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| Nova, 2019 |
Chinese contemporary artist Cao Fei has exhibited her groundbreaking films and video installations all over the world, from New York's MoMA to the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Her work fearlessly embraces new technology to explore the world around us in poetic ways.
Cao Fei is often described by the art world as the embodiment of the new China. Her wide-ranging practice bridges film, digital media, photography, sculpture, installation, and performance to explore China's societal shifts in the face of rapid urbanisation and globalisation.
Over the last 20 years, the artist has constantly challenged herself by experimenting with new technologies, moving from documentary filmmaking to digital animation, stop-motion, and virtual reality.
Born in Guangzhou in 1978, at a time when China was just starting to open up, Cao Fei absorbed the new influences from American TV channels transmitted from nearby Hong Kong. "We used MTV the same way young people are now using Instagram and Facebook. It was a way to get information about the world," she recalls. "Even today, music and pop culture remain extremely important in my work."
Having first experimented with film using her father's huge BETA Cam, bought in Japan in the 1980s, the budding filmmaker later created her first docudrama when she was 21 years old on a more manageable Sony video camera. The type, she remembers, that "had the flap opening on the side."Presented as an end-of-year project, the work was noticed by a curator who picked it up for an exhibition in Spain. This put Cao Fei on a fast track for international recognition that would, in time, see her work presented at the Tate, the Guggenheim, and two Venice Biennales, amongst others.
Cao Fei's work reflects the evolution of digital technology. In 2007, she became interested in the fantasy world of Second Life, a virtual world that lets participants choose avatars and interact with one another. After playing for hours every day as the avatar China Tracy, she created one of her career-defining video artworks, 'RMB City (2007)', a virtual island where traditional communist China collides with new landmarks such as the CCTV Tower. It is a reflection on the rapidly evolving urbanisation of her home country.
"For me, virtuality is a means to express myself, to understand reality, which is what I'm interested in," explains the artist.
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| 'RMB City' |
"I use writing and film too, but we are living in an age of rapid technology and in this context we need to know that virtuality has changed the way reality works. And to do this we need to be part of it."
Her recent work, unveiled at the Serpentine Galleries in 2000, has moved on from the "pre-virtual reality" of RMB City — where the viewer looks at a screen — to fully immersing the visitor into her work.
'The Eternal Wave' offers viewers a multisensory, virtual reality (VR) experience, inserting them into the film set of her 2019 feature-length retro sci-fi movie, 'Nova,' where they can interact with objects and travel back in time.
While always experimenting with new technologies, Cao Fei does not completely turn her back on more "traditional" art forms.
In 2014, she created 'La Town,' a stop-action film using miniature figurines and architectural models to depict a society on the verge of destruction. "After creating so many digital works, I told myself I wanted to create something with no artificial effects. Everything needs to be totally handmade, even the sky," she says. "Yesterday, I was straightening one of the figurines [which is on display at the Serpentine Galleries] and I felt very relaxed. It was a very good feeling to use my hands for La Town; just sticks and glue."
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