Full Description
Featuring over 30 colour photographs of his work and studio, celebrated Chinese artist Wang Jianwei takes us on a journey that goes behind the scenes of our materialistic world bound by rigid, socially acceptable 'norms', and introduces us to the beauty and usefulness of the seemingly banal.
As the reader accompanies Wang through his contemplation of speculative realism and object-oriented ontology, we learn how he integrates his thinking into his creative practice. His philosophical musings turn our worldview of human-object and object-object relations on their head, as he positions humans and objects on an equal footing. By revealing the intrinsic value of an object and refusing to define it by a single meaning, Wang fills the materials and objects that surround him with infinite potential.
A fascinating and thought-provoking book that opens up the realms of the ordinary.
Contents
Chapter 1: COUNTERPART IS OMNIPRESENT
• Asymmetry
• Mang Zhong (Grain in Ear)
• It and Them
Chapter 2: ALWAYS, NOT COMPLETELY
• A Case of Intensification
• Saw Them Before I Did
• Reality and 'Reality'
• Not Everything Used Leaves a Trace
• Larger Than the Part 'Useful' to Me
Chapter 3: THE CAUSE AND THE EFFECT OF DENSENESS
• OSB
• 'Draft'
• Normal Choice
Chapter 4: SWALLOW AND DISCHARGE
• All Are Ingredients
• Those With Shells
• What is Disturbing Me, Making Me Restless
Chapter 5: DEEP IN TIME
• Ancestor
• Flat
• Too Much or Too Little
• Staggering Along
Chapter 6: ONCE SEEN, THEN IT'S NOT JUST ME
• Machine-guided
• Tangle
• Metaphor
Chapter 7: STICKY
• Foreign Substance
• Unnatural
• Animals
