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  • Above the Cloud

    September 5, 2024 | Posted By: | Artist Talks · News · Press |

    Above the cloud ☁️ “In Xie Rong’s sharing, #gender is not a #slogan, and #race and nationality are liberated from mere #symbols.Returning the #couplet, taken by the #father, back to the #mother—using hers: the #daughter’s body. A tribute to #YokoOno, crafting a new “Added” “ #CutPiece”—using her own body. Confronting the #colonial veneration of masculine hero statues with the endangered Spanish “maternal” #seagrass, #Posidonia—using her #body.#Contemporaryart has been nurtured in a twisted, giant vacuum culture dish, where it becomes pretentious and hollow when new expressions are forced upon it. I haven’t been moved by something truly fresh, unpretentious, courageous, or cosmopolitan in a long time. But tonight, I’m witnessing something remarkably heartfelt and honest! I have no words, only pure #emotion, and the deepest praise for her pure spirit and powerful expression!She is a naturally gifted #storyteller, with passion flowing effortlessly and a rare ability to communicate in a low-context manner within #Asian#societies. With a wise heart and a fluid, adaptable standpoint, it’s clear that she is better suited to being a #globalcitizen, a #free#traveler!What a beautiful night!”— Freesia, Absolute KunmingFor the first time, I used my #mothertongue to articulate the origins of my #Action#Body in front of my mama.Perhaps it was the expertly crafted coffee, the soulful #teaceremony, the artistic #Yunnan dishes, and the heartfelt warmth from our new friends in #Kunming.For the first time, my mother and I shared such an honest and loving exchange, encouraging and caring for each other through our stories and emotions.I am so grateful to #空空间 (Empty Space), organized by artist HeLibin, which welcomed us with such a rich and fulfilling experience! ????#artisttalk

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    My Performative Body

    May 15, 2024 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Artist Talks · News |

    Artist Talk at Sotheby’s Institute of Art

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    Hologram Hope

    May 9, 2024 | Posted By: | AR · Art Protest · News |

    Let it bring hope

    Let it be a tale 

    My first hologram performance is to honour Dr. Refaat Alareer and his last poem, “If I Must Die,” which he wrote 5 days before he was killed with his brother, nephew, sister, and her three children. If you click this link from your mobile phone, you can view my performance hologram in your environment, Let’s tell his story together!

    VIVAAR VENEZIA

    For the 60th Venice Art Biennale – 17.4.-24.11.2024 – the curator-duo Jonas Stampe and Xiao Ge. I am so grateful for the volumetric video cuption at wimbledoncollegeofart with incredible PHD research Terence Quinn and Chris Follows, Grzesiek Sedek, Jakob Taylor Black and Cory Allen from Scatter USA for sharing his personal grief of losing families to the bombing in Gaza.

    https://vivaar.8thwall.app/rong-xie/

    #ceasefirenow #Gaza #Palestine #humanity #savepalestine #peace #body #gazagenocide #childern #death #occupation #war #violence #killing #end #genocide #freedom #famine #warcrimes #ifimustdie #refaatalareer #liveart #venicebiennale2024 #hologramart #digitalbody #performanceart #actionart #volumetricevideo

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    Nowness China

    May 9, 2024 | Posted By: | Art Protest · News · Press · reviews |

    Along the Adriatic coastline, from the Arsenal to the Giardini, walking towards the sunset, you can see gatherings and performance art everywhere. “Hope…,” “Kite…,” “Love…,” a few Chinese words waft intermittently from nearby. Approaching a crowd of dozens by the bridge, we see people sitting in the front row, with a Chinese woman dressed in white at the center. Her hair is tied up in a bun, and the word “Freedom” is written in blue paint on her face. She is telling the story of a child in wartime: “She is searching for her father who disappeared in the flames of war,” “She hasn’t had the chance to say goodbye to anyone,” “Look at this kite, the one you made for me…” From her words, we piece together the keywords “Hope” and “Love,” and discover that these two words are not rare in Venice.

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    If I Must Die

    May 8, 2024 | Posted By: | blog: film link · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |

    Let it bring hope
    Let it be a tale

    My first hologram performance is to honour Dr. Refaat Alareer and his last poem, “If I Must Die,” which he reshared 5 days before he was killed with his brother, nephew, sister, and her three children. I hope you can follow the link in my bio and scan the barcode wherever you are around the world, you can watch this performance on your mobile in your own environment. Let’s tell his story together

    VIVAAR VENEZIA is a project initiated by the curator-duo Jonas Stampe (Sweden) and Xiao Ge (China) to coincide with the 60th Venice Art Biennale – April 17 to November 24, 2024.

    Grateful for the volumetric video cuption at Wimbledon college of art with incredible PHD research Terence Quinn and Chris follows , Grzesiek Sedek, Jakob Taylor Black and Cory Allen from Scatter USA for sharing his personal grief of losing families to the bombing in Gaza.

    Fragmented sound from An-Ting In the sunny afternoon, Venice was suddenly struck by a thunderstorm, as if the heavens too heard the poetic songs in 50 languages. Under An-Ting’s poignant and cinematic sound wave, tears were shed. The holographic digits also dispersed and evaporated into the night sky.

    #ceasefirenow#Gaza#Palestine#humanity#savepalestine#stop#peace#body#gazagenocide#childern#death#occupation#war#violence#killing#end#genocide#freedom#famine#warcrimes #ifimustdie#refaatalareer#liveart#venicebiennale2024#hologramart#digitalbody#performanceart#actionart#volumetricevideo

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    VIVAAR VENEZIA

    April 20, 2024 | Posted By: | body-politics · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |

    For the 60th Venice Art Biennale – 17.4.-24.11.2024 – the curator-duo Jonas STAMPE and XIAO

    Ge has commissioned eighteen international performance artists to explore the latest hologram technology as a gateway to the future.

    Simplicity and natural framing are key components for VIVAAR VENEZIA as a human centric technological showcase fusing performance art with the hologram.

    VIVAAR VENEZIA is an experiment and a showcase of the conceptually and visually new hologram technology presented in the real world setting of public space near the Giardini.

    Eighteen hologram performances will be on display for the public to explore on their smartphones by scanning a QR code following the hashtag #HologramMe! Eighteen red mobile bases will be positioned in an open configuration close to the Giardini and the scenic lagoon.

    Xie Rong, China / UnitedKingdom

    London-based Xie Rong, aka Echo Morgan, challenges stereotypes of ‘Chineseness’ and femininity through body-centred works. Using ink, lipstick, charcoal, chlorophyll and even breast milk, she creates provocative action paintings and portraits with personal and eco-feminist themes. Blending Eastern philosophy, Fluxus and live art, she seamlessly interweaves English and Chinese folk songs to challenge beauty standards. Trained at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Central Saint Martins and the Royal College of. Art, her creations have received international acclaim. and are featured in numerous private and public collections and exhibited worldwide.

    www.echomorgan.com

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    The Red Body: The Red Drum

    March 13, 2024 | Posted By: | Art Protest · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |
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    Artist Talk at Chelsea College of Art

    November 24, 2023 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Artist Talks |

    Artist’s Talk : Xie Rong : Tuesday 28th Nov : 1pm : Lecture Theatre

    Xie Rong
    Tuesday 28th November
    1pm Lecture Theatre

    It’s with great pleasure that we invite Xie Rong to deliver our final Artist’s Talk of the term this Tuesday lunchtime.

    Xie Rong, also known as Echo Morgan, fearlessly challenges stereotypes surrounding “Chineseness” and femininity through her provocative art. She uses her body as a canvas, employing materials such as Chinese ink, red lipstick, coal, chlorophyll, and even her own breast milk to create expressive action paintings and emotionally stirring portraits. Drawing inspiration from personal experiences and broader themes like the body politic and eco-feminism, Xie Rong skillfully combines Eastern philosophy, the Fluxus movement, and action art to encourage introspection and foster meaningful dialogue.

    Xie Rong’s artwork seamlessly integrates English narration with Chinese folk songs, challenging prevailing notions of beauty, power, and vulnerability. She honed her artistic skills at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute High School, Central Saint Martins, and the Royal College of Art. Her visually enchanting creations have garnered international acclaim, with exhibitions held in various countries. Collaborating with photographer Jamie Baker, Xie Rong explores the fusion of painting on photographs and employs mark-making techniques, resulting in unique artist prints. She also creates intimate and emotionally challenging personal films. Recently, Xie Rong has expanded her creative collaborations to include musicians and movement artists, delving into the realm of immersive site-specific storytelling experiences. Blurring the boundaries between theatre and action art, she practices art as the healing power within our community.

    Xie has earned numerous accolades, such as the Aesthetica Art Prize in 2014, the 40 Under 40 Perspective Art Award in 2017, the Chinese Arts Now Scratch Award in 2019, and was shortlisted for the Mother Art Prize in 2022. As a lecturer and researcher, she has presented her work at many UK and Chinese universities. She is an associated lecturer at the Chelsea College of Art, Royal College of Art, Central St Martin, and Glasgow School of Art.

    Xie Rong is based in both the UK and China. Her dedication to pushing boundaries and defying conventions is evident in her work, which continually pushes the limits and invites viewers to engage with thought-provoking narratives through the embodiment of body, gesture, and voice.

    www.echomorgan.com
    https://www.instagram.com/echomorgan/

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    Teaching as Performance

    November 21, 2023 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Workshops |
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    Inky String

    November 7, 2023 | Posted By: | body-politics · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News · Press |
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    She/Her and M(other)in Mexico

    November 6, 2023 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · News · Press · reviews |

    The IV Chinese Artists Video Festival and its Cuernavaca-Kunming program on Facultad Artes Uaem on the 8th of Nov. Curated and talk by Elizabeth Ross.

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    Little Mermaid Performance

    October 1, 2023 | Posted By: | Live Performance · News · Press |

    for HCA Museum and Le FIX

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    The Non-Fungible Body BOOK

    September 12, 2023 | Posted By: | Art Protest · body-politics · Newbook · News · Press |
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    Le Fix and HCA House Collaboration

    September 10, 2023 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Exhibitions · Live Performance |

    Fashion + Art + Dark Fairytales with Xie Rong

    Hans Christian Andersen Project from Signe Emma on Vimeo.

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    Mother Art Prize

    July 4, 2023 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · News |
    © Vicki Couchman

    Xie Rong, Painting until it becomes marble 

    Love never dies, 2019. 

    In the depths of grief after my mother-in-law’s passing, I painted with my own hair. As an action painter, my work is a physical manifestation of emotion, and this unique medium allowed me to capture my profound feelings of loss in a raw and visceral way. Through the drops of ink and the movement of my body, I connected action and mind, creating a powerful expression of sorrow on paper. I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to enjoy an exhibition opening without being covered in ink or paint, a rare and cherished experience for me. My heartfelt thanks go out to the Mother Art Prize and the incredible Anita team for facilitating such a memorable event. Additionally, I am immensely appreciative of all the visitors who shared their photographs and recordings with me, further enriching this unforgettable experience. 

    Exhibition opens Thursday-Sunday at the ZC until 25 June. 

    Procreate Project Mother Art Prize, 2023

    Zabludowicz Collection, London

    Installtion Photo by Tim Bowditch

    Opening photo by Vicki Couchman

    #MotherArtPrize #ProcreateProject #ExhibitionOpening #ExhibitionLaunch #LondonGallery #MotherArtPrize #ArtExhibition

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    Woman+Horse=Mother

    October 30, 2022 | Posted By: | body-politics · Exhibitions · News · Press · reviews |

    Q&A | Hettie Judah on how galleries, museums and art schools treat artist mothers

    A new publication unpicks how becoming a parent can detrimentally affect an artist’s career and suggests ways the art world can do better

    Gareth Harris4 October 2022Share

    A child joins in with Echo Morgan's performance Woman 女 + Horse 马 = Mother 妈 at TJ Boulting during Love, Celebration and the Road Ahead, a three-day festival to mark the launch of Hettie Judah's book Photo: © Jamie Baker
    A child joins in with Echo Morgan’s performance Woman 女 + Horse 马 = Mother 妈 at TJ Boulting during Love, Celebration and the Road Ahead, a three-day festival to mark the launch of Hettie Judah’s book Photo: © Jamie Baker
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    Echo of Posidonia in Ibiza

    September 19, 2022 | Posted By: | body-politics · Eco Art · News · Press |

    It was my first time in Ibiza and I was completely amazed by it’s landscape, culture, energy and history! It was emotional to see my performance been reviewed in Spanish and published on magazines, newspapers and radios! Thanks you Territory Team!

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    Echo of Posidonia_behind the scene

    September 17, 2022 | Posted By: | blog: film link · News · Press |

    A short interview about my newest performance: Echo of Posidonia ? thank you IB3 for capture those sensitive moments and thank you Isa Sanz Dirctor of Territori festival for the truly remarkable effort to produce and promote this new body of work. Sharing precious opening light with Sarah Misselbrook and Saul Garcia Lopez✨

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    NFT presenting at Ephemerisle

    July 25, 2022 | Posted By: | Art Protest · blog: film link · body-politics · News |
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    Be the Inside of the Vase

    July 7, 2022 | Posted By: | blog: film link · News |

    10 years since the make of Be the Inside of the Vase. The film will be screening at The Third Festival of Chinese Video Artists at the Cine Morelos Cinema, Cuernavaca Mexico. It as a parallel activity in their own Violet Green Festival. Feminisms in Morelos. Thanks to Curator and longtime supporter Elizabeth Ross.

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    ?结?

    June 27, 2022 | Posted By: | Art Protest · blog: film link · body-politics · Live Performance · News |

    第一章:变成小花梅

    Chinese Knot, chapter one:

    Become “Little Plum Blossom”

    Our names are not Jane Doe. 

    An alias is our last defence. 

    Sensational title on the society page, photos with mosaic cover our eyes … 

    In the past 6 months, a mother of eight children locked up in an iron chain has captivated the attention of many people in and outside of China. It is beyond a tragic human trafficking case.

    There are many twists and turns in the narrative. After huge public outrage authorities in China’s Xuzhou city issued 5 statements and named Chained Mother as “Xiaohuamei: “ Little Plum Blossom – a woman was sold three times from south-western Yunnan province to Feng county. But is she truly her?

    Can DNA being fake? Can identify be swap?Can 1.4 billion people save one woman?Can the internet hottest topic break the censorship wall? When is the systematic structure of rape fall? Is this horrific tragedy only happens in China? Are we truly protected in so-call more civilized city? Religion, morality, tradition, custom, politics and law, why everything over powering a woman’s choice roar! 

    Silenced, Jailed, Disappeared…

    Delete, Remove, Forget …

    Opening act at The Non-fungible Body performance Festival, Linz, Austria

    Directed by Alfred Weidinger 

    Curated by Freda Fiala and River Lin

    4 hours body painting Captured by Jamie Baker

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    The Non-fungible Body

    May 28, 2022 | Posted By: | Live Performance · News · Press |

    Painting until it Becomes Marble, Leipzig 2019

    Photo by Jamie Baker

    Bodies Assert Themselves in the Digital: The “West” makes its own images of China, and the Internet plays along diligently. The Chinese Xie Rong performs in Linz. © Jamie Baker

    les-nouveaux-riches Magazine Interview: The Non-fungible Body?

    Xie Rong, Chinese Knot. Photo: Nurith Wagner-Strauss

    Linz has a new performance festival: THE NON-FUNGIBLE BODY – Performance and Digitalization. It brings together artists who address the cultural significance of live performance in the (post) pandemic era.Curated by Freda Fiala & River Lin. Participating artists: Cibelle Cavalli Bastos, Marita Bullmann, Yun-Chen Chang, Beatrice Didier, Jan Hakon Erichsen, David Henry Nobody Jr, Sara Lanner, Sajan Mani, Boris Nieslony, Yiannis Pappas, Jianan Qu, Xavier Le Roy, Sarah Trouche, Xie Rong

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    Cut Piece 2022

    May 22, 2022 | Posted By: | Art Protest · blog: film link · Live Performance · News |

    The Outfits ?

    I choose to wear white because it’s world peace sentiment and most importantly I was imaging as the performance goes, the energy and the shift of missing piece creates abstract clouds just like the exhibition title: This room moves at the same speed as the clouds. I wanted to in-body the cloud. ☁️

    My outfit was combined with newly bought items: tights, underwear and jacket and my own loved designer clothes: shirt, skirts and shoes but this time I made a decision not to wear European Union heritage brands. I didn’t want to have the concept of “cutting” related to them because of the Russian-Ukraine war and Brexit. Still I wanted to offer my best outfit also most recognisable classic brands that has their own social identity and global expansion and influence. Here are some of my thinkings:

    Jacket: Ralph Lauren ( one of the oldest American luxury brand based in New York, many people would considered it as the icon of American/Western lifestyle.) 

    Shirt: Vivienne Westwood, UK brand ( “The mother of punk” Vivienne Westwood is also an Eco fashion campaigner, social injustice activist, consumerism ideologist. ) 

    Skirt: Alexander McQueen, UK brand: ( This was a vintage piece designed by Lee McQueen himself, who has a vision to “create armor for women”. To wear that to cover my bottom because both myself and Lee has experienced abuse from childhood. ) for me, Lee’s proud queer identity, HIV positive status, drugs use and tragic suicide makes him one of the most complex icon of our time. 

    Underwear: Calvin Klein ( one of the most iconic cultural symbol of body and branding. In 2020, Calvin Klein made a statement to cut ties with any factories or mills that produce fabric or use cotton from Xinjiang by 2021 due to human rights Al campaigners say, the cotton are produced by Xinjiang’s Uighur minority forced labour. ) 

    Tights: Wolford ( This was the only European brand I used for it’s second skin feel and intimate last protection concept ) 

    Shoes: Manolo Blahniks: ( It’s a pair of very classic heel. Many used as symbol of modern femininity, often used as feminist statement in  soap opera such as: Sex and The City. 

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    Gifts for the River Film Festival

    March 26, 2022 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Art Protest · blog: film link · Eco Art |

    Journey with Water, Betsy Damon in China

    Film screening on the March 25th, 2022 at Central Michigan University

    Gifts For The River Film Festival seeks to celebrate our relationship with the land and waterways that sustain us. To celebrate the artists and filmmakers who are in intentional relationship with the natural world and utilize their medium to create awareness about the issues that threaten Mother Earth as well as celebrate the ongoing resilience of Turtle Island and the peoples who care for it.

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    The Radical Outdoors

    March 4, 2022 | Posted By: | Academic Research |

    Betsy Damon’s feminist performances and eco-justice collaborations in the U.S. and China

    • Friday, March 4, 2022
    • 12:00 PM  1:30 PM

    Session The Radical Outdoors: Betsy Damon’s feminist performances and eco-justice collaborations in the U.S. and China
    Chairs: Monika Fabijanska, Independent Art Historian and Curator
    Dr. Christine A. Filippone, Millersville University
    2022 College Art Association Annual Conference
    Friday, March 4, 2022, 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM (online only)

    Presenters:

    Monika Fabijanska, Independent Curator
    Out In the Open: Betsy Damon’s Street Performances and Transnational Social Practice
    Petra Poelzl, Independent Researcher, Vienna, Austria
    The reception and impact of Betsy Damon’s Keepers of the Waters in China (1995) and Tibet (1996)
    Dr. Christina Filippone, Millersville University, US
    From Social Justice to Eco-Justice: Feminist Collaboration in the Work of Betsy Damon
    Rong Xie, Independent Artist, London UK
    A Journey with Water: Betsy Damon in China

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    Masking “Chineseness”

    February 11, 2022 | Posted By: | Academic Research |

    The Performance Works of Xie Rong 谢蓉 (Echo Morgan)

    By Freda Fiala

    As part of the conference series on “Women and Masks” at Boston University, I am glad to present my long-term research on performance artist Xie Rong 谢蓉 (Echo Morgan) for the first time.

    The performances of Xie Rong 谢蓉 (Echo Morgan) engage with Masks and Maskings as strategies of a strong contemporary female artistic expression. Born in Chengdu in 1983, Xie Rong’s studies have taken her to the UK, where she currently lives and works. Looking at Chinese culture from a diasporic perspective, her performances focus mainly on her family history in relation to the political history of modern China. She uses both physical Masks as well as various strategies of Masking her skin, which highlight the body both as a place for the projection of transcultural phantasy and as a site of power struggle. Contextualising the case study of Xie Rong, the presentation takes a conceptual approach, to understand her artistic engagement with Masks and Maskings as a ‘method’ of corporeal investigation and as ambitious intercultural articulation.

    Freda Fiala is a writer working across the contexts of performance art, new media dramaturgy and interculturalism, through researching and curating. She is a fellow of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and currently pursues a PhD on contemporary performance practices in East Asia. She studied Theater and Chinese Studies in Vienna, Berlin, Hong Kong and Taipei. Her research interests mainly include cultural diversity, cross-cultural exchange and ‘actionable speculations’ in the age of digitalisation.

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    Solo Exhibition Opening

    November 7, 2021 | Posted By: | body-politics · Exhibitions · News |

    Xie Rong. “The place where I yearn is day and night.” 
    Ramat Gan Museum of Russian and Far Eastern Art. 
    From November 11, 2021 
    Exhibition curated by Adiya Porat

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    The Place Where I Miss Day and Night

    November 7, 2021 | Posted By: | body-politics · Exhibitions · News · Press |

    Solo Exhibition, at the Museum of Far Eastern Art . An exhibition that includes a selection of video performances, as well as video art and photographs.

    By maska

    Posted on 07.11.2021

    Xie Rong: The Place Where I Miss Day and Night, Photographs of works – ©  Jamie Baker 

    Xie Rong, a Chinese-born contemporary artist, specializes in performance and video art. Her work, born from a hybrid complex self-awareness, balances between tradition and modernity. The artist tells about the personal, translating her stories into the language of performance, recites texts in English, and sings traditional Chinese songs. Xie Rong uses the technique of homage and silence, indicating his presence, powerful and fragile at the same time. The artist uses her influence on the public, involving the audience in her own performance.

    Xie Rong’s narrative is based on her family history. In her works, she shares memories of her childhood in the city of Chengdu in the Sichuan region, talks about her relatives and the ancestors of her family. The personal memories that the artist explores are based on the deep traditions of a complex Chinese society undergoing ideological, political, economic and social changes.

    Xie Rong analyzes the stereotypes associated with China, fights against them and opposes them. He paints his body with classical Chinese cultural symbols, mimicking either blue-and-white porcelain or classical Chinese landscapes and calligraphy, giving new meaning to traditional Chinese painting. With her art, she “translates” traditional classical Chinese art into modern language, adapting it to modern Western perception.

    Xie Rong’s work is influenced by Western performance artists of the 1960s and 70s. In those years, performance included an exploration of the capabilities of the human body, a test of physical and mental endurance and stamina. Shi Rong, using voice, body, symbolic images and personal texts, examines the relationship between such human manifestations as cruelty, beauty, vulnerability, trying to understand how all this together affects the formation of self-awareness and the feeling of one’s own body. Shows traditional Chinese art through a modern view from the side – from Europe, using both sound and traditional Chinese symbols – for example, a goldfish, concepts from Chinese philosophy.

    Often, Xie Rong invites the audience to take an active part in her performances, drawing strength from the vulnerable position in which the audience finds themselves and the discomfort experienced by the participants in the show. The emotions of the audience are intertwined with the feelings of the artist, which allows her to build a certain model of relationships, which is a holistic performance.

    The creative cycle of actions of the artist and the audience, the inextricable link between the past and the future, between traditional cultural baggage and contemporary art echoes the principle of Buddhist samsara: the cycle of birth and death, growth and decay, death and rebirth.

    Xie Rong (1983) was born in Chengdu, China. She attended art school in Sichuan, where she studied classical drawing and calligraphy, at the age of 19 she left to continue her studies in London, where she received her first academic degree in graphic design from the Central Saint Martins College of Art (CSM) and the second academic degree in art from the Royal College of Art. Lives and works in London and Surrey. Participated in solo and group exhibitions in Hong Kong, Australia, China, Sweden, Germany and England. Her husband, photographer Jamie Baker, helps her in her work.

    *****

    Xie Rong. “The place where I yearn is day and night.” 
    Ramat Gan Museum of Russian and Far Eastern Art. 
    From November 11, 2021 – May 2022
    Exhibition curated by Adiya Porat

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    I would like to know you

    October 9, 2021 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Art Protest · blog: film link · Exhibitions |

    Conversation with DuanYingMei for

    Spirit Labor: Duration, Difficulty, and Affect

    Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow

    10 Sep 2021-30 Jan 2022

    Lawn Are an Ecological Disaster, Are you surprised?

    This year I have been researcher on the history of Lawn. Reflecting on the social and environmental impacts of Lawns, family roots, man occupied space, collective memories, native species beyond human centred perspectives. How visionary plans for the city can be sustainable for generations to come.

    Portrait 爱LOVE is made from layers of wild flowers and weeds from our lawn. The character written across my face reads: Love. If the lawn is a symbol of status and a sign of pride and unity in the community, I truly wish our love for a manicured lawn can be more inclusive by allowing it to grew higher and more wild.

    Film: TianFu Lawn: Keep off the Grass
    In early 90s, my father’s business was declining. He borrowed money from his friends and family to invest in properties. A trusted the contact in the government, shared a secret business opportunity. Chengdu is redesigning its city centre on Ren Min south road, where the imperial city was demolished during the Cultural Revolution. My father can invest in one real estate and turn it into a shop front. This seems to be a golden opportunity to change his life, he dreamed excitedly the future customers spending fortune on his merchandise in the middle of this heavenly city centre. One year later, the reality was unexpected and cruel. This city centre square that many people was waiting for was 88000 square meters of lawn. Lawn does not grow well in China so for the next 24years, “Keep Off the Grass” has become a symbol for a civilised city. Together with ground-breaking urban modernisation, our motherland has transformed from mountains and water, villages and gardens to forests of irons and concretes decorated by manicured and not so evergreen turf patches.

    XieRong’s wild lawn & neighbour’s manicured lawn, Surrey England 

    TianFu Square in1980, ChengDu China

    XieRong’s father in TianFu Square, 1991, ChengDu China

    TianFu Square Lawn in1997, ChengDu China

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    Eco Echo

    April 15, 2021 | Posted By: | Academic Research · Art Protest · blog: film link |

    STAY CONNECTED: CHINESE ARTS NOW 2021 FESTIVAL

    15 April 2021

    Echo Morgan (Xie Rong) is a performance artist. She has always been interested in the relationship between Body, Memory and Politics through gesture, mark making and storytelling. Through video and an audience Q&A, she will share her research into some inspirational artist’s projects (including Betsy Damon, Zheng Bo and Song Chen), that address important environmental issues through the theme of water, plants and soil.

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    Body Politics

    October 2, 2019 | Posted By: | Art Protest · body-politics · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |

    02/10/2019

    Human 人 -Little white flower
    Live performance @ilminmuseumofart? @jamiebakerphotography
    1997, I was 14years old. I had my first article published on national newspaper. I passionately wrote my grief for the death of DengXiaoPing. Sorrow is a strange thing when you see everyone around you was crying, tv channel was playing funeral songs, over over again, all newspapers were filed with condolences … people were in black and wore white paper flowers, it affect you, It makes you sad, our school decided to stop classes for three days instead we were setting in the classroom watching documentaries about Deng’s achievement and folding hundreds of thousands white paper flowers. We then decorated them around the classrooms, hallway, and every trees around the school.

    Yesterday was PR China’s 70 years birthday. The entire nation was celebrating its victory and power. My cousin woke up 6am in the morning to watch the rising flag ceremony at the city square in my hometown ChengDu. All her classmates were in uniforms, standing in the rain, national flag painted on their little face, shined with bright smiles. On TV, I watched the replay of the whole parade. The familiar pride, smiles, absolute perfection, millions of people in one voice, millions of steps in uniformed movement. The patriotism was in the air and deep in people’s blood. .

    Five demands, no one less. The message from Hongkong is loud and serious, one 18years old protester was shot on the chest right next his heart … watching them online, they have nothing but a brave heart. 269 people were arrested on the national day, 178 male, 91 female. age from 12-71. Aiweiwei posted the number this morning.
    My heart and thoughts goes to Hongkong. It’s not about Hongkong independence! They have shown the real hope for democracy and real strength of dignity! Once were so precious to the true Chinese identity and still so important to our world peace and humanity.


     

    29/09/2019

    Human 人- Prisoners 囚

    When I was 3years old, a disable old man bought me a rocking horse. He told me the first English word I knew: “ White “. He was my grandfather. One of the most intelligent man I have never get to know. Grandpa Yong, speaks five languages. That made him one the main target in the culture revolution. A Slave to Western Culture. The red guards broken his legs and he died of depression in early 90s.
    I whitened my face, while telling the story, I applied two brush strokes with finger: two line joined at the top splits down the bottom, like a standing man, read: 人 Ren, : Human. Black ink covered my mouth, silenced me.
    Live performance at Ilmin Museum of Art
    Seoul, Korea

    Part of PAN Asia performance festival

    Photo by Jamie Baker

    Waves of arrests in Hongkong. “Police have rounded up children as young as 12 years old on suspicion of unlawful assembly, possession of offensive weapons or rioting, often based solely on the color of their clothing and objects in their bags. Of the 1,596 people arrested since protests began in June, 464 were students, including 207 this month. “ – Los Angeles Times.

    Families began to warn me, what to say and what not to post ; Friends are divided over opinions…

     

    05/08/2019

    Light

    Those flowers

    The laughter reminds me of those flowers,
    Quietly open for me in every corner of my life,
    I thought I would always be by her side,
    Today we have left, searching in different parts of the world.
    How are they?
    Are they still there?
    They have been blown away by the wind and scattered around the horizon.

    Some stories haven’t finished yet, forget it!
    Those moods are hard to distinguish between true and false in the years.
    Now there are no flowers in the grass.
    Fortunately, I witnessed your beauty in spring, autumn, winter and summer.
    How are those flower?
    Where are they now?
    Old umbrella, hospital stand, 12 ropes and fairy-lights.
    12 words:
    #Light, #love, #hope, #trust, #air, #water, #earth, #imaging, #feel, #freedom, #forgive, #dream

    4 balconies, 8 doors. I build a #lighthouse inside the #museum.

    Live performance @mdbkleipzig
    @alfred_weidinger
    Video by
    @lumalenscape
    Sound art by
    #andreastrobollowitsch

    Yoko Ono “Peace is Power” exhibition @yokoonoofficial
    Heavy heart following the live-stream of Hongkong Protest. Don’t know where the passion will leads the land … reading brutal comments from opposite viewers. Only finding peace in Patti Smith’s words :
    This is
    a mourning wreath
    nothing but grief
    nothing but blooms
    cascading as dust
    nothing but hatred
    and the terrible cost

    #grief#flower#dust#umbrella#hongkong#future#xierong#extraditionbill#onecountrytwosystems#香港#返送中

    24th/07/2019

    At the other side of the water
    Chinese song from 1975

    Verdant green grass, Misty white fog
    There is someone at the other side of the water, I wish to drift down steam, to meet up with my closed one. However, there is dangerous swamp awaits and the journey far and long. I wish to force the wave and push up searching for her direction. far away vaguely I see her standing right there: in the center of the water.
    An old man was interviewed to tell his story about the Great Escape. Vast numbers of mainlanders fled to #Hongkong illegally by swam cross the “XiangJiang” river which divided the broader from mainland and Hongkong. During the 1950-1970 it also define the opposition between capitalism and socialism. He was 14years old, swam, ran and hide for months, together with his mother they swam crossed the XiangJiang river. The rain was heavy… a big flood is on its way, the mother and son grabbed hold of a tree, mother pushed him to climbed up, suddenly many voices shouted from the tree. “push him down, it’s full here!” In the dark light they realized there were hundreds of people also in the water, many try to grab his legs and pull him down. The mother begged:”please let him stay, I lost my husband and other son in the water already! He is only 14! He needs to stay alive, pull him up please!” People did, helped her to hold him up, she used her body to support him … for hours, she stood in the water… the rain gets heavier, waves crashed in, dragged her into the dark. After that storm, many baby floated up but he never found hers.
    The Chinese word “Sea” constructed in three parts: water, human and mother.

    It’s a word about bodies. body of human, body of water. body of individual and collective history.

    We all remember little #AlanKurdi that three-year-old Syrian boy drowned in the Mediterranean Sea. We all saw photo of two bodies in one red t-shirt. Face down, died but together. The Salvadoran migrant #OscarMartinezRamirez and his 23months old daughter, who #drownedwhile trying to cross the Rio Grande in Matamoros.

    Human history is a record of #migration; migration is search for #home.

    Photo by @annakucera.au Curated by @alexieglass
    #xierong

    16/06/2019

    家- HongKong on my mind

    家 (Jia) means Home, Family and Country. But most dearly It’s my mother’s middle name. My mother’s early life meets every changing political event in modern China.

    My mother was born in 1957, two years after the birth of her brother, my mum is the seventh daughter in the family. Her arrival had broken my great-granny’s dream for more grandsons so my mum was the “bad luck”. Her childhood was during The Three Years of Natural Disasters. She remembered she was always starving.

    During those year 1957, 1962, 1972 and 1979 marked the four major booms in illegal emigration to Hong Kong, as mainlanders had suffered greatly from the Cultural Revolution, which included vast famine. According to research and my investigations, about two million people flooded into Hong Kong as illegal immigrants, often with great personal loss, and more people died on their way or were caught and repatriated.

    There are many touching footages shown when some of the mainland Chinese illegal immigrants hide in the mountains, the local Hongkong citizen brought food and clothes to help, they even surrounded the deportation vans and threw food into the vans… eventually that group of illegal immigrants stayed in HongKong! The wave of illegal emigration also prompted the mainland authorities to rethink their economic policy, scholars said. Late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, who was said to blame extreme leftist policies for the mass escape, launched the “reform and opening up” policy and endorsed the development of Shenzhen – a key hub for illegal migration – into a special economic zone in the late 1970s … .

    2017, together with my mother and my boys I had my first Solo exhibition in HongKong, the local Art Hongkong Magazine kindly made this cover of me. Same year HongKong Perspective awarded me the “40 under 40 Art price .” .

    My heart is with all the Hongkonger on the street protest today! For your strength and bravery! Please stay safe.The world is watching and celebrating the solidarity with you! ❤️ .
    Photo by Photo by Jamie Baker

    #extraditionbill#onecountrytwosystems#hongkong#protest#law#nochinaextradition#voiceofpeople#反送中#一國兩制#香港#東方之珠#逃犯條例#撑香港#616

    14/06/2019

    Pearl of the Orient ?? By Luo Da You
    Little river convolutedly flows to the south

    Drifting to Hong Kong to take a look

    Pearl of the Orient, my love

    Your elegant demeanor and romanticism are still the same?

    The harbor of curve moon

    The color of night is deep, and the light and the fire are sparkling and bright

    Pearl of Orient doesn’t sleep all night
    Keep the promise of vicissitudes of life

    Have let the sea wind blow for five thousand years

    As if each tear speaks about your dignity… ?

    1997, I heard this song for the first time and sang it passionately in the People’s square with millions of ChengDu citizens to celebrate the return of Hongkong to our motherland. I was 14, like the rest of the mainland China girls I thought I was free and Hongkong is coming home!
    It has been hard few days following up the news and watching the story turned darker… reading the papers in both Chinese and English with completely different narratives that painted opposite sense of realities … ( most of mainland Chinese won’t even know what happened in Hongkong because all the news are consorted and removed, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are blocked ). The more I look into the situation the more I questioning my life grew up in 80’s China and recall my recent memories when I visited my Chinese artist friends who are live in fears and under oppressions. All the unfair legal cases that happened to the people I knew and cared … It is easy for one to conclude that China has no #humanrights but it is heartbreaking to gradually realized that yourself! Because it is still where all my family are live and where my roots are deeply buried and a home where I wish my children will keep loving! ?

    #teargas#rubberbullets#violence#extraditionbill#onecountrytwosystems#hongkong#china#fugitives#trust#law#nochinaextradition#notinmyname#voiceofpeople#performanceart#actionart#emotion#xierong#nohatred#fakenews#反送中#一國兩制#香港#東方之珠#逃犯條例#撑香港

    Performance photo by Photo by Jamie Baker

    I was attacked by 150 water balloons. After live performance Break the Vase.

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    Baltic Sea

    September 23, 2019 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |


    Jamie Baker

    Xie Rong: Sea
    Durational performance
    Saturday 19.10. between 13-16
    Wäinö Aaltonen Museum of Art, Itäinen Rantakatu 38
    As part of Wäinö Aaltonen Museum’s When Is Now -exhibition

     

    Friday 18.10.2019

    WHEN WHAT INFO WHERE
    18:00  Panu Pihkala: Earth Emotions  Performance lecture  Viinatehdas MANILLA
    19:15  Leena Kela: Space Here We Come  Performance lecture  MANILLA courtyard
    20:00 Nathalie Mba Bikoro: Black A(n)thena  Performance TEHDAS Theatre MANILLA
    21:00  Leyya Mona Tawil: Lime Rickey International’s Future Faith  Performance  Viinatehdas MANILLA
    22:00  FESTIVAL Lounge  Bars open!  TEHDAS bar + courtyard MANILLA

    Saturday 19.10.2019

    WHEN WHAT INFO WHERE
    9:00-17:00  Salla Talvikki Nieminen: Free Verse Work  Durational performance  City centre – place TBA
    11:00  STRETCH 2019 keynote: What is the point of it all? Working internationally in the age of ecological crisis Visitor and Innovation Center Joki Kupittaa
    13-16 Xie Rong: Sea Durational performance Wäinö Aaltonen Museum of Arts
    13:30-16:30 Henna Laininen: My Climate Emotions (workshop) Workshop on climate emotions Enrollments here
    14:30 Antti Tolvi & Tero Niskanen: Honk  Durational moving performance Multiple performance spots – starting point at Mannerheiminpuisto
    17:00  Leyya Mona Tawil: TURKU FUTURE FOLK DANCE LAUNCH  Performance  City Centre
    18-02 Stirnimann – Stojanovic: – The Space –  Durational performance Vanha Viinatehdas / Danasali MANILLA
    Hourly/start 18:30 Tiia Kasurinen: Life of Harmony – Extended  Series of performance choreographies  Studio MANILLA
    Hourly/start 18:30  Tytti Arola: The Silakka Triptych  Series ofperformative concerts  TEHDAS Theater MANILLA
    20:00  Niko Hallikainen: Television  Performance Viinatehdas MANILLA
    21:30  Ali Al-Fatlawi & Wathiq Al-Ameri  Performance Aurinkobaletti MANILLA
    22-03  FESTIVAL CLUB: Clubbing dancing and partying until early hours Evening programme  TEHDAS Theatre + Viinatehdas + courtyard of MANILLA

    Sunday 20.10.2019

    WHEN WHAT INFO WHERE
    13:30  Fern Orchestra: Vox HerbāriumNOTE! Transportation leaves at Manilla at 13:30. The performance starts at 14:00 at Ruissalo. Enrollment for the transportation and performance here (limited seats)  Performance  Ruissalo Botanical Garden
    16:30 Qi Gong & meditation by AnttiTolvi  Taiji and meditation class Vanha Viinatehdas MANILLA
    17:30- EVENING SNACK AND FINAL DISCUSSION. Festival ends with joint early evening snacks and discussion about the festival themes and performances. The discussion is moderated by Marika Räty (Arts Promotion Centre Finland)
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    Body of Work

    September 11, 2019 | Posted By: | News · Press · reviews |

    Body of Work

    Interview by Jing Zhang

    Published on Aug of 2019 Prestige Magazine

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    Echoes from Jeju Island

    August 11, 2019 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |


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    PAINTING UNTIL IT BECOMES MARBLE

    June 12, 2019 | Posted By: | blog: film link · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News · Press · reviews |

    XIE RONG PERFORMS YOKO ONO’S PAINTING UNTIL IT BECOMES MARBLE

    Leipzig, Germany – May 2019

    Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig

    By Madeline Bocaro ©

    Watch the performance video:

    Following her intense performance of Yoko Ono’s Cut Piece (as Echo Morgan) at the Peace Is Power exhibition in Leipzig (April 2019), the amazing artist Xie Rong performed another of Ono’s works at the museum’s retrospective of Yoko’s career. Although Yoko’s Painting Until It Becomes Marble is an actual painting rather than a conceptual one, Rong performed a live interpretation of Yoko’s work. Immersing herself in paint and becoming a part of the actual work is an integral aspect of Xie Rong’s art. She applied her own method to Yoko’s static painting, and the result was stunning.

    Yoko’s original work is a black and white ink drawing which is an accordion style fold-out. It was first shown during her first solo art exhibition Paintings and Drawings by Yoko Ono, at Fluxus founder George Maciunas’ AG Gallery in New York City.  Painting Until It Becomes Marble came with Yoko’s instruction that visitors were to “cut their favorite parts until the whole thing is gone”. It was also shown at MoMA in 2015 as part of Yoko Ono: One Woman Show, 1960-1971.

    Xie Rong’s live interpretation of Yoko’s painting was stunning. Yoko’s original painting actually has some ‘movement’ in its accordion folded shape. Rong took it to a new level, breathing new life into the piece. Reverently and ceremoniously, the artist stood quietly in the huge empty space with extremely high floor-to-ceiling windows emitting a background of pure light. Dressed all in white, Xie Rong stood with two bowls at her feet, one filled with Chinese black ink and the other with pure blue pigment powder. The artist combed the ink through her long black hair, saturating it and began to paint on a very large canvas on the floor.

    Rong’s barefooted dance began – at first light and graceful like a ballerina, then more intensely, furiously jumping as her drenched hair splattered paint in all directions and on herself. ‘Jack the Dripper’ (Jackson Pollack) has fierce competition! The chaotic calligraphy continued with her head to the floor, making brush strokes. Kneeling with her head down on the canvas, submitting to the work in reverence, she made thicker strokes and swirls. Covered in ink, her white clothing and skin took on the characteristics of the actual artwork.

    Xie Rong:

    “An amazing aspect of the performance was the sound! This heavenly space is where they displayed Yoko’s cricket cages. I sang this song and told the story about losing my mother in law two weeks ago. And I invited audiences to rise the painting with me! But the paper dropped and become a cloud!”

    Read the full article on:

    Xie Rong Performs Yoko Ono’s Painting Until it Becomes Marble

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    Stone and Light

    June 12, 2019 | Posted By: | blog: film link · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News · Press |

     

    XIE RONG – STONE AND LIGHT

     

     By Madeline Bocaro ©

    Xie Rong performs her new works:

    Story of the Stone/ To Reach the Light

    (inspired by Yoko Ono) 

    at Yoko Ono: Peace Is Power exhibition @mdbkleipzig in Leipzig Germany

    May 11, 2019.

    Watch the performance videos:

     

    Story of the Stone

    This work by Xie Rong is inspired by three of Yoko Ono’s works; Three Mounds, Riverbed and Rising (lyrics).

    Xie Rong: “I wish to create a piece to bring illumination and sound into the darkness. To connect all the rooms into the main hall, create movement of audiences. From 9:30 Andreas played music create tension and atmosphere. 10pm, Me, in a mirror suit, walking into the main hall. I stood inside a rope light, silent, I will sing “Olive Tree” then I walk off to collect all the ropes, I shout out to each floor and balcony, drag ropes between people. Creating spider web collection between the three museum floors and four exhibition rooms.” … …


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    My Cut Piece

    May 20, 2019 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · Live Performance · News |

    MdbK Leipzig, Yoko Ono “PEACE is POWER”, Eröffnung, Performance “Cut Piece”, Echo Morgan

    Cut piece ✂️

    Last night, I performed my “One Woman Show”. It is a title that borrowed from Yoko Ono’s MoMA’s exhibition in 2015. It was my 5th performance piece that responded to Yoko’s work.
    This morning, tiredly woke up from sore muscles. I watched the video of Theresa May’s resign speech. Her usually steely demeanour collapsed, her voice cracking with emotion, she said:” The second female prime minister but certainly not the last. I do so with no ill-will, but with enormous and enduring gratitude to have had the opportunity to serve the country I love.” Suddenly, it reminded me of the aloneness and vulnerability I experienced before, during and after the “Cut Piece”. It’s a historical piece, I had exception and preparation for it. But it was still very challenging for me and the audiences.

    1.The stage was high, because there were hundreds of audiences.

    2.I was programmed into an opening timeline which the mayor and museum director were waiting to give a speech.

    3.A daughter came with her mother,shaking, her mother encouraged :” Do it! Do it!” she cut small piece of my shirt “yes!” Her mother shouted loudly with proud!

    4.A man walked up brutally took my bra and swung in the air! Whole room cheered!

    5. As soon as my bra was off, two women jumped in front the queue. Quickly, collaboratively, tightly, they swaddled me together like a new born baby.

    6. A woman gently removed my underpants, Later watching the footage I realised she was sobbing.

    7. An elder woman ran close to the stage after my underpants was removed. She stood apart her legs, lifted up her long skirt, cut a small piece of fabric, she faced the audiences, like a warrior. She turned around and covered my crotch. She then held her both hands bowed me like a Buddha.

    8. The second day, she waited for me in the museum and wanted to check if I was ok, she never heard about the original Cut piece so she was deeply sadden and dramatised by the action and process.

    9. Dinner, one of curator call me the best actress, others angry:” You shouldn’t be allowed to cut your own hair to end the show! Because it’s Yoko’s work !

    10. The sound was a sculpture and movement was a drawing!


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    Yoko Ono and I

    April 14, 2019 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · News |

    Yoko Ono and I in 2009, Notting Hill Gate, Feathers Boutique

    Cut Piece ✂️

    I made a promise to myself not to participate in other artist’s work; not to react someone els’s performance after a heartfelt and inspiring conversation with John Court in Beijing. When Alfred Weidinger, the director of the Museum of Fine arts Leipzig approached me with the idea of performing Yoko’s Cut Piece. I fall into deep thoughts.
    Cut Piece was first performed by YokoOno on July 20, 1964 at Yamaichi Hall, Kyoto, Japan. The artist entered the stage in her best dress, sat in a traditional sitting position, and invited the audience to cut pieces of her clothing with scissors and take the piece with them.

    I met Yoko in 2009, at a design boutique in Notting-hill gate. Feathers, where I have worked throughout my study years in London. I helped her chose few outfits: jackets and shirts and 5 hats. While packing the clothes, I said to her: My husband gave me a piece of broken vase in 2003, he said it was from your live performance in Tate Modern and you invited the audiences to put the vase back together in 2013, we got married in 2004 and we have been cherish that piece of vase and really look forward to rebuilding it with her. Yoko smiled and asked me for pen and paper. She wrote down: Dear Luke and Echo, I give you a sun. Love, Yoko Ono. She even drew a smiley sun.
    2011, I separated with Luke, went to the Royal College of Art and became a performance artist. Same year, I did a performance: I Buried My Loss, together with many sentimental letters and photos I left the note from Yoko and her piece of vase behind. The only thing I kept was his surname: Morgan.

    As a pioneer in conceptual and performance art, Yoko’s work has moved and influenced many people. Including myself! I do feel deeply honoured to be approached to perform her Cut Piece at the opening of YOKO ONO. PEACE is POWER at @mdbkleipzig So for one time only I will break my own promise, this is my tribute and love for Yoko’s art and life. I do believe it is a fate that I have to take this offer. There for, I would like to take this opportunity and mark this performance as my last performance under the name Echo Morgan.

    With Yoko’s best friend, the Curator of Yoko Ono exhibition: Jon Hendricks after performed Cut Piece, 3rd of April 2019

    Unfortunately, Yoko didn’t come to the Opening and the only day she could visited the exhibition Peace is Power in Leipzig was on my mother in law’s funeral …

    I am proud for doing this piece! It’s my way to return that piece of vase (PromisePiece) to her.

    Watch the whole performance online:

     

     

     

     

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    Fire of Yi People

    November 12, 2018 | Posted By: | blog: film link · Exhibitions · Live Performance · News · Press |




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    Body Calligraphy: The Performance Work of Echo Morgan _ By Luise Guest

    August 10, 2018 | Posted By: | News · Press · reviews |

     



    Body Calligraphy: The Performance Work of Echo Morgan

    Echo Morgan is the English name of Xie Rong, a Chengdu-born, London-based, multi-disciplinary artist whose work is underpinned by a dark family story. She works with stereotypes of ‘Chineseness’ and femininity in order to subvert them. Morgan has written texts on her skin using red lipstick, black Chinese ink, white ‘ink’ made from jasmine tea, and her own breast milk after giving birth to her second child. She has played with tropes of Chinoiserie, painting her naked body to resemble blue and white porcelain, and then inviting the audience to violently wash the patterns away by hurling water-filled balloons at her. Her work mines her own experiences of childhood, family, marriage and motherhood – and those of her female ancestors. She is a story-teller.

    … …

    Juxtaposing English narration with Chinese traditional songs, Morgan plays with her complex hybrid identity and her difficult childhood. She explores the territory of translation: between two languages, between gesture and stillness, between her Chinese past and English present, between performance and image.

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    The Body is Cultural – Xie Rong’s Home at Galerie Huit Hong Kong

    April 14, 2017 | Posted By: | News · Press · reviews |

     

     

    The Body is Cultural – Xie Rong’s Home at Galerie Huit Hong Kong

    Galerie Huitis currently exhibiting the debut solo show in Hong Kong of the Chinese multi-disciplinary artist Xie Rong, otherwise known as Echo Morgan. Rong was born in the southwest province of ChengDu, China in 1983 and has lived and worked in London since the age of nineteen. Within her work, Rong oscillates between the role of performer, filmmaker, director and artistic narrator, operating across the intersection of a variety of mediums including painting, performance, film, prints, publications, short stories and audio works. The current exhibition, entitled 家Home, consists of an extension of the core thematic and aesthetic preoccupations Rong has explored in her previous work, predominantly the use of her personal prismatic and textured family experience as a reflection of the political, ideological and philosophical complexities and transformations of Chinese society…

    A Broader Reflection of the Female Working Class Experience

    The second dominating project within the exhibition is Rong’s sequel to I am a Brush, from which the exhibition takes it’s name – Home. The piece is comprised of an original performance, a video work and the parchment retaining the traces of Rong’s performative presence. Homeis reminiscent of Rong’s previous performance pieces including Be the Inside of the Vase (2012) and Little Red Flower (2012). The correlation can be seen within two avenues. Firstly the use of the narration of her own troubled childhood and relationship with her parents (particularly her father) and by extension the society within which she was raised. Secondly, the process of transforming her body into symbols, be it the Chinese national flag, blue and white porcelain, Chinese landscape painting or in the case of Home a more monochromatic reflection of the contradictions between her cultural identity. In this sense, in Home, Rong projects a more overt reflection of her cultural juxtapositions and her attempts to reconcile her socialized political and gender conforming upbringing with her intellectual and political confliction through her international exposure. However, arguably this is a somewhat superficial reading as, in my opinion, „Home“ projects a broader reflection of the female working class experience of both east and west. In this respect, despite in the obvious cultural nuances, which are not to be diminished of critical importance, in actual fact the core narrative characteristics and anecdotes are largely a global tale of subjugation and a struggle for the psychologically, physically and financially oppressed to overcome.

    Ultimately, Rong’s debut Hong Kong exhibition depicts a strong foundational voice and aesthetic. Although there are notable influences from prior body art practice and both Eastern and Western cultural and artistic iconography – a large degree of indebtedness to Yoko Ono, Yves Klein and Carolee Schneemann, for example – Rong’s appropriation and assimilation of both cultural narratives is what makes her work particularly interesting from a critical perspective but also as an illustration of the interconnected and mutating cultural psyche’s of an internationalist ‘millennial’ practitioner….

     

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    Art China_Interview_by Meng Yuan

    November 12, 2016 | Posted By: | Exhibitions · Live Performance · News · Press · reviews |

    logo.png

    Xie Rong x Echo Morgan – After her divorce in the UK, a petite Sichuan girl started her five-years performance art journey.

    Art China · Meng Yuan | 2016-11-03 17:20

    The first “Beijing·Live” International Performance Art Festival was held from October 15th to 23rd, 2016. More than 30 performance artists from 13 countries presented performance art works at the Danish Cultural Center. Echo Morgan performed her new work, My Father and My Son. The Art China reporter interviewed the artist Xie Rong and had a new understanding of her behavior.

    1. You were a designer at the beginning. What is the opportunity for you to switch to behavioral art creation?

    Yes, I was in college at the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. I belonged to the University of the Arts in London. When I was in school, I found that the boundaries between design and art were very vague. The graduation thesis at the time was influenced by Hélène Cixous’s theory of “negative writing”. In the book “Medusa’s Laughter,” she wrote: “Women must write about herself: must write a woman and bring a woman to writing… a woman must put herself in the text – bring her story back In the world and in history – through her own actions.”

    My graduation thesis is “The Symbol of Negative Writing and Identity”, and I wrote an autobiography “Xie Rong and the Thirsty Devil”. In the autobiography, I combed my family history into the “three steps”: the root of the school, the school of death and the school of dreams. This is a turning point in my spirit and a turning point in art.

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    Xie Rong’s paper self-made book

    I am a very emotional person. From small to large, I can feel the impact on my body and emotions around me. I like performance and like to speak, but I didn’t find a suitable channel to send it out. Body writing made me open my voice. I realized that my voice and my story are powerful. I used to think that this is just my personal experience. I think art is not personal but public. Everyone can feel and Experience, so I feel too personal to become very narrow. But after reading the book of Xisu, I found that it was not. When I put my body in the big age, I suddenly had power. I found the art of performance art and the sheep to express myself.

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    Xie Rong’s paper self-made book

    2. What is the first performance art work?

    In fact, this starts from the fact that I stopped writing for two years. When I was 21, I married an Irishman. After seven years, I separated. Later, I met my father to commit suicide. The two worlds collapsed at the same time, causing me to collapse. I have not created any works for two years. From 2011 I entered the Royal College of Art and followed Nigel Rolfe to study performance art.

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    “Send Book” was created in 2011 by artists during performances

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    “Book” was created in 2011. The artist is barefoot and uses ink to wash his hair.

    My first performance art work was “Send a Book,” which was created in 2011. I was studying printmaking and learned that the world’s first prints were made with women’s hair instead of silk. So I went back to the woman’s body and painted it with ink on her hair. The painting was very abstract and it was an understanding of my own hair. I spent five hours creating an eleven-meter abstract scroll that represents my eleven years with my ex-husband. After bathing, the water washed the paint off the hair, and the ink was painted all over the body. At that moment, I felt that I was born again. Many of my works draw on the works of predecessors and need to think about how to turn them into their own artistic language. I feel that my cultural background is very important.

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    Xie Rong is painting with his hair

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    “Send Book” was created in 2011. The artist paints on a long roll of eleven meters.

    3. This time, “My Father and My Son,” I used an object like a ball, which seems to appear in your previous work.

    The object was woven from bamboo strips and covered with more than 80 sheets of rice paper. The shape is not very precise. It is made up of two parts, like a lantern, uterus, breast, testicles, planet, silkworm cocoons, eggs, nests, and so on. It also appeared in my four-hour behavioral work, Be the Inside of the Vase, in 2012. The image at the time was more precise and it was a vase.

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    Bamboo and rice paper woven objects

    Objects appearing in “My Father and My Son”

    At that time, the museum did not allow me to ignite the vase. I stood in the whole body with Meilan Zhuju, and asked the audience to throw a water polo to break the vase. The story of my father and me has puzzled me for so many years, and I hope to break it. The audience broke the lantern with 150 water polo. The water polo lost its light in 5 minutes and washed off the blue and white porcelain patterns and pigments on my body.

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    Xie Rong painted part of the bamboo on his body

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    Xie Rong’s 2012 performance art work “Being the Inner of the Vase”, which also appeared similar objects

    One of the water polo players was very hard when they lost it. It hit my eyes and it hurts. The dark circles are like pandas for two weeks. This is a kind of violence. It is a retrospective of the cold violence I felt when I was a child. My mother has a face to face. I am not allowed to talk about their divorce. It is a mental imprisonment for me. At the time, an editor wrote a commentary and said that it was very repugnant to this kind of violence, and he did not know how to become a party to violence. She feels that the artist appears in a fragile and weak image, using his own vulnerability to make the audience become weaker, and the artist controls the mood of the audience.

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    The audience threw the water polo to the artist, the water polo broke the rice paper, and washed off the paint on the artist.

    4. You just mentioned that there is a water polo that hits your eyes. Does it mean that there are many sudden and random factors in the performance of performance art?

    Yes, there was an unexpected situation in the performance art performance of “My Father and My Son”. After my father died, I really wanted to burn the lanterns that were not allowed to be lit before. Originally, the fire was very beautiful when I was experimenting the previous day. The ashes floated up and slowly fell. At that time, it should be the end of my performance art. On the second day of the official performance, I found that the paste completely prevented me from burning the lantern. I used to use the pvc adhesive that was very flammable in the UK.

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    After the flames are gathered, leave scars and holes

    Everyone saw it at the time. Some people gave me a lighter. Many people who had heard my thoughts wondered how I would continue to the next step, and most of the audience didn’t know that this momentum was not my original idea. I found that I liked this kind of burning way. The flame burned up, and soon the flames went out again. It was both arrogant and subtle. Curator JonasStampe said that this is the sorrow of people. You want him to drift with the wind in a big fire, but it is always lingering. This is the most real emotion and life of man.

    Later, when I was communicating with a Swedish artist, he felt that the most striking thing about performance art was that while the audience was thinking, the artist was thinking about the direction of performance. This is also the place where performance art is different from step-by-step stage play. It is a real situation on the scene, rather than step by step according to the script. When I wanted to burn this lantern and burned it, during this time, everyone had a lot of ideas and removed all the factors of the stage and performance.

    5. You said that you have n’t thought about how to explain this work with your mother after returning to the UK. Is it afraid that the mother can’t accept the nude or do you say a lot of personal family scars in the work?

    I think that for performance artists, the body is no longer naked, but a carrier of art. In fact, this is more about my mother’s face. My mother is a soldier. My father is a little punk. It is a waver in the rivers and lakes. She wants to use her love to save a fallen soul. At that time, the mother’s family did not agree with them. After quarreling with the family, the mother rushed out of the house and suffered a car accident causing the uterus to shift, leaving a scar on the lower back. In “Inner of the Vase”, I set up a canal with a water polo. The shape is a map of China. It has nothing to do with politics. It is the shape of the scar on my mother’s lower back.