《物非物——果实 01》
Material/Immaterial - Fruit 01
2010
About the Artist
Chu Chu was born in 1975 and currently lives and works in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province.
Solo Exhibitions:
2008 It’s Not It, OFOTO Gallery, Shanghai, China
Group Exhibions:
2010
Beyond the Body, MoCA, Shanghai, China
The First Interna onal Contemporary Art Fes val of China Jimei, Xiamen, China
Another Landscape, Beijing, Shanghai, and Dali, China
2009
Moving, Likailin Contemporary Fine Art Gallery, Manchester, UK
Art Beijing Contemporary Art Fair, Beijing, China 2008 Genius, Xiaoping Gallery, Shanghai, China
The Crea vity of Women, Houston, USA
2007
The Alchemy of Shadows, Lianzhou, China
The Twelfth Lishui International Photography Festival, Lishui, China
Passing: Ten Scenes from West Lake, Hangzhou, China
ABOUT THE WORK
In May 2007, my mother gave me some oranges totakewithmetomystudio.IateafewandIle the rest there. A er a few days, some had already begun to look di erent; they couldn’t be eaten, but I didn’t want to throw them out and I didn’t move them. I very seldom went to my studio, about once every few weeks or even once every few months, but every me I went, I felt that everything on the inside was the same as before, it was only the outside that had changed. Because of the humidity in Hangzhou, the studio hadn’t been aired out in a long me. The paint on the walls had started to bubble and there were black and yellow spots near the ceiling. The oranges were being eaten by insects, but I didn’t move them. The insects very peacefully ate the oranges and the oranges were very peacefully eaten by the insects.
When autumn came, I brought some pears and pomegranates. My studio was very quiet, as if urging me to finish things. Without another thought, I sat down to eat, as the air inside moldered.
In spring of the next year, I discovered that the appearance of the fruit had changed again. The oranges were uneven and on the top were many patches of white mold. They were pre y, and I wanted to take photographs of them, but they were still not quite beau ful enough, so I didn’t touch them.
In 2009, when I was making the series It’s Not It –Knife Blade, I was afraid that they would be disturbed, so I put them in some plastic containers to cover them. At this point, there were oranges, pears, kiwis, pomegranates, and apples. I moved them to the trunk of my car, so they went with me when I went out, rain or shine, for about a year.
Later I discovered that insects had eaten a lot of the fruit, so I put them in my basement, where they stayed un l I brought them back to my studio in the winter of 2009. The peel was all that was left of the kiwi; the flesh had already disappeared. It was like a piece of paper; if you moved it, it ripped. Because there was no way to move it, I had to throw it out. The apple had been eaten by insects to the point that water was all that was le . The water then evaporated and a pasty substance remained.
Because my studio was a rather far from home, I didn’t go very often, it wasn’t very efficient. I still wanted to take more pictures of the fruit, so a few days ago I moved everything home. It was a good environment, cool and airy. Dozens of genera ons of insects had been raised on this fruit. A moth just ew out. Away from the light, the fruit retained a very deep color, so I knew they were s ll them.