Nowadays, more and more artists are interested in performance art and try to use this medium to create, however, there is no teaching of performance art in Chinese art colleges, and there are very few books of this kind. People mostly practice self-study through reading scattered materials and information and small-scale exchanges and discussions. In order to establish a professional, open and equal communication platform for teaching and learning of performance art, and to focus and promote the research and practice of creative theories and methods, the archive has launched the Night School project. Since the first session was held on May 23, 2022, nine sessions have been completed. Through a variety of methods such as talks, workshops, lectures, observation sessions, special projects, etc., the archive invited young artists Li Rui and Li Yao Yao to the tenth edition of Night School on January 16, 2023, to share their experiences and thoughts on the creation of performance art through both offline and online means.
Li Rui
Born in Sichuan in 1993, graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts of Southwest University, now lives and works in Chengdu. In recent years, he has mainly used performance art as his main creative method, and his works unload the rhetorical components of the body’s ups and downs, so that the meaning of the body returns to the body itself in the performance.
Recent Exhibitions:
– MIPAF 17th Macau International Live Art Festival, Ox Warehouse, Art Garden, Macau
– “Present Shape” – Solo Exhibition by Li Rui, X-Space, Chengdu- “Unbelievable Action”, A4 Art Museum, Chengdu
– 10th UP-ON International Live Art Festival, Guanghui Art Museum, Chengdu
– “Layers of Alien Origins”, Blue Roof Art Museum, Chengdu – 9th “Fire” Live Art Festival
– 9th “On the Clouds” International Live Art Festival, Chengdu
– “The Fire” International Live Art Festival, Chengdu
– “On the Clouds” International Live Art Festival, Chengdu International Live Art Festival, TCG Nordica Cultural Center, Kunming
– Twelve Years: Live Archives of UP-ON International Live Art Festival, Yunling Art Center, Chongqing
– The 8th UP-ON Up International Live Art Festival, A4 Art Museum, Chengdu
– Contemporary Performances Documentary Open Exhibition “2020: The Whole World Becomes Theatre”, Blue Dome Art Museum, Chengdu
– “Heterogenous Layers”, Blue Dome Art Museum, Chengdu
– The 9th “Fire” Live Art Festival – 9th “On the Cloud”, TCG Nordica Cultural Center, Chengdu Turned into a Theater”, OCAT, Shenzhen Pavilion
– The 5th International Performance Art Touring Exhibition, ASC Art Park, Tianjin, China
– The 2nd International Live Art Festival of Chongqing, Beibei Farming Museum, Chongqing
Plastic Body No.2 | Performance Live | Li Rui ，Video Screenshot Clip Color Audio 9’20” | 2021 | Kunming
① flour covers the body ② A blower blows out the red down in the clothes ③ the clothes are hung in front of the blower ④ mimic the puppeteer’s body movements ⑤ kick the puppet away, the blower blows up the flour, the scene is filled with dust, and the work ends.
Night Patrol-II | Performance Image | Li Rui ，Color Audio 6’12” | 2021 | Chengdu
At night, a naked man walks from far and near carrying two bamboo poles with burning clothes on his shoulders.
Li Yaoyao
Born in Chengdu in 1994, she received her undergraduate degree from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, then studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice, where she received her master’s degree in 2021. Her works cover fiber, installation, performance video and other creative methods, mainly focusing on the transformation and extension of the body and its peripheral environment in the space of containing and being contained, as well as focusing on the encounter and connection between each point of energy of the body and each “uncertain possibility”, and completing the flux from one state to another in the process.
Between Opening and Closing | Performance | Li Yao Yao ，Video Screenshot 27′ | 2022 | Chengdu
Peeling away, the body is revealed, the friction of every bone and every muscle can be heard, all the power just goes out slowly, and then comes back slowly, every bit of them connects together, flows together, finds a sound together, and then slowly closes, slowly closes, and in the end all of them come back, and fall on the land.
Listen – Speak | Performance | Li Yao Yao | 2022 | Kunming
Drawing a beautiful blue moon with her forefinger on white rice paper, she sits under the moon and speaks:
” Why cry, why laugh, why sad, why hate, why happy, why dance, why sing ”
With each note, the index finger and the mouth and the saliva leave holes in the blue moon, and the light leaks out.
In one breath, he slowly blows up a thin blue balloon, then slowly releases his index finger and thumb, ”… … Ah … …” The sound then drifted away with the air currents.
