颜石林

What’s up? Empty Sofa

source: facebook
Yan Shilin, born in 1982. Graduated from Hubei Academy of Fine Art.

“Do you remember your childhood dreams? Maybe you lost that dream or misplaced it years ago,” says Yan Shilin. ‘When we look back at our lives, we realize that we have lost so much happiness. Sometimes happiness slips away without us noticing.’ The contrast of the subjects’ sorrowful eyes and clean colors conveys Yan’s ideas to the outside world.

Right after having graduated from the Hubei Institute of Fine Arts, Yan Shilin, who was a very talented student in the eyes of his teacher went to a remote village in the nearby of Beijing and started living in solitude, and this complete unfamiliar environment gave him more opportunities to face his soul, to seriously reflect upon being an independent individual in the society, upon being part of the world of Chinese contemporary art, and upon what he had to express through his art.

In the ‘What’s Up’ series, all the characters are children, and they all wear earplugs. Earplugs are the intervention of a foreign body in the self, and at the same time they represent the resistance to the external world. Earplugs represent the difficulty of the individual has in integrating himself in the existing social sequences, a sense of disorientation evolves into doubt, bring to question about the external world and gives a deep anxiety.

Yan Shilin refuses to use the techniques of industrial sculpture and paints his sculptures by hand. Colors are not uniform and they gradually change, and make thin about the process of erosion to which a child’s heart is subjected by the external environment.

The characters in Yan Shilin’s work are all on a stage, this stage became a theater for the artist himself, on this the stage the acts of a play about unripe youth its complicated feelings.
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source: thelongmuseumorg
Yan’s One Two Three exhibited in Beijing Moon River Sculpture Festival in 2008 was one of his realistic works reflecting that the subtle elements in daily life were in fact flowers blooming. The expectations for the future were written on the innocent faces. One Two Three was Yan’s graduation work that ever won him the God Award of the Graduation Works in Hubei Institute of Fine Arts and the Excellent Award of the exhibition of the Outstanding Graduation Works of Chinese College Students in Beijing. Although he was not famous immediately, it paved a promising way for his success.

Yan was indomitable in his pursuit of art. He overcame all the disadvantages and more importantly he kept lifting himself to a new level. In teachers’ eyes, Yan was the most diligent students. His ambition, self-renewal and the aspiration to stand out finally fashioned his strong-minded spirit that pushed him to keep moving on. After graduation, Yan headed for Beijing alone. Then he had no more than 1,000 Yuan. However, he felt no fear but eagerness to gain success. Later he met Wang Shaojun, teacher of China Central Academy of Fine Arts, who encouraged him to work on and introduced him to an artist. He assisted the artist to convert graphic arts into sculpture. He was well paid and finally owned his first studio. Of course, it was very shabby. He put the bunk beds which somebody threw away in the corner of the studio and put his luggage on the upper bed and slept on the one below. In this way, he made a temporary bedroom with curtains. Next he bought two barrels of mud and a revolving table and then officially started his creation. He was so happy that he was finally closer to his dream.

Although Yan Shilin’s artistry may be influenced by the fashion of the times and gradually pays attention to children’s interest and animation aesthetics, all his creation is still derived from the experience in his real life. Life is the inspiration source of his works and unites his real world and his utopia. The conflict between virtual world and reality always exists in Yan Shilin works. It’s probable that the anxiety and suspenseful context in the interpretation of his work is the greatest pleasure of Yan Shilin when he finished his creation. It’s a ritual of facing up to the anxieties and addressing them with the audience. This communication mode usually occurs in theatres. The sculptures of YanShilin look more like his personal life situation growing into the collective imagination and expectations for the future by means of the theatrical ritual.

——Victoria Lu
From Crossing Bound to Being Boundless
—A Review on Yan Shilin’s Life of Sculpture
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source: thelongmuseumorg

When Lin Gallery was still in 798, a disheveled flower girl was standing at the front door for quite a long time, she was not good looking, but very vivid and interesting. This piece was named GateringFlowers, it was Shilin’s graduation work, might be the work he was well-known for. This piece won a national sculpture competition award in the year of his graduation; but I’m afraid it was the chance that the girl standing in frontLin Gallerythat people really got to know her. Too many people have taken pictures with her, so many pictures was taken that one of the photo became IKEA’s product. After that, numerous pictures was taken forShilin’swork Don Quixote’s Dream, that is a little boy who was ridding on a horse situated at hiartstore‘s front porch. Shilin’s work became our symbol or even a mascot. Of course Shilin’s works were no longer limited in our gallery, they could be found in many places. Over the past five years, Shilinhas been moving forward, he has become the most popular sculptor that was born after 1980s.

In the past five years, we have held three solo exhibitions of Shilin,his improvement was apparent in every step. While the pieces became richer in expressions, the most valuable thing is thatShilin hasnever discarded his pureness. I believe this is why we all treasure so much of him. We are not lack of artists with skills, however, very few young artists could express himself through an icy cold sculpture, Shilin is one of them.

I usually said, of figurative sculptor in China, besides Xiang Jing, Yan Shilin is the best. Few believed me, but now seems everyone does. In comparison to painting, I personally feel that sculpture is more difficult; there are more problems to be solved in three dimensional spaces than intwo dimensions. I have tried, the feeling of notbeing able to take care of all aspects did not happen during my experience of painting. Therefore, in my personal highly respected artists list, Michelangelo was close to the existence of God. I was not able to find someone as good as Michelangelo, who had both strong rationality and vigorous emotions. The best in our century would be Xian Jing. Within the senior artists, HuaTianyou would be the big mountain that not many canget over; Pan He had his touching works; TianShixin is pure and powerful……My list isn’t very long. It must be fated that I could meet Shilin, he met all my imaginations about a sculptor, even the simple and naive element in his personality appears to be nature to me.

——Wu Jin
Gathering Flowers
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source: thelongmuseumorg

The presentation of personal memory and life state by Yan Shilin’s sculptures fully explains his philosophy of life. In Yan’s eyes, all things are externalization or objectification of impulses of life, and he highlights that only the ones with the instinct to experience inner life can grasp the integrity of Life. As he stated, “all inspirations of my works come from my life. I do not care about political issues, nor do I like pop art forms. I just think about myself and other people’s lives and feelings as a human being, and take the baffling and uncomfortable issues as questions to discuss and solve them with audience and people who share the same concern.” His words further testify his attention on the consciousness of life. He sees artistic creation as a instinct and impulse of man. As the German philosopher Wilhelm Dilthcy (1833-1911) puts it, life is the origin of world. Life is not simply physical activity. Life is not a concrete body, but a dynamic power that cannot be described with rationality, a power that is unstoppable and timeless with an ephemeral flow, and such power is a dynamic and creative force. It is both orderly andimpalpable. It has directionsbut they are indefinite.

In conclusion, in the eyes of Yan Shilin, the authentic pursuit of artistic creation endows him with the incentive for continuous creation. Artists should always have their own analysis and presentation of reality and personal psychology, remind themselves from time to time not to be dominated by popular art, and be vigilant against realist-mundane expression. Artists should take open and realistic means for personal artistic expression in meeting new challenges. We can say that Yan Shilin’s works do not intend to offer a final and definitive answer, but allow audience to see or feel a glimpse of their memory when standing in front of his sculptures.

——Huang Du
A Choice between Loss and Hope
–On Yan Shilin’s Sculpture
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source: peupledepapierblogspot
Artiste chinois né en 1982
Sculptures en fibre de verre peintes à la main.
Cet artiste nous transporte dans son univers à la fois poétique et ludique aux confins de l’enfance pour des créations très contemporaines et très personnelles.
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source: news99ys

颜石林将雕塑创作看做摆棋局，他喜欢这样那样的经营与调整，表达出他期望的宫崎骏式的人与自然的和谐。颜石林认为，以前自己更多地是抱怨解决不了的问题，现在则会试着去着眼能够解决的问题。此次颜石林向观众展示出自己脑海中的奇幻世界，就像地上的荆棘被弱化为鹿角的那样，艺术家要用自己的方式跟世界和解。观众处身于颜石林营造的魔幻森林中，能感受到一份被邀请进入的友好与开放，带着探索之心看到故事、看到雕塑的美，或者作品背后的情绪。

参展的所有铜雕都使用化学着色的方式，使作品表面的色彩与铜融为一体，不会过分鲜亮刺眼，也不会覆盖雕塑本身的细节之美。就像展厅门口那尊5米高的巨型雕像一样——带着小鹿帽子的男孩微皱眉头，一幅认真努力的表情，这里头就有艺术家自己的影子——他说自己内心可能只是一只鹿，但是努力将自己想象成一个巨人，去营造和支撑内心这个有忧伤、但是向往美好的世界。
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source: reporternews

Outro destaque da feira de artes em Pequim é a escultura “What”s up? Empty Sofa” (“O que há? Sofá vazio”). Criado pelo artista Yan Shilin a peça é um sofá cercado de manequins nus na parte traseira.