Mr. Black, Mr. Navy, Mr. Stripes is a photographic series of opera gloves made of men’s tailored trousers that were presented in 2017 in “La Plage” in Paris, a shop window turned into an experimental art space. The personification of the objects named after characters intended to compose a fiction from the display. The project follows Zhu’s thinking on the definition of “queer”: how to express a state?

Sculpture (Sculpture)

Blue Elbow (Coude bleu) is made from plaster, burlap, lacquer, pigments and plastics. The materials related to the techniques of the sculpture or the painting but also others, which refer to commerce, to objects of consumption. The chair refers directly to the body as does the title of the work, Blue Elbow .

Film & Video (Film & Video)

The television monitors utilized in the video installation Come On (2008) ostensibly serve as playback devices for a multi-channel installation of clips from blockbuster films as part of a larger commentary of mass entertainment and its relation to consumer cultures. Arranged in a grid, however, the monitors begin to resemble closed circuit security systems, evoking associations of surveillance and policing. More than just casual documents of the every day, Gao’s video works carry a subversively political charge and force viewers to reconsider their own relationship to media and perception.

Film & Video (Film & Video)

In the film Hustle in Hand (2014) we observe secret negotiations carried out between two characters with only their torsos visible in the frame— negotiations that consider fetishizations, meaning and symbolic value of the body and flesh. Money, food, appearances, and consumption: the viewer is pulled into a round of transactions, a rumination on our society in which art occupies a coveted position. The film’s rhythm is suddenly interrupted by the appearance of a green polyhedron that, once licked by one of the mysterious protagonists, becomes golden yellow, a magical event accompanied by an intense swelling of violin music.

Photography (Photography)

Diversionist is part of the Cosplayers Series from 2004. In Cosplayers Cao Fei depicts the popularity among Asian youths of “cosplay” in which daily life is merged with images of video games and popular films. For many, this virtual reality is an outlet to “transcend” the paradox of a developing society in which the pleasures of consumption and depression of alienation go hand-in-hand.

Film & Video (Film & Video)

In this video, a parrot chews on seeds printed with punctuation marks. A radio on the shelf in the background broadcasts the news of an unfolding football match. As the game (and video) progresses, the bird eats all of the remaining punctuation.

Photography (Photography)

Materia en Reposo II (Brasil)

Installation (Installation)

Mapa-Mundi BR (postal) is a set of wooden shelves holding postcards that depict locations in Brazil named for foreign countries and cities. When installed, viewers are invited to fill out and mail a postcard to any destination, an act which parallels the dissemination and global circulation of image, text, and the idea of place.