Biography: Feng Zhengjie

Feng Zhengjie, one of the brightest rising stars of Chinese contemporary art started his career with the first series of work “Anatomy” around 1992 while he was still a student in Sichuan Fine Art Institute. The reality of today’s Chinese society, the conflicts of traditional and modern mindsets, and the fast paced economic growth with its associated material needs from the mass has been the central topic throughout the artist’s various bodies of work.



“My works are primarily focused on the massive consuming culture and the effects of a fast changing society on its people’s looks and minds. When I was in school we were very traditional, the education was conservative, being adopted from the soviet methodology. In the mean time, however, there were massive changes outside the school. There was popular music from Hong Kong and Taiwan blasting on the street, everywhere was covered with posters of superstars; this sort of things baffled me. Deep down I was trying to think about profundity but my youth was attracted to popular culture, I was struggling and puzzled because I couldn’t resist it. I wanted to enjoy it but I knew it was shallow and of no importance, a waste of time.



My portrait series also contains a significant amount of perplexity, at the beginning I wanted to express the consequences upon individuals as a result of expedited growing society, these effects and influences come from the capitalization within China. The façade of the subject in the portraits are very international, but is the inside of the subject also international? I feel dubious about it. A lot of people ask me why the eyes of the subject look as if they lack engagement, absent-minded and unable to concentrate; when I was creating the portraits I didn’t think of any of these words but all these statements are included and inclined to show how we feel: on one hand we are looking around to discover and are tempted; on the other, we are hazy and intimidated by the wide range of options that we can choose from,”

(Feng Zhengjie, “In Artists’ Eyes,” China Securities Journal, December 2008, translated from Chinese).

Biography
1968
Born in Sichuan, China

1988 – 1992
Fine Arts Education Dept of Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, BFA

1992 – 1995
Oil Painting Dept of Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, MFA

Selected Exhibitions:

2006
1st Annals Exhibition of Chinese Contemporary Art, The Art Museum of China Millennium Monument, Beijing, China
A Beautiful Deception, Shine Art Space, Shanghai, China
Very Red and Very Green, Xin Dong Cheng Space for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China
Paintings of Feng Zhengjie, Tokyo Gallery, Tokyo, Japan

2005
Good Girls – Bad Girls, The Red Mansion Foundation, London, UK
Grounding Reality – Chinese Contemporary art, Seoul Art Center, Seoul, Korea
Made In China, Willem Kerseboom Fine Art, Bergen, The Netherlands
Challenging the Traditional Visual Limits, Shine Art Space, Shanghai, China
Beauty, Rudolf Budja Gallery, Salzburg, Austria
Chinese Contemporary Painting, Palazzo Bricherasio, Torino, Italy
Prague Biennale 2, Prague, Czech
ARCO’ 05, Juan Carlos I Exhibition Centre, Madid, Spain
China,Contemporary Painting, Fondazione Cassa Di Risparmioin Bologna, Italy
Paintings of Feng Zhengjie, Marella Art Contemporary, Milan, Italy (solo)
Paintings of Feng Zhengjie, Goethe Art Center, Taiwan, China (solo)
Paintings of Feng Zhengjie, Galerie De Bellecour, Lyons, France (solo)

2004
China Avantgarde, Vanessa Art House, Jakarta
Kitsch As A Face Of Chinese Society, Vanessa Art House, Jakarta, Indonesia (solo)
Kitsch As A Face Of Chinese Society, Soobin Art Gallery, Singapore (solo)
The Beautiful Poison, Suka Art Space, Korea (solo)
Young Artists from Korea,China and Japan, National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea
The First Salon of Art in Autumn, National Museum of China, Beijing, China
Chinart, Sa Llonja, Palma de Mallorca, Spain
The First Nominative Exhibition of Fine Arts Literature, Hubei Institute of Fine Arts Museum, Wuhan, China
Chinart, Municipal Gallery, Bydgoszcz, Poland
New Perspectives in Chinese Painting, Marella Art Contemporary, Milan, Italy
Hua Jia Di, China Art Seasons, Beijing, China
Chinese Contemporary Art, Marseille Contemporary Art Museum, Marseille, France
KunstRAI, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Forbidden Senses, Espace Culturel Francois Mitterrand, Perigueux, France

2003
Regards de gauche à droite, Galerie Albert Benamou, Paris, France (solo)
Femmes de Chine, Galerie Albert Benamou
Chinese Avant-garde, Foundation Culturegest, Lisbon, Portugal
Image from Image, Shenzhen Art Museum, Shenzhen, China
Shanghai Art Fair, Shanghai, China
Regards vers l’Est, Regards vers l’Ouest, Albert Benamou Gallery, Paris, France (solo)

2002
Packaging, Xin-Dong Cheng’s Space for International Contemporary Art, Beijing, China (solo)
Paintings of Feng Zheng-Jie, M K Ciurlionis National Museum of Art, Kaunas, Lithuania (solo)
Paintings 1996-2001, Foundation 314, Bergen, Norway (solo)
Shanghai Art Fair, Shanghai, China
International Contemporary Art Fair, Melbourne, Australia
Paris-Pekin, Espace Cardin, Paris, France
Chinese Modernity, Fondacion Armando Alvares Penteado (FAAP), Sao Paolo, Brazil
International Contemporary Fair, Basel, Switzerland
The 1st Chengdu Biennial – Beijing Invitation Exhibition, Art Museum of China Century Monument, Beijing
Korea Contemporary Art Festival, Seoul, Korea
Dialogue with Asia, Vika Gallery, Oslo, Norway

2001
Coolness, Common Ground Art Gallery, Windsor, Canada (solo)
The 1st Chengdu Biennial, Chengdu Contemporary Art Museum, Chengdu, China
Art 2001, Art Seasons Gallery, Singapore
Who am I?, Kempinsky, Beijing, China
Dialogue with Dali, Shanghai Art Fair, Shanghai, China
Next Generation – East Asia Contemporary Art, Passage de Retz, Paris, France
A myth of China – Portraits of a Consumer Culture, Yi Dian Gallery, Shanghai, China
Portrait of China, Loft Gallery, Paris, France
Contemporary Chinese Art, Valle Quintana Gallery, Spain
On boys and girls, Upriver Loft, Kunming, China & Soobin Art Gallery, Singapore
Rouges, Loft Gallery Paris
New State, Florence Gallery, Beijing, China

2000
The Academic Exhibition of Beijing Oil Painting, Huanyu Sutra Gallery, Beijing, China
Plane, China Women Center, Beijing, China

1999
Contemporary Chinese Art, Zurich, Switzerland
The Academic Invitation Exhibition of 46 Chinese Contemporary Artists, Shanghai, China & Hoke Art Gallery, Taipei & Arts Sans Frontiers International Art Museum, Melbourne, Australia
Food for thought – Hedenhaage multimediale Chinese Kunst, Mu Art Foundation & ARCTIC Foundation, De Witte Dame, Eindhoven, Netherlands
Ouh la la Kitsch!, TEDA Contemporary Art Museum, Tianjin, China
Open channels, Dongyu Museum of Fine Arts, Shenyang, China

1998
The Invitation Exhibition of Beijing Youth Oil Paintings, Art Gallery of Beijing International Art Palace, Beijing, China
Personal Touch, TEDA Contemporary Art Museum, Tianjin, China

1996
Recounting of Skin, Art Museum of Capital Normal University, Beijing, China (solo)

1995
The 3rd Annual Exhibition of Chinese Oil Painting, National Museum of Fine Arts, Beijing

1994
The 2rd Annual Exhibition of Chinese Oil Painting, National Museum of Fine Arts, Beijing
Works by Fine Arts Students in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, The Chinese University of Hong Kong

1992
Modern Chinese Art Research Documents Exhibition, Library of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, Guangzhou, China
Present State, 1992 Art Exhibition, Art Museum of Sichuan-jie Academy of Fine Arts, Chongqing, China