Zhai Liang’s (翟倞) three-month stay in New York City for his residency at Fou Gallery was his first time outside of his home country of China. “New York is a Big Liar” (“纽约是个大骗子” / “紐約是個大騙子”) his first US solo exhibition, is a visual diary of what he saw. Like many visitors, Zhai, a savvy and well-read Beijing native, traversed the streets, people watched, and explored museums, but he has a unique presentation of a familiar city and punctuates it with a provocative title. Over nine watercolor paintings, he shifts from reality and plain observation to fantasy and overt social criticism.
When you tour the exhibition, imagine yourself on a tour of New York. Start on the left and work your way clockwise around the gallery. A length of windows roughly splits the exhibition in two and presents a view of the city, an intermission, as you walk from one side of the gallery to the other.
Absent from the hodge podge of scenes are the typical New York City identifiers — the Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Times Square, bodegas, brownstones, street signs. In stripping away the distraction of a backdrop, the focus is on what Zhai has chosen to remember. They are recognizable components of New York that everybody, natives and tourists alike, see.
“Still Pigeon” and “One Just Stand There Staring Blankly, When Another Just Pass By…” are inspired by typical street scenes. Why is the pigeon still? They are never still. Two men on the street. Just an observation.
You may notice that “Still Pigeon” is slightly narrower than its frame. Exhibition curator and Fou Gallery co-owner Echo He explained that Zhai took advantage of this accidental mismeasurement and cleverly recovered by painting two spots on the mat board to give the area within the frame the appearance of a painter’s sketchbook. Recalling Magritte’s The Treachery of Images, the pigeon is not a pigeon. From the very start, appearances are questioned.
“Still Pigeon”, 2014
“静止的鸽子”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
12 x 16.1 in. (30.5 x 40.6 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
“One Just Stand There Staring Blankly, When Another Just Pass By…”, 2014
“一个在发呆，另一个碰巧路过”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
16.1 x 12 in. (40.6 x 30.5 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
“The Same Name” 3 and “The Same Name” 4 come from his visit to the American Museum of Natural History. One is a straightforward representation of a human skull while the other looks like one of those uncanny reconstructed faces. Placed slightly higher than eye-level, looking up at them is like looking up the evolutionary tree.
“The Same Name” 3, 2014
“同一个名字”3
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
10 x 8 in. (25 x 20 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
“The Same Name” 4, 2014
“同一个名字”4
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
10 x 8 in. (25 x 20 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
With the sarcastic title “Appreciate”, he mocks idle museum goers (who I initially believed to be subway riders). Commentary and cynicism are becoming more apparent. The Little Italy a capella group in “Sing a Song” could be joyful but they are just busking for tourist dollars. As Zhai shows in their postures, they’re so casual about it.
Zhai’s interest in groups of people who share a common purpose is an intriguing.
“Appreciate”, 2014
“欣赏”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
12 x 16.1 in. (30.5 x 40.6 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
“Sing a Song”, 2014
“唱一首歌”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
12 x 16.1 in. (30.5 x 40.6 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
In the press release, the images are said to “suddenly emerge from a void space”, as if they have been hidden and are now revealing themselves to us. From another perspective, they are forming, imprinted like a memory in a blank space. Removed from their environment into a barren void, even the most mundane subjects are surreal and silent. I’m reminded of the mood in Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks. Take away everything but the people, and you have something that approaches a work from this exhibition.
If you’ve followed the suggested route, in the second half of the exhibition along the long wall of the gallery, you sense that the anonymous visitor is starting to see things not as they physically are but as he believes them to be. He’s being overtaken by his opinions.
Sigmar Polke and David Lynch become one in “Sigmar Lynch”. The Tennis Player (Tennisspieler)’s “beautiful and bland” (as described Hal Foster) charmer morphs with Eraserhead’s everyman Henry Spencer in the ultimate body horror. It’s a view from the side as if it could not be viewed from directly from the front.
“Sigmar Lynch”, 2014
“西格玛∙林奇”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
12 x 16.1 in. (30.5 x 40.6 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
In the surreal “Dark Heart of the America”, a scene from a social gathering — perhaps a party at home, business function, gallery reception — is reduced to its basic elements heads (with great looking hair), faces, and drinks. Two smiling and attentive people are face to face with a literal dark heart. Do they notice? Do they care? Is this reality perceived through a sixth sense or is he being judgmental?
“Dark Heart of the America”, 2014
“美国黑暗之心”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
16.1 x 12 in. (40.6 x 30.5 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
The visitor is detached and wholly consumed by his disapproval in the abstract “Pinocchio’s Face” where even inoccuous pieces of paper on tabletop are seen to represent the titular liar. Pareidolia meets paranoia.
“Pinocchio’s Face”, 2014
“匹诺曹的脸”
Watercolor on Paper 纸上水彩
16.1 x 12 in. (40.6 x 30.5 cm)
© 2014 翟倞, 致谢否画廊
Zhai’s painting process reflects his strong intuition and talent. He applies watercolor paint to paper without first drawing or outlining the images. As “Still Pigeon” shows, he adapts as needed. The results are surprisingly detailed. Folds of clothes, layers of feathers, facial features, and even individual fingers have been given form, adding a strange realism to the figures that from a distance appear as indistinct colors and shapes but are anonymous and indeterminate even up close. It’s actually quite a strange effect. You see the painting from afar and move closer expecting to see details but they are never quite defined.
Fou’s smart framing of the paintings in near invisible frames and sparse placement of them against a high white wall expand the voids where his painted subjects exist. The flood of natural light in the gallery illume the textures Zhai has deftly created and the muted earth tone colors he has chosen.
Zhai is very aware that titles influence the viewing experience and leads the viewer with his titles. It’s no mistake that quotation marks are part of the titles of the exhibition and paintings. The twist is that the the words are not his own, but belong to an anonymous visitor whom Zhai has said is like himself, but has a different personality and is cynical. Whose New York experience did we just experience? Has Zhai overheard an anonymous visitor and witnessed his descent into cynicism and delusion? Who is the person talking to? Is it really the artist hiding behind the quotation marks?
Fou displays the works without titles. Like New Yorker cartoon caption contests, we’re given a chance to interpret the familiar scene and to try to figure out how they all make New York a big liar.
The exhibition is on view at Fou Gallery, 535 Dean Street, Apt 507, Brooklyn, through November 15, 2014. The gallery is open 2 – 6 on Saturdays and open by appointment.
Images: Copyright Zhai Liang, Courtesy of Fou Gallery