Qiang LI

Li Qiang is a contemporary visual artist who lives and works in New York.

Li’s artistic endeavors include engraving painting, sculpture, imaging, performance art, and installation art. He started to create “book tearing” works in 2009 by using magazines and books as the medium to express the uncertainty and vulnerability of the current era through the destructive behavior of “tearing”. As a part of the works, the torn pieces became scenes of action. From “traces of land” to “cultural texture”, the artist has been practicing the art for over 20 years.

Li’s major works include “Each Tree Branch Connects with Another Branch” in 2021, “Under the Surface” in 2020, “Why Is News Always Black and White?” in 2019, “Sea Water” in 2018, “Library Plan” in 2016, “You Know” in 2015, etc.

“In this era of the internet, magazines are outdated but they are also rebellious entities.

I am an artist who uses magazines and books as the medium to create installation art works. I use the information and colors of the magazines to express the vulnerability and uncertainty of the current world through the destructive behavior of “tearing”. Meanwhile, I establish a physical interlocking relationship between the images as well as the thickness and appearance of the magazines. The works are stacks of magazines. A face is like a stack of old magazines that require the audience’s imagination and emotions to be meaningful.

If Michelangelo’s art is to sculpt a “human” image from stones, then my art is to find the existence of “human” from the ruins of media information. It aims to seek traces of humanism from the obscured and forgotten history, while paying attention to the reality intentionally hidden by power and capital. When images in news media become mosaic, art is a call that does not require specific content, but emphasizes the urgency.