Among the works on display is one by Verdensteatret, an art group from Norway. They present a complicated hybrid piece combining installation and performance art with a live concert.
The project, entitled And All the Question Marks Started to Sing, uses mechanical structures such as disassembled video cameras, loudspeakers and wheels taken from bicycles, and scatters them over a large room. Performers produce unsettling musical arrangements by turning the wheels, while various cameras project shadows on the walls nearby.
More than 10 members of the group have been working on the audio and visual presentation for a year, tweaking different parts and getting the engineering in, or out, of synch.
"The whole creative process is a never-ending rehearsal," curator Gao says.
A French photographer JR presents his giant portraits of Shanghai's old folks, in his solo exhibition Wrinkles of the City. He talks to elderly people in the park, has their pictures taken, prints them out and pastes them on the weathered walls of old buildings, letting their wrinkles merge into the bleak lines of the walls, mixing their personal history with that of the fast-changing city.
"It's my job to give my subject recognition and dignity," says JR, who declined to give his full name, and who hid behind dark glasses and a hat.
Xu Jiang, president of China Academy of Fine Arts, says: "People have experienced all sorts of visual extravaganza at the Expo, and they will expect to see something different at the biennale. We can't just bombard them with visual stimuli now and expect them to be impressed. They've already seen it all. We will give them something deeper, something more academic and thought-provoking."
Many galleries and private art museums in Shanghai have decided to hold their most important exhibitions of the year during the biennale, so that visitors can enjoy a variety of art events.
At Rockbund Art Museum, the exhibition By Day By Night not only showcases the works of nine artists, but also includes a lecture every Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening, by artists and the museum's curators.
Meanwhile, the first edition of the Nanjing Biennale began on Oct 28 in the neighboring city of Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province. It will display the works of acclaimed Chinese artists such as Zhou Chunya, Zhang Xiaogang and Zeng Fanzhi, alongside those of graffiti artists from Western countries.
The Nanjing Biennale will run at the Nanjing Museum of Art till Nov 25.
By Zhang Kun
Editor: Feng Hui
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