Pork Belly Series - Flesh Weapons - Warship

2006

Oil on canvas

145 x 195 cm

Titled on the reverse Pork Belly Series - Flesh Weapons - Warship in Chinese, Chang-Ling in Chinese and dated 2006

Estimate
280,000 - 350,000
68,000 - 85,000
9,300 - 11,700
Sold Price
480,000
122,762
15,826

Ravenel Autumn Auction 2010 Taipei

116

Chang-Ling (Taiwanese, b. 1975)

Pork Belly Series - Flesh Weapons - Warship


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Catalogue Note:

Chang-Ling's "Pork Belly Series" is an epic history of the progress of civilization in the world of the flesh, with multiple levels of fat and lean progression nurtured by the spirit. The world of the flesh that Chang-Ling attempts to create is neither the essence or the surface of desire; it is fresh-cut, blood-soaked meat and shiny, slippery fat cavorting across the land. Lust, passion and appetite limitlessly expand and devour, creating vocal chords in this world of the flesh.


Looking at the "Pork Belly Series", we can see that this work, "Flesh Weapon – Battleship" is the act of the artist returning to his stores of memory, excavating his roots to face setbacks from the environment. He takes the sweet innocent desire of his childhood love for war toys, using re-creation to express the clash of cultures he experienced while seeking an education as an adult. These "Flesh Weapons", navy boats, planes, tanks and submarines come together to create a different world made of blood and piles of flesh with many different levels and shades fused together.


Here, fragile flesh, a symbol of desire, has been turned into a bloody instrument of war. These Western toys of childhood memory are no longer just for play-killing; now they are permeated with an air of real violence. This hazy composition of flesh and blood alludes to the artist's awareness and resistance towards the cultural colonialism of the powerful West. Drawing from the wellspring of his own self conscious, he fetters out the complex cultural identity issues shared by so many Taiwanese of this era. It is like an all out counterattack against an invisible foreign culture in the darkness of the battlefield, and a pursuit of the essence of culture, except that it is carried out in a dark world where nothing is visible. Chang-Ling carries forward in this somewhat provocative and risky exploration, evoking the feeling of some terrifying undercurrent flowing beneath.


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