COLLECTION NAME:
Visual Resources Teaching Collection
mediaCollectionId
ArtArtHiAAH~7~7
Visual Resources Teaching Collection
Collection
true
Image Record ID:
aahi0004166
image_record_id
aahi0004166
Image Record ID
false
Work Title (display):
Portable City, New York
Image Title:
full view
Work Dates (display):
2003
Work Dates type:
creation
Image Date (display):
2009-03-30
Work Creator (display):
Yin Xiuzhen (Chinese, born 1963)
Work Creator gender:
male
work_creator_or_agent_gender
male
Work Creator gender
false
Work Creator notes (display):
Chinese installation artist. Yin studied painting in the Fine Arts Department of Capital Normal University, Beijing (19859) and following graduation she taught at the high school attached to the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, until her exhibition schedule grew too demanding. In 1989 she was first exposed to installation art; she showed her first installation, Door, in the studio of artist Zhu Jinshi (b 1954) in 1994. Yin's works have consistently demonstrated a concern for the relationship between the individual and the environment, with a particular interest in her native city of Beijing. She has developed a vocabulary of signature materialsprimarily used clothing, cement and discarded building materialsall of which she deployed to underscore the impermanence and fragility of the human environment. At a time when little attention was paid to environmental degradation in China, Yin created Washing the River (1995), constructing a wall from frozen blocks of polluted Funan River water and inviting passers-by to scrub the wall clean. While the natural environment suffered as China's economy surged, so too did the urban environment. In the 1990s China's major cities changed dramatically, with old neighbourhoods razed to clear the way for skyscrapers. Observing the demolition of a way of life, Yin created Ruined City (1996), a solemn testimony to the Beijing of the past. She constructed the installation from roof tiles discarded during the demolition process, as well as old furniture and piles of the cement powder ubiquitous in areas undergoing reconstruction. The works Yin created from the detritus of the old city invoke cultural memory. More personal cast-off materials, such as clothing, are intimately tied to personal memory. With Dress Box (1995), Yin symbolically laid her past life to rest, mortaring folded clothing from her babyhood to adulthood into a wooden chest, and recording the process by video. Later, she depicted her life in Shoes (1998), an installation of ten pairs of traditional Chinese women's cloth shoes, each lined with a portrait photograph of her ranging from childhood to adulthood.Yin's interest in change on a global scale intersects with her focus on change as it affects the individual in her constructions made from donated used clothing. Considering the role of the individual in China's burgeoning metropolises, Yin created Suitcases (2000), a group of suitcases displayed open to reveal pop-up model buildings fitted into each of them. Fabricated from used clothing, the buildings highlight the human factor hidden behind the new cities' glitzy façades. For her subsequent Portable Cities series (2001), she shaped the dominant features of major metropolises that she has visited, such as Shanghai, Singapore, Minneapolis and Paris, out of clothing donated by locals, and fitted them into suitcases. International Flight (2002), a set of two large model airplanes made from used clothing, suggests the fragility of the people who are the machines' raison d'être. All of Yin's works crafted from second-hand clothing have a home-made feel. Sewn mostly by members of her family, they are not polished productions, instead relying on their rough qualitythe mismatched fabrics often left in the shape they had taken as part of a garment, sewn together sturdily rather than with great finesse and, in the case of the airplanes, buttoned onto a frameworkto underscore the human element. (Britta Erickson. "Yin Xiuzhen." Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. 18 Mar. 2009 .)
Work Style Period:
21st century
work_styleperiod
21st century
Work Style Period
false
Work Style Period:
Contemporary
work_styleperiod
Contemporary
Work Style Period
false
Work Subject:
scale (relative size)
subject
scale (relative size)
Work Subject
false
Work Subject:
clothing
subject
clothing
Work Subject
false
Work Subject:
cityscapes (representations)
subject
cityscapes (representations)
Work Subject
false
Work Subject:
New York (state)
subject
New York (state)
Work Subject
false
Work Worktype:
sculpture (visual works)
work_type
sculpture (visual works)
Work Worktype
false
Work Category (VRC classification):
sculptures and installations
work_category__ucbaahvrc_classification_
sculptures and installations
Work Category (VRC classification)
false
Work Material and Technique (display):
suitcases, used clothes, sound, light, map, and magnifiying glass
Work Measurements (display):
32.25 in (H) x 28.5 in (W) x 11.75 in (D)
Work Location (Repository or Site) name:
private collection
Work Location (Repository or Site) role:
repository
Image Source Reproduction citation:
Collins, Judith. Sculpture Today. New York: Phaidon Press, 2007.
image_source_copy_from_print_name
Collins, Judith. Sculpture Today. New York: Phaidon Press, 2007.
Image Source Reproduction citation
false
Image Source Reproduction refid:
978-0-7148-4314-21
Image Source Reproduction page number:
396
Image Source Reproduction plate-figure number:
397
Image Source Reproduction refid type:
ISBN
Image Rights (display):
© Alexander Ochs Galleries
Image Rights fair use checklist:
1) use of this image is for education and educational research; 2) access is restricted to University of Colorado and Auraria Higher Education Center communities; 3) the original photographer is credited if known; 4) the image is published; 5) the amount of the work in relation to the whole is needed for education or educational research; 6) the number of derivatives is the minimum required for education or educational research; 7) the image has not been found to be reasonably available for sale; 8) duplication of the image does not violate preexisting contracts.
Work Rights (display):
© Yin Xiuzhen
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Holding Institution:
University of Colorado at Boulder
Collection:
Art and Art History Visual Resources Collection
Collection info and contact:
For information about this collection, see