Biography
Working primarily in performance and video, and with a keen eye for the absurd, Hu Xiangqian highlights the contrasts in our society and amplifies minor incidents into major social signifiers; he believes that a hidden reality can be found in the most straightforward experiences.
In the video The Labor Song 1 Night, 2012, the artist and others are dressed to resemble security guards at a typical upper-middle-class apartment compound in China; crammed into a small security booth, they deliver an operatic performance. A 2006 video, Blue Flags Everywhere, documents Hu’s campaign to be elected to the committee of his home village.
His work has appeared in the Mindaugas Triennial, Baltic Triennial of Contemporary Art, CAC Vilnius, Lithuania (2012); Thirty Years of Chinese Contemporary Art – Moving Image in China 1988–2011, Minsheng Art Museum, Shanghai, China (2011); CAFAM Biennale, Museum of the Central Academy of Fine Art, Beijing (2011); and the Asia Triennial Manchester, UK (2011).
Born in 1983 in Guangdong, China, he currently lives and works in Beijing.
This person was part of Sharjah Biennial 11
