The oeuvre of the Chinese artist Zhou Tiehai focuses on the clash of the Chinese and Western worlds. A large proportion of his works show fragments of plants, figures, fish or rocks. These are typical elements of traditional Chinese paintings, but Zhou Tiehai uses an airbrush to depict them in a completely unconventional way. This technique does not allow the artist to create precise lines but enables him to achieve almost imperceptible colour passages. The non-traditional means of artistic realisation is another crucial point of Zhou Tiehai’s art. Much like the proponents of Western Concept Art, he questions the role of the artist as the individual who must personally create an artwork: most of his airbrush paintings are produced by assistants in his workshop.
Zhou Tiehai was born 1966 in Shanghai. His work has been exhibited at renowned international institutions such as The Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, the Deichtorhallen in Hamburg, the Kunsthal Rotterdam, the Shanghai Art Museum, the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin and the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo. Additionally, he participated in the 48th Venice Biennale, the 5th Shanghai Biennale and the 4th Gwangju Biennale (South Korea). From 2010-2013 Zhou Tiehai was the director of the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai, a leading private art museum in China. Zhou Tiehai lives and works in Shanghai.
Works
Exhibitions
PKM Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai, China
Yuanda City, Changsha, Hunan, China
Shanghart H-Space, Shanghai, China
Shanghart Gallery, Shanghai, China
Marella Arte Contemporanea, Milan, Italy
Shanghart Gallery, Shanghai & Ise Foundation, New York, NY, USA
Statements, ART BASEL, Basel, Switzerland
Gallery Quadrum, Lisbon, Portugal
Schloss Morsbroich, Leverkusen, Germany
Hara Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Shanghart Gallery, Shanghai, China
Vancouver, Canada
Galerie Bernhard Schindler, Bern, Switzerland
German Consulate, Shanghai, China
Kunsthal Rotterdam, Rotterdam, Netherlands
CIFA Gallery, Beijing, China
Galerie Karsten Greve AG, St. Moritz, Switzerland
Shanghart Gallery, Shanghai, China
UCC University College Cork, Lewis Glucksman Gallery, Cork, Ireland
Shanghai Contemporary, Shanghai, China
Art Cologne, Cologne, Germany
Tate Liverpool, Liverpool, United Kingdom
Mori Art Museum Tokyo, Japan
The Third Chengdu Biennal, Chengdu, China
Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany
Galerie Karsten Greve, Cologne, Germany
MoCA Shanghai, China
Sala Rekalde, Bilbao, Spain
Villa Manin, Centre for Contemporary Art Passariano, Codroipo (Udine), Italy
PKM Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
), Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA), Queensland Art Gallery, Queensland, Australia
Shanghart H-Space, Shanghai, China
Kunstmuseum Bern, Bern, Switzerland; Kunsthalle Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany & Museum der Moderne Salzburg, Austria
Shanghai Gallery of Art, Shanghai, China
MC1 Biennale, Montpellier, France
Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio, Bologna, Italy
Stanford University, Stanfort, CA, USA
Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Prague, Czech Republic
Museum Villa Stuck, Munich, Germany; Kunsthalle Kiel, Kiel, Germany
Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerpen, Belgium
Lothringer 13, Munich, Germany
Shanghai Art Museum, Shanghai, China
MACLA (Movimiento de Arte Cultura Latino Americana), San Jose, CA, USA
Duolun Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai, China
Whitney Museum, New York, NY, USA
Le Parvis Centre d'Art Contemporain, Pau, France
25000 Cultural Transmission Center, Beijing, China
Trevi Flash Art Museum, Milan, Italy
City of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France
Bandao Gallery, Shanghai, China
Galerie Urs Meile, Luzern, Switzerland
Gwangju, South Korea
Bizart, Shanghai, China
Deichtorhallen, Hamburg, Germany
Seoul Arts Center, Seoul, South Korea
Espace Pierre Cardin, Paris, France