With the theme of “Field.Horizon”, the Seventh Contemporary Art Invitation Exhibition (Biennial) was staged at Beihang Art Gallery on September 19.
80 artists were invited to participate in the exhibition with their works, covering many categories like ink, color ink, oil painting, prints, sculptures, installations and comprehensive materials. It presents to the teachers, students and the public an academic and original art feast that reflects the development trend of contemporary art.
The opening ceremony was hosted by Professor Cai Jinsong, Dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences (School of Public Administration) and the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences and Director of the Beihang Art Gallery. At the ceremony, he also read a written speech by Professor Zhao Gang, Vice Secretary of the Party Committee.
In his speech, Zhao Gang expressed his warm welcome and heartfelt thanks to the artists who were invited to participate in this exhibition to support the introduction of elegant art to campus. “On August 30 last year, General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed in his reply to the old professor of the Central Academy of Fine Arts that ‘aesthetic education is important for shaping a beautiful soul’,” he said. “ In the current process of accelerating the construction of ‘Double First-rate’ universities, we must pay more attention to promote the overall improvement of students’ comprehensive literacy such as moral, intellectual, physical, aesthetic and labor education.” Zhao Gang emphasized that Beihang University has long adhered to openness, inclusiveness, pragmatism and responsibility, and continuously strengthened the cultivation of an artistic atmosphere and improved its practical ability of aesthetic education. Beihang University has formed a variety of cultural venues represented by Beihang Art Gallery, Sunrise Concert Hall, Air and Space Museum and so on, which provided a positive social impact on cultural transmission. The success of this exhibition at Beihang Art Gallery will play a positive role in deepening the connotation of Beihang’s aesthetic education, improving its aesthetic taste and inheriting and continuing the excellent traditional culture.
At the opening ceremony, many distinguished guests and representatives like Wang Zhichun, Vice Director of Art Committee of Beijing Fine Art Academy, Shi Jin, one of the first resident artists of Beihang University, and Li Hanping, Director of Institute of Fine Arts of Beijing Forestry University, delivered speeches and congratulated Beihang on the success of the exhibition. According to them, Beihang Art Gallery, adhering to the “public, professional, high-grade” positioning, had been holding high-quality exhibitions to lead the university’s art communication and aesthetic education practice since its establishment 14 years ago. These explorations and endeavors won the full affirmation of these speakers who also shared their feelings and experiences about the “ Field·Horizon” theme of the development of contemporary academic art and the ideas and paths of artistic innovation.
The 7th invitational exhibition (Biennial) invited more than 80 artists who have a deep sense of mission, academic attainments, humanistic quality, aesthetic pursuit and had made arduous explorations and achieved fruitful results in their respective creative paths. More than 80 paintings, sculptures, installations and comprehensive materials was showed in the exhibition. Being mapped in the theme framework of “ Field” and “Horizon”, the exhibited works of this year embrace diverse art styles and unique design and build an exploratory and academic field and horizon of art.
Since its foundation in May 2006, Beihang Art Gallery has insisted on independently organizing a large-scale contemporary art invitation exhibition (Biennial) every two years, which is continuously supported by the artists with ardent response. This exhibition has been held for seven sessions, from the first “Inspiration·Space” to the current “Field·Horizon”, and brought together a large number of scholarly artists to promote the multi-dimensional exploration of the concept of academic art, formal connotation and creative paths. In the past fourteen years, Beihang Art Gallery made its academic accumulation and gradually refined and perfected its value orientation and exhibition character by holding over 300 public, professional and high-grade exhibitions, especially the seventh Biennales reflecting the artists’ creative cluster patterns, the college’s connotation of academic art and cultural responsibility. It can be said that the academic “Biennial” which was jointly completed by the artists of the contemporary academic art provides a new sample for the innovation and development of contemporary art. In the meantime, it also offers new enlightenments and possibilities for deepening art communication and aesthetic education in universities.
As one of the series of cultural and artistic activities of Beihang University to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, this year’s Biennale was hosted by the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences and the Institute of Cultural and Art Communication. The exhibition will be open to the public at the Beihang Art Gallery for free from September 19 to October 30.
Reported by Wang Jiafa and Li Shuai
Photographed by Song Chao
Reviewed by Yu Jinlong
Edited by Jia Aiping
Translated by Ren Chenjie
