Li Ran

Mont St. Victoire, 2012

Mont St. Victoire is an installation in several parts that combines various facets of artistic issues with the artist’s personal experiences. The title of the installation – which is borrowed from a series of artworks by Paul Cézanne – provides Li Ran with his own bridge to modernism. The video shows the four-part performance – ‘The Reflection of Images and Scenes’, ‘The Gaze’, ‘The Tournament’, and ‘The Chance Encounter’ – in which the artist plays a series of characters in the style of Chinese dubbing actors of the 1970s/1980s (a period when China was becoming more culturally open). In addition to the artist’s own thoughts, the script for his performance contains various quotes on a range of themes: art history, creativity and existential musings. The projector slides present images from museums and history books, collected by Li Ran during his art studies. In terms of its content, his installation enquires into the complex art theory discourses that has characterized the relation between Chinese modernity and the West as well as our current understanding of contemporary Chinese art.