell K. Hearn. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2013, p. 30.

Wu Hung. "On Bingyi's Cascade." Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, Volume 10, No. 4, July/August, 2011, p. 66.

Xu Bing. "Six Accounts of A Floating Life, on Bingyi's Recent Paintings." In Bingyi: Six Accounts of a Floating Life. New York: Max Protetch Gallery, 2008.

Zhang Xiao. "Cultural Convergence, on All Design of the Qianmen Project. " The Space Magazine, April 2014, pp. 142 - 145.

Zi Ran. "Bingyi's Skin, the Salon Filled with Memories." Modern Weekly, Volume 572, December 5, 2009 (http://www.modernweekly.com/content.aspx?artID=30858)

Zong Xuan. "Bingyi's Poetics at the Temple." Elle Decoration, May 2014, pp. 158 - 161.

CATALOGUES

Bingyi. Beijing, Bangkok and Hongkong: Tang Contemporary Art Center, 2008.

Bingyi: Six Accounts of a Floating Life. New York: Max Protetch Gallery, 2008.

Dawns Here Are Quiet: Bingyi's Recent Paintings. New York: Ethan Cohen Fine Arts, 2007.

Luminaries: Information and Light Bodies, by Bingyi. Beijing and Valencia: Qianmen Projects, 2014.

Luan (Seamlessly Lost): Projects by Bingyi. Brussels: Erna Hecey Gallery, 2009.

Su 宿 Home. Hangzhou: Zhongguo meishu xueyuan chubanshe 中国美术学院出版社 China Academy of Fine Arts), 2007.

ARTIST'S OWN WRITINGS

Huang Bingyi. "As We Live with Art — On the Discourse of Yipai." Cultural Studies, September 2009.

Huang Bingyi 黄冰逸. "Jingshenhua de wu: xiegei Minglu" 精神化的物——写给名潞 (Spiritual Things: Writing to Minglu). In Shuimo yuanxing 水墨原形 (The Original Forms of Ink Painting). Nanjing: Jiangsu meishu chubanshe 江苏美术出版社 (Jiangsu Fine Arts Publishing House), 2012.

Huang Bingyi. "Wilderness, on Yang Hongwei's Recent Projects." In Wilderness: Printmaking of Yang Hongwei. Beijing: White Space Beijing, 2008.

Huang Bingyi. "Unbounded." In Unbounded: You Si. Shanghai: Art Labor Gallery, 2007.

Huang Bingyi. "Vertical: On Wang Luyan, Chinese Conceptualism and the New Analyst Group." In Wang Luyan: Sawing or Being Sawed? Beijing: Arario Gallery, 2007.

Huang Bingyi 黄冰逸. "zai meixue yu shiyi zhijian" 在美学与诗意之间 (Between the Aesthetic and Poetic). In Gao Minglu 高名潞 ed. Meixue xushi yu chouxiang yishu 美学叙事与抽象艺术 (Aesthetic Narration and Abstract Art). Chengdu: Sichuanchuban jituan 四川出版集团 (Sichuan Publishing Group), 2007.

Huang Bingyi 黄冰逸. "Zhongli de feixu: lun Tan Ping, Jinshi chouxiang huihua de neizai luoji" 重力的废墟：论谭平、金石抽象绘画的内在逻辑 (Ruins of Gravity: On the Internal Logic of Zhu Jinshi and Tan Ping's Abstract Paintings). In Feixu: Tan Ping, Zhu Jinshi huihuazhan 废墟：谭平、朱金石绘画展 (I Paint Therefore I Am: Tan Ping and Zhu Jinshi). Chengdu: Sichuan chuban jituan 四川出版集团 (Sichuan Publishing Group) and Sichuan meishu chubanshe 四川美术出版社 (Sichuan Fine Arts Publishing House), 2006.

Huang Bingyi. "Go with the Flow: He Yunchang's Performance Art at Niagara Falls." In Art Asia Pacific, No. 48, Spring, 2006.

Huang Bingyi. "One Person's Classics of Mountain and Sea: On Qin Yufen and Her Installation Art." In Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, Volume 5, No. 2, Summer/Jun 2006.

Huang Bingyi. "Screening Cinematic Space: On Chinese Experimental Films form the Last Decade." In The Wall: Reshaping Contemporary Chinese Art. Beijing: Millennium Art Museum, 2005.

Huang Bingyi. "Rereading Mawangdui, from Chu to Han." Dissertation, Yale University, 2005.

OTHER MATERIALS

Asia Art Archive. Collection Online: Huang Bingyi

(http://www.aaa.org.hk/Home/Search?globalKeyword=Huang+Bingyi)

Bingyi's Homepage:

http://www.bingyi.info

Bingyi's Blogs:

http://blog.artintern.net/bingyi & http://blog.sina.com.cn/u/1265762692

Bingyi's Weibo:

http://weibo.com/u/1934914102?from=profile&wvr=5&loc=infdomain

Bingyi, "Shape of the Wind." Filmed and edited by Rick Widmer, 12 min, 35 sec., digital, color, sound, 2012.

Bingyi, "Epoche." Filmed and edited by Rick Widmer, 12 min, 34 sec., digital, color, sound, 2014.

Erickson, Britta, producer and director. "Bingyi's Magic." The Enduring Passion for Ink: A Project on Contemporary Chinese Ink Painters. Part of a 10-part film series, filmed and edited by Rick Widmer, 13 min, 25 sec., digital, color, sound, 2013.

Meng Yufang 孟玉芳. Zhuanfang Bingyi: yishuquan zhiqing zhixing de qinvzi (上、中、下) 专访冰逸：艺术圈至情至性的奇女子（上、中、下）(Interview with Bingyi: A Legendary Girl in the Art Circle I、II、III). Artron Feature, 2014.

I：

http://contemporary.artron.net/20120816/n257340.html;

http://video.artron.net/20120820/n257956.html

II：

http://contemporary.artron.net/20120819/n257700.html;

http://video.artron.net/20120820/n257957.html

III：

http://contemporary.artron.net/20120819/n257701.html;

http://video.artron.net/20120820/n257958.html

Xiang Yi 向伊. "Yelu daxue yishuxue boshi zhuming yishujia Bingyi zhuanfang: yitaitiancheng" 耶鲁大学艺术学博士著名艺术家冰逸专访：意态天成 (Interview with Bingyi). Ifeng, November 8, 2013 (http://edu.ifeng.com/campus/detail_2013_11/08/31076229_1.shtml)

Zheng Shengtian 郑胜天. Bingyi 冰逸 (Bingyi), in Zheng Shengtian de wushiyi cifangtan: zoujin dangdai yishujia 郑胜天的五十一次访谈：走近当代艺术家 (Zheng Shengtian 51 interviews with the contemporary artists). Taipei: Diancang yishujiating youxian gongsi 典藏艺术家庭股份有限公司 (Art and collection co.,LTD), 2014, pp. 30 - 38.

Video