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An interaction between the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing and the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL.

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Beyond Boundaries - Somerset House poster
Beyond Boundaries - Somerset House poster, 2019

Beyond Boundaries is an exhibition of work by 24 artists of international renown with close working associations to two of the most important art institutions in the world; the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing (CAFA) and the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL, London. Timed to celebrate the centenary of CAFA, 150 years of the Slade School of Fine Art and the historic contribution these two great organisations have made in nurturing artistic vision, Beyond Boundaries celebrates the important role of practicing artists as educators at CAFA and the Slade and examines transcultural interaction. Aritsts include Phyllida Barlow, Kate Bright, Susan Collins, Dryden Goodwin, Neil Jeffries, Lisa Milroy, Jayne Parker, Kieren Reed, Karin Ruggaber, Andrew Stahl and Phoebe Unwin. The show, co-curated by Andrew Stahl, is a joint exhibition with the Central Academy of Fine Arts, China. The exhibition takes place at Somerset House, West Wing Galleries, London WC2R 1RA, from 12 March - 2 April 2019.

See www.somersethouse.org.uk.

Introduction

The exhibition showcases current and previous faculty members or influential artists closely related to the institutions. Both CAFA and Slade have played (and are continuing to play) an excellent role in nurturing generations of artists and art educators, who then became the vital artistic soul of their own country. The joint exhibition highlights this aspect in presenting works by reputable teaching members of the academies. 

The CAFA + Slade collaboration brings artworks and academic staff together, but it is also a fantastic opportunity to exchange, interact and understand each other’s practices.

CAFA: China Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA)

CAFA, The Central Academy of Fine Arts, was originally founded in 1918 as part of the Peking National Art Institution during the era of the Republic of China (1912-49). In 1950 it merged with China Northern Academy’s art departments. It is now considered as one of China’s most prestigious art institutions. CAFA continues to contribute and influence Chinese art education and, more recently, a wider international art community. There are eight schools under CAFA: School of Chinese Painting, School of Fine Art, School of Design, School of Architecture, School of Humanities, School of Experimental Arts, College of City Design and School of Continuing Education.

CAFA Art Museum

Established in 1953, the art collection of CAFA was located in Beijing city centre. It has over 13,000 works covering a wide variety of genres and styles from ancient to present. In 2008, CAFA Art Museum was built, the collection and the art academy both moved to their new home in Wang Jing district, Beijing suburb.

Academy website: http://www.cafa.edu.cn

Curating team

The organising team comprises: Zhang Zikang, Guo Xiaohui, Andrew Stahl. Guo Xiaohui is the main curator and is in charge of the project, the team will work together with her to help successfully deliver the exhibition.

Zhang Zikang, Project director
Zhang Zikang is a highly experienced artist, curator, publisher and art museum expert. He is currently the curator of CAFA Art Museum, he was the former vice-director of the National Art Museum in China, his previous posts and responsibilities include: vice-director of the minister of Culture in Xinjiang Province, head of the National Arts & Culture Publishing Group, president of National Institute for Research in the Arts, president of National Information for Arts Research, vice-president of The Museum of National Arts Research Institute, director of Today Art Museum Beijing, chief editor for Art of the East, Art Today magazine, director of Ya-Song Arts of He Bei Educational Publishing House. 

Guo Xiaohui, Project director and curator
Guo Xiaohui is a London-based curator who has over ten years’ experience in the arts. In 2014, she gained two MAs from Goldsmiths College, University of London, majored in Art & Politics and Cultural Studies. As an independent curator with an interest in Art & Politics, Xiaohui’s main focus is to produce innovative and meaningful exhibitions that bring together art from China & the West. She founded XH Projects in 2016 and had since curated numerous exhibitions in China, UK, Israel and Berlin.  

Andrew Stahl Artist and co-curator
Andrew is Professor of Fine Art at the UCL, Slade School of Fine Art. He will work as joint curator and consultant helping with curatorial activities of the exhibition and will bring to the project an exciting network of artists associated with the Slade.

Selected artist staff at Slade

Phyllida Barlow 
Phyllida Barlow CBE RA (b. 1944, Newcastle upon Tyne, England) is a British artist. She studied at Chelsea College of Art and the Slade School of Art in London where she later became a professor. Barlow taught at the Slade for more than four decades before retiring in 2009 and is now Emerita Professor of Fine Art. She has had an important influence on younger generations of artists through her work and long teaching career in London art schools. In 2011 Barlow became a Royal Academician and in 2015 she was made a CBE for her services to the arts. In 2017, Barlow represented Great Britain at the Venice Biennale. Barlow recently exhibited at venues include: Venice Biennale, Italy (2017, 2013); Turner Contemporary, UK (2017); Kunsthalle, Zurich (2016); Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, UK (2015); Tate Britain, UK (2014); Carnegie International, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (2013); New Museum, New York (2012); Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, UK (2012) and Hauser & Wirth, London, UK (2011). 

Susan Collins 
Susan Collins (b. 1964 London) is one of the UK's leading artists working with digital media. During the 1980s she studied at Chelsea College of Art and the Slade School of Fine Art in London. She then continued her study at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in the US before gaining a PhD at University of Reading in the UK. She is currently Slade Professor and Director of the Slade School of Fine Art where she established the Slade Center for Electronic Media in Fine Art in 1995. For the past decade the collision between the real and the artificial or virtual has been a key area of her investigation. Collins works across public, gallery and online spaces. Recent exhibitions have included Outlook Express(ed) at Oakville Galleries, Ontario, Canada; Digital Aesthetic 2, Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston; Webscape, Vestsjællands Kunstmuseum, Søro, Denmark 2007; Video Vortex at Montevideo/The Netherlands Media Art Institute, Amsterdam and Multiplicities at ARC Projects, Sofia, Bulgaria.

Andrew Stahl 
Andrew Stahl (b. 1954, London, UK) studied at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, he is currently the head of undergraduate Painting at the Slade. Stahl is known for his large figurative paintings reflecting on his travel to Japan and Thailand and address the conflation of time, space and cultures that long-haul travel brings. He has exhibited frequently in the UK and widely internationally across Europe, Asia and America. He has received many awards including the Abbey Rome Scholarship and the Wingate scholarship for travel in South East Asia. He also participated in public-funded residencies in Thailand, China, Australia and Sri Lanka. His exhibitions have been frequently discussed in international newspapers and art journals and his works are in many private and public collections both in the UK and abroad including: the Arts Council England, the British Council, the Government Art Collection, the British Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Dryden Goodwin
Dryden Goodwin (b. 1971, Bournemouth, UK) is a British artist known for his intricate drawings, often in combination with photography and live action video; he creates gallery installations, films, projects in public space, etchings, works on-line and soundtracks. Goodwin is a Reader in Graduate Fine Art Media working with MA/MFA and PhD students. His work has been shown extensively nationally and internationally, including exhibitions at Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool, The Photographers' Gallery, London, The National Portrait Gallery, London, the Venice Biennale and the Hasselblad Foundation in Gothenberg, Sweden. His work in collections includes, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, The Tate Collection, The National Portrait Gallery, London and The Science Museum, London. Festival screenings of his first feature length film 'Unseen: The Lives of Looking', have included, 24th Edition of Camerimage, International Film Festival, 2016, Bydgoszcz, Poland, nominated in the International Documentary Feature competition for Cinematography; CPH:DOX 2015, Copenhagen, nominated in the Dox:Award, the Documentary Feature competition; The International Film Festival Rotterdam, 2016.

Lisa Milroy
Lisa Milroy (b. 1959, Vancouver, Canada) is an Anglo-Canadian artist. In the 1970s and 1980s, she studied at St Martin’s School of Art and later at Goldsmiths College of Art in London. Following her graduation Milroy concentrated on painting everyday and household objects, often arranged in rows or patterns against plain backgrounds. In her recent work, most notably her series featuring geishas, Milroy has explored a less linear aesthetic. She won the John Moores Painting Prize in 1989. Milroy is currently Head of Graduate Painting at the Slade. Recent exhibitions include: Seeing Round Corners, Turner Contemporary, Margate, UK (2016); Memories Croisees/Derives archivisitiques, Institu National d’Art, Galerie Colbert, Paris (2015); Hands On, Drawing Room, London (2015); Post Pop: East Meets West, Saatchi Gallery, London (2014); Ideas City Streetfest, New Museum, New York, US (2013); Jerwood Collection, Jerwood Gallery, Hastings, UK (2012); Heartbeat, 99 Art Center, Shanghai, China (2012); Paintings and Sculptures, Lehman Maupin Gallery, New York, US (2011); Life on the Line, Alan Cristea Gallery, London (2009); Painted Worlds, Galerie Lelong, Zurich (2008) and Lisa Milroy, Tate Liverpool, Liverpool, UK (2001). 

Jayne Parker
Jayne Parker is an artist and filmmaker whose work has been widely shown, both nationally and internationally, in major art institutions, on television and in film and music festivals. In 2003 she was the recipient of the 1871 Fellowship, researching the relationship between music and film, hosted by the Ruskin School of Drawing, Oxford and the San Francisco Art Institute. In 2008 she completed Trilogy: Kettle's Yard, funded with the help of an AHRC Small Award and the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL and premiered at The Times BFI 52nd London Film Festival, October 2008. In 2011 she presented a retrospective of her films at the BFI Southbank as part of Maya Deren: 50 Years On, a celebration of the American film maker's life.

Kieren Reed 
Kieren Reed (Slade Director) (b.1976 in Dover, Lives and works in London) His practice encompasses sculpture, performance and installation, from studies in form to the production of architectural structures. Artworks are most often linked to a place, a site or a consideration of a space or situation. Taking an interest in the conceptual space between form and functionality, the real and the fabricated, artworks explore the artistic task of imitating reality, considering their own utility to society. Presenting them provides a public stage for the 'private' principle of work. Their meaning is in their use, needing both to act in real terms as usable forms as well as simultaneously functioning aesthetically as sculpture. The use value of the work is manifested by being engaged with by the public and audience. It then becomes real - a simulacra of itself. This duality ensures it never becomes a static work, always being part of a negotiation.
Currently working on large-scale social architectural commissions for 2017 and new artworks which further consider notions of form and functionality, recent projects and commissions have included Tate Britain, Whitstable Biennale 2010, Ritter Zamet, Quay Arts, Camden Arts Centre, Ikon Gallery, The New Art Gallery Walsall, Gasworks and Studio Voltaire.

Neil Jeffries 
Neil Jeffries(b.1959 in UK)studied at St Martin’s School of Art, 1978-82, and the Slade School of Fine Art, 1982-84. He has a deep interest in medieval art and the continuing insistence of an awkward figuration fuels his work. He makes painted metal reliefs/sculptures.
His subjects include a miscellany of apparently incongruous subjects and concepts, which concern and fascinate him. These might be shapes, stories, points of view, dreamed experience, bumps, holes, corners and edges. Fragments join together and suggest a narrative, others remain separate, but still relevant and compelling.
Jeffries started his teaching career at the Slade School of Fine Art in the early 1990’s and he continues to have major input into the painting course today. He has won the Wollaston Award in the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition as well as the Bryan Robertson Award and the Arts Foundation Award

Enrico David 
Enrico David (born 1966, Ancona, Italy) is an artist based in London. He works in painting, drawing, sculpture and installation, at times employing traditional craft techniques. In the 1990s he garnered acclaim for creating monumental embroidered portraits using sewn canvases, which often began as drawings and collages from fashion magazines. During the past several years David focused on sculpture in a variety of media and returned to more traditional methods of painting. His recent works include large-scale portraits of deeply psychological meaning. Drawing continues to be an important element of his practice.
David studied at Central St. Martins in London and has since exhibited his work in galleries and museums worldwide. David was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2009. In 2012 he mounted his first solo exhibition in New York City, Head Gas, organized by the New Museum. In 2013 David presented a major installation of paintings, tapestries and sculptures as part of The Encyclopedic Palace, curated by Massimiliano Gioni for the Venice Biennale.

Kate Bright
Kate Bright (b. 1964) lives and works in London, UK. Her paintings explore the opticality of water in the natural and human landscape, combining both realist approaches and an idealist sensibility. Studying the seductive refractions of light in pools, fountains, and ponds as well as the piercing brilliance of sunlight on snow, Bright’s signature style utilizes glitter, resin, glass and polystyrene on the surfaces of the paintings. These visually mutable materials create illusory experiences, expanding the possibilities for contemporary realism in compositions toying with abstraction and the artificiality of painting.
Bright studied at Camberwell School of the Art and Goldsmiths College and is currently a lecturer at the Slade School of Fine Art at the University College of London.

Phoebe Unwin 
Unwin (b. 1979 Cambridge, UK) studied at the Slade School of Fine Art and University of Newcastle. Her exhibitions include: Towards Night, Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne, UK (2016); Walk through British art, Tate Britain, London, UK (2016); Distant people and self-soothing objects (solo), Wilkinson Gallery, London, UK (2015); British British Polish Polish: Art from Europe’s Edges in the Long 90s and today, CSW Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw, Poland (2013); Recent British Painting, curated by Tom Morton, Grimm Gallery, Amsterdam, Netherlands (2012); Phoebe Unwin (solo), The Corridor, Reykjavik, Iceland (2012); Newspeak: British Art Now, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia (2009); Making an outside space theirs (solo), Honor Fraser, Los Angeles, US (2009) and Very Abstract and Hyper Figurative, curated by Jens Hoffmann, Thomas Dane, London, UK (2007).

Karin Ruggaber
Ruggaber was born in 1969 in Stuttgart, Germany. She graduated from Chelsea College and Slade School of Art, London. Ruggaber currently lives and works in London. She has produced a number of artist’s publications.
Her solo exhibitions include: greengrassi, London, 2018; Walter Knoll, London, 2015; PEER, London, 2013; greengrassi, London in 2012, 2008 and 2005; and Art Now, Tate Britain in 2006. Group exhibitions include: CONDO, Proyectos Ultravioleta Guatemala City with greengrassi, London, 2017; El Curso Natural de las Cosas, La Case Encendida, Madrid, 2016; Quiz 2, MUDAM, Luxembourg, 2016; Accadra' domani, Museo Marino Marini, Florence, 2015; The Library Vaccine, Artists Space, New York, 2014; Quiz, Ensemble Poirel, Nancy, 2014; British Art Show 7, Nottingham Contemporary, Hayward Gallery, London, and touring, 2010-11; Legende, Domaine De Chamarande, Paris, 2008; East International, Norwich, 2007; How to improve the World, Arts Council Collection, Hayward Gallery, London The Way We Work Now, Camden Arts Centre, London, 2005.

Artists from CAFA

刘小东 Liu Xiaodong
Liu Xiaodong (b. 1963, Liaoning, China) is considered as one of China’s most celebrated painters. Liu studied at China Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) and has been teaching in CAFA since 1994. Since 1990s, Liu’s works have been widely appreciated both in China and abroad. His work has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions at venues including: Chronus Art Centre, Shanghai, China (2016); Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, Italy (2016); Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, Italy (2015); Minsheng Museum, Shanghai, China (2014); Seattle Art Museum, WA, USA (2013) and Today Art Museum, Beijing, China (2013). He was included in group exhibitions including at: Qatar Museums Gallery, Doha (2016); Gwangju Biennale (2014) and the Venice Biennale, Italy (2013, 1997).

苏新平Su Xinping 
Su Xinping (b. 1960, Inner Mongolia) studied at Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts and Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in Beijing. Since his graduation from CAFA in 1989, he has taught in numerous art academies and is currently vice president of CAFA. Su has exhibited worldwide including: Tradition and Innovation: the human figure in Contemporary Chinese Art, Chazen Museum at University of Wisconsin-Madison (2015); Master mould and copy room, CAFA, Beijing (2014); Toasting, Dolores De Sierra Gallery, Madrid (2008); Landscapes, Today Art Museum, Beijing (2007); Inside Out – New Chinese Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1999); Chinese New Art, Asian Association Museum, PSI Museum New York (1998) and Mamalieres, Museum of Contemporary Art, Paris (1997). 

邱志杰 Qiu Zhijie
Qiu Zhijie (b. 1969 Fujian, China) studied printmaking at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA). He currently works and lives in Beijing and Hangzhou. 
Constantly innovating and evolving, since 1993, Qiu Zhijie’s works have shown at prestigious art institutions including: New York PS 1 Contemporary Art Center (Inside Out: New Chinese Art, 1998); Pompidou Art Center (This is China, 2003); The 6th Guangzhou Biennale (2006); Tate Liverpool (The Real Things: Chinese Contemporary Art, 2007) and Venice Biennale (2009). In 2010, the artist also participated in The Pace Gallery, Beijing's group exhibition, Great Performances.

喻红 Yu Hong
Yu Hong (b. 1966, Xi’an, China) studied oil painting at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in Beijing. She has been teaching at CAFA since 1988.
Yu’s selected solo shows include: Garden of Dreams, CAFA Art Museum, Beijing (2016); Wondering Clouds, Long March Space, Beijing, China (2013); Golden Sky, Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China (2010) and A Woman's Life: The Art of Yu Hong, Goedhuis Contemporary, New York, NY, USA (2003). Yu participated in group shows include: Shanshui Within, Museum of Contemporary Art, Shanghai, China (2016); CHINA 8, Kunsthalle Recklinghausen, Recklinghausen, Germany (2015); China Arte Brasil, Sao Paulo, Brazil (2014) among others.

展望 Zhan Wang
Zhan Wang was born in 1962 in Beijing, China. In 1996 he graduated from the sculpture department of the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) and he currently lives and works in Beijing where he teaches sculpture at CAFA.
Zhan Wang’s work has been widely exhibited at institutions internationally, including: the Shanghai Pujiang OCT Ten Year Public Art Project, China (2016); Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan (2005); Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art, China (2006) and Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China (2012). Selected collections that have acquired his work include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY; the de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA.

唐晖 Tang Hui
Tang Hui (b. 1968 Wuhan, China) studied at China Hubei Academy of Fine Arts and China Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing. In 1997 he participated in Japan ARCUS Art Fund Artists' Living Program. He is Associate Professor of Fresco Department of Central Academy of Fine Arts and holds a Ph.D. Currently he lives and works in Beijing, China. He had participated in a number of important national art exhibitions including "the first Chinese contemporary art exhibition", "Chinese contemporary oil painting exhibition" etc. At the same time, Guangzhou "Gallery", Hubei "art literature" and other magazines also featured his works.
Tang Hui's education, especially his family education, has its deep imprint of the times. Even in a period of turbulence and cruelty in the Cultural Revolution, he still cherishes the beauty of mankind. In his works, whether it is the science of fantasy, or the memory of history, are optimistic, bright, and are filled with life’s energy.

 耿雪 Geng Xue
Geng Xue was born in Jilin, China, in 1983. She attended the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, China, from which she graduated in 2007 with a BFA. In 2013, she attended the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design in Karlsruhe, Germany and received an MFA from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, China, in 2014, under the tutelage and direction of renowned artist Xu Bing. Geng’s solo exhibitions include Mount Sumeru, Klein Sun Gallery, New York, NY (2017); Borrowing an Easterly Wind, Klein Sun Gallery, New York, NY (2015); Mr Sea, ZERO Art Center, Beijing, China (2014); and The Other Side, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, UK (2009). Her recent group exhibitions include: Memory and Contemporaneity.China Art Today, Collateral Event of the 57th Venice Biennale, Giardini Arsenale, Italy (2017); Reciprocal Enlightenment, CAFA Art Museum, Beijing (2017); China, Art of Movement, Annecy International Animation Film Festival, Musée-Château d’Annecy, Annecy, France (2017); Holland Animation Film Festival, Utrecht, Netherlands (2017); Fire Within: A New Generation of Chinese Women, Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI (2016); Here Out There, Helsinki Festival, Finland (2015) and Busan Biennale, South Korea (2014).

 随建国 Sui Jianguo 
Sui Jianguo (b. 1956, Qingdao, China) received a BA in the Fine Arts Department from the Shandong University of Arts in 1984 and an MA in the Sculpture Department from the China Central Academy of Fine Arts in 1989, where he currently presides as the Head of the Sculpture Department. He has been praised by art critics for being a “pioneer venturing to the farthest reaches of Chinese sculpture.” Sui Jianguo’s art explores his unique understanding and recognition of creation, form, diverse media, alternative methods, and space-time. Sui Jianguo’s sculpture succeeds in bringing forth introspection on the artistic process in modern China. Whether it be the Realism in his early works or the classic shapes in his later Mao Jacket and Dinosaur pieces, both rely on the wisdom of native Chinese genealogy and channels of culture to serve as ways to solve problems, functioning as outlets.

王郁洋 Wang Yuyang
Wang Yuyang (b. 1979 Harbin, China) studied at the China Central Academy of Drama and the Central Academy of Fine Arts. He has taught at the School of Experiment Art at the Central Academy of Fine Arts since 2008. He lives and works in Beijing. 
Wang Yuyang’s solo exhibitions include: Lettering – Folklore of the Cyber World, Chronus Art Center, Shanghai (2015); Liner, Copeland Park, London (2015); Objects of Fantasy, Chinese Visual Festival, King’s College London, Somerset House East Wing, London (2013) and Wormhold, Boers-Li Gallery, Beijing, China (2009). He has exhibited in group shows including: A Beautiful Disorder, Cass Sculpture Foundation, Chichester, UK (2016);Linguistic Pavilion, Shanghai Minsheng Art Museum, Shanghai, China (2016) and Cine Cine Cine!!! - Chinese Contemporary Art Beyond the Global Market, Palazzo Strozzino, Florence, Italy (2008).

徐冰 Xu Bing
Xu Bing (b.1955 Chongqing, China) studied at Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing (CAFA). He is now the professor of CAFA. He lives and works in Beijing and New York. 
Xu Bing’s solo exhibitions include: Phoenix 2015, the 56th Venice Biennale, Italy (2015); Traveling to the Wonderland, John Madejski Garden, Victoria and Albert Museum, London (2013); Xu Bing: Language Landscript, Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, University of Oxford, UK (2013) and Background story 7, British Museum, London (2011). Selected group shows include: The Translator's Voice, MARCO, Museo de Arte Contemporánea de Vigo (2015); Myth/History, Yuz Collection of Contemporary Art, Shanghai (2014); Print/Out, MoMA, New York (2012) and The Printed Image in China, 8th-21st Century, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2012).

邱挺 Qiu Ting
Born in Guangdong Province in January 1971, Qiu Ting studied in the Department of Chinese Painting at the China Academy of Art, majored in Landscape Painting, gaining a bachelor degree, from September 1992 to July 1996, and studied for a masters degree from September 1997 to July 2000; he then graduated from the Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University after gaining a doctorate from September 2000 to January 2004; since 2004 to today, he has taught at CAFA as an associate professor. His works have been included in a variety of exhibitions at home and abroad and collected by many art organizations, including the Palace Museum, National Art Museum of China, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Toronto Museum (Canada), Brittany City Federal Committee (France), Zhejiang Art Museum, Guangdong Museum of Art, Shenzhen Art Museum, CAFA, China Academy of Art, Tsinghua University, Jingxi Hotel, etc.

冯梦波 Feng Mengbo
Feng Mengbo is a Professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) and graduated from CAFA himself in 1991. He is the first Chinese artist to use computers in his work, and is well known for his video game pieces. Feng Mengbo is a self-described “video game artist” who uses new media and technology to explore Chinese iconography and history. Besides interactive art, his works feature calligraphy, painting, photography and music. 
Feng Mengbo has had main solo exhibitions at Dia Center for the Arts, 2001; The Renaissance Society, 2002; Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei, 2003; UCCA, 2009; PS1, 2010; Today Art Museum, 2011; and Madein Gallery, 2017. His main group shows include Venice Biennial, 1993; Kwangju Biennial, 1995 and 1997; Lyon Biennial, 1997; Johannesburg Biennial, 1997; Documenta, 1997 and 2002; ISEA, 1998; Arts Electronica, 2004; Shanghai Biennial, 2004; and the Guangzhou Biennial, 2002 and 2008. MoMA, Guggenheim, LACMA and the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum have collected his works