Representing Identity in Flow: Xu Bing's Art since Immigration (1991—2003)

Abstract

This essay explores Xu Bing's work created during the twelve years(1991—2003) after he emigrated to the United States, with the aim to investigate how they demonstrate the impact of his relocation on his identity. Xu Bing's identity was inevitably re—contextualized not only by his own experience of encountering a new socio—cultural environment, but also by the identities typically ascribed to people of Asian origin in American society. This essay observes that this re—contextualization, this development of a Chinese identity within multi—cultural American society, culminated in his works created in the early 2000s. As Xu Bing was a central figure among Chinese avant—garde artists, at the time of displacement, his work gained influence in the West because it was perceived as authentically Chinese. However, such Chineseness obtained its new meanings through his displacement. As a native Chinese, in his work such as <Book from the Sky>(1987—1991) created while in China, Xu Bing showed his introspective concern for the authenticity of Chinese cultural identity during China's modernization. However, this type of work was received by American viewers of different perspectives. The central position that Xu Bing's work occupied in China's art community was now transferred to that of the periphery, which as such was valued for adding diversity to multicultural and transnational America. This essay claims that a number of Xu Bing's works created in America spontaneously reflect both this change in reception and his change in subject position from a native Chinese to a Chinese immigrant of the United States. The initial impact of Xu Bing's encounter with Western/American culture on his work manifested in the comparison and juxtaposition of the representative symbols of his original culture and the one he was relocated into. After several years, this binary comparison of the East and the West became less sharp. Xu Bing started to suggest in his work a landscape perspective of the world he newly belonged in. His <Landscripts> series suggested a distance that allowed a contemplative perception of the new place as the hybrid space in which his native culture added to Western culture. During this time, Xu Bing also began to reflect his position vis—à—vis an Asian American identity within a multicultural America. This transformation, though not originally occurring self consciously at the time of his relocation, appeared in his first exhibition in the United States and had gradually reached its culmination in 2001 in such work, <Excuse me sir, can you tell me how to get to the Asian Society?>, installed at the Asia Society Museum in New York. Since his immigration, Xu Bing has moved beyond Chinese essentialism towards an understanding of the plural realities that coexist and are in conflict with each other. Xu Bing's works created during this period could be best understood as a reflection of complex intersections of multiple places, cultures, and subject positions.