Too much newness, too much to buy, too much height, too much taste, too much money, too much everything has resulted from the new market economy in China. Current trends in Chinese life depart drastically from traditional Confucian ideals of balance; where once human beings were in harmony with nature, now their tastes and aesthetics are constructed and determined via artificial and synthesized systems, by city planning and architecture, fashion, and Internet animation. Too Much Flavor gathers together contemporary Chinese art that reflects this excess. Witness Hong Hao’s photographs of the mass-produced minutiae of daily life; Shi Jinsong’s morphing of corporate logos into cast-metal objects that resemble archaic weapons; Shu Fadong’s transformation of the body into a vehicle for advertising; and Weng Fen’s panoramic photographs of uniformed Chinese schoolgirls staring at the spectacle of urban construction on the rise.
Translation from Chinese: Ida Hiršenfelder