Isaac Julien began his filmmaking career creating works for TV and cinema but he soon jumped ship to the art world, in search of greater creative freedom. Fusing dance, photography, music, theatre and sculpture, he creates an extraordinary visual language, which is currently being shown across nine different screens at ShanghART H-Space.
Titled 'Ten Thousand Waves', the former Turner Prize nominee's latest project sees him collaborating with some of China's leading artistic lights, from the legendary siren of Chinese cinema Maggie Cheung to master calligrapher Gong Fagen.
Inspired by the Morecambe Bay tragedy of 2004, in which 23 Chinese cockle-pickers drowned, it explores migrants' culture and what motivates people to take perilous journeys in search of a better life. Layering fact, fiction, poetry and film essay genres, it looks at modern and traditional Chinese values and superstitions.
Like most of his films, Ten Thousand Waves is as aesthetically pleasing as it is intellectually challenging - helped by the photogenic backdrop of the remote Guangxi province. His solo show at ShanghART is the gallery's first for a foreign artist.
The Ten Thousand Waves installation in situ in the gallery
The film is set against the backdrop of Guangxi province
Isaac Julien collaborated with master calligrapher, Gong Fagen, on the project
Layering fact, fiction, poetry and film essay genres, it looks at modern and traditional Chinese values and superstitions.
The film is shown across nine different screens
ADDRESS
ShanghART H-Space
50 Moganshan Road, Bldg 18
Shanghai 200060
China
-
Year in review: the top 10 cars of 2024, selected by transport editor Jonathan BellWhat are our cars of the year? We’ve scoured the archives to unveil the machines that most impressed us over the past 12 months, from retro revivals to high-tech EVs
-
An Indian mud house - and more, on Sketch Design Studio's natural material wondersSketch Design Studio in Rajasthan, India does wonders with the simplest ingredients
-
Experience this Singapore apartment’s Zen-like qualities and cocooning urban havenWelcome to Singapore apartment The Rasidence, a spacious, Zen-like interior by Right Angle Studio
-
Henni Alftan’s paintings frame everyday moments in cinematic renditionsConcurrent exhibitions in New York and Shanghai celebrate the mesmerising mystery in Henni Alftan’s paintings
-
‘Gas Tank City’, a new monograph by Andrew Holmes, is a photorealist eye on the American West‘Gas Tank City’ chronicles the artist’s journey across truck-stop America, creating meticulous drawings of fleeting moments
-
Intimacy, violence and the uncanny: Joanna Piotrowska in PhiladelphiaArtist and photographer Joanna Piotrowska stages surreal scenes at the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania
-
First look: Sphere’s new exterior artwork draws on a need for human connectionWallpaper* talks to Tom Hingston about his latest large-scale project – designing for the Exosphere
-
Marc Hom reframes traditional portraiture in Cooperstown, NY‘Marc Hom: Re-Framed’ has taken over the grounds of the Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, planting Samuel L Jackson, Gwyneth Paltrow and more ‘personalities of the world’ into the landscape
-
Alexander May, founder of LA studio Sized, on the joys of creative polymathyCreative director Alexander May tells us of the multidisciplinary approach that drives his LA studio Sized and its offspring, a 5,000 sq ft event space and an exhibition series
-
50 of America’s top creatives, photographed by Inez & VinoodhPhotographed exclusively for Wallpaper* by Inez & Vinoodh, we present a portfolio of 50 creatives driving the current discourse on American culture and its dynamic evolution
-
Nona Faustine confronts the past in New YorkArtist Nona Faustine reframes New York's colonial past in an exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum
