This time, IPAMIA introduces works of a Chinese performance artist,WANG YANXIN. He is experienced and who is flourishing internationally. Like Tong Wenmin, who is featured by IPAMIA, and Zhou Bin, who teaches at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, he actively engages in performance art, establishing a strong presence in the Sichuan region. In China, performance art is being pursued with great enthusiasm by many artists.
WANG YANXIN has a straightforward and sincere personality-he is simply”good guy.” However, when his honesty and openness are expressed within the vast land of China,it evokes a certain sadness and feeling of helplessness.
Biography
Wang Yanxin, born in 1988 in Lanzhou, Gansu, China. graduated from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in 2013. Since 2013, he has been engaged in multi-media artistic creation based on performance art. He currently lives and works in Chengdu and is a professor at Sichuan Conservatory of Culture and Arts.
About the Artist
Yanxin Wang is a performance artist who constantly uses his body to expe- rience and explore the world. Highly attuned to the nuances of performa- tive language, he places significant emphasis on the concept of presence. His actions are deeply intertwined with historical memory, time, ritual, and trauma. His creations blend the gran- deur of personal heroism with the wit of playful irony, often unfolding in a short-theatrical format composed of multiple segments—at times evoking inexplicable sorrow, and at others, dark humor that elicits laughter.
Raw intensity and poignant melancholy define the internal tension within his body. Self-punishment, provocation, and shock are frequent methods in his practice. Emotion and pain ripple through his powerful actions and un- wavering determination, culminating in a reliving and reimagining of historical memories and traumas.
website：wangyanxin.com
title: Shazhuyu 沙珠玉
date: July 2024
venue: Qinghai Republic Desert
organized by Tuff Contemporary Art Museum (China)
curated by Cui Fuli
camera and edited by: Wang Yanxin
“Shazhu Yu” is set against the backdrop of the Qinghai Lake Gonghe Desert in China, intertwining natural land- scapes and historical symbols to present a desert scene filled with loneliness and struggle. The work explores the quest for freedom, solitude, and the meaning of existence in extreme natural environments. Through these symbolic elements, the artist creates a space full of tension and metaphor, portraying the smallness and resilience of humanity in the face of nature and life. These symbolic and figurative scenes construct a space that is both desolate and full of vitality, exploring how one confronts in- ner loneliness and struggle in such extreme conditions. The desert becomes a metaphor—can we find our own direction in this endless wilderness? -From Wang Yanxin’s portfolio
title: When we meet again-Action video 当我们再次相遇
date: 2018-2022年
venue: Fukushima nuclear radiation isolation zone in Japan, Former Chongqing Power Plant
project: Responding International Performance Art Festival and Meetings R1(2018,Fukushima),video taken within residency program in Chongqing DIMENSIONS ART CENTER (2018-2022,China)
camera: Wang Yanxin, Kitayama Seiko, Jintong
edited by: Wang Yanxin
In the evening in the isolation zone of the Fukushima nuclear power plant, lights abandoned houses and daily necessities with a flashlight in the one’s mouth, dances like a ghost in the clothes of a Led lamp, looks for the direction of the road at night.
Concept: Nuclear leaks of power plant lead to a devastation of beautiful memories and home- land. Individual and collective memories are lost. Behind government’s continuous attempt of rebuilding the plant and calling people return their contaminated home, there is a lie, between economic interest and political party, which bursts into bubble all at once. In the second half of the video, a performance by Wang Yanxin at the former Chongqing Power Plant, created during their residency in Chongqing, is also included. The performance in Chongqing and the performance in Fukushima appear to crossover.-From Wang Yanxin’s portfolio
title: Couldn’t Repair 无法修复
date: October 2022
venue: Chengdu Guanghui Art Museum
organized by: Chengdu Guanghui Art Museum
camera and edited by: Wang Yanxin
In this performance, various materials onto which people have their memories—such as balloon flowers, sweets in a swan-shaped container, an angel candle, a gun-shaped lighter, and a violin—are used and at times violently destroyed. At the end of the video, the text reads: “Confronting violence, lost memories, the loss of life, and the lingering sense of suspension in the present.
title: Wheel 车轮
date: August 2021
venue: Shanghai Xinhua Road(former French Concession)
project: Shanghai Urban Space Art Season 2021, organized by Shen Lieyi,Shi Wanwan
camera and edited by: Wang Yanxin
The artist walks through the streets of Shanghai, pushing a discarded wheel, while feathers float in the air behind him. As we witness the artist’s physical exertion, we also simultaneously observe the city of Shanghai and its people.
title: Circle-Body-Rhythm 圆–身体律动
date: 2019
venue: Chengdu A4 Art Museum
project: Upon International Performance Art Festiva, organized by Zhou Bin
camera and edited by: Wang Yanxin
This performance consists of five actions by the artist.
1.rings
2.Circle – wipe circle
3.let the balloon go
4.flying clothes
5.Tippingmarbles
In the action of throwing rings, the audience enjoys a game of aiming rings at Wang Yanxin, treating him as a pin. Rolling marbles is also a way for him to engage directly with the audience.Within the spiral structure, the relationship between the audience and the artist at times appears violent, while at other times, it resembles a playful game.
title: White 白
date: 2017
venue: Jade Dragon Snow Mountain in Lijiang, Yunnan
project: In the clouds International Performance Art Festival, organized by He Libin
camera and edited by: Wang Yanxin
Standing on a broken pine tree, the wind blows white cloth, fluttering in front of the snow-capped mountains, slowly revealing the body. -From Wang Yanxin’s portfolio