Beijing's best art galleries part 1: UCCA
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E-mail CRI, June 28, 2012
As Beijing's modern art scene continues to surge into the lime light, the number of its galleries keeps apace. As with any city with a massive art scene, the quality of art you can find ranges from jaw-droppingly phenomenal to stomach-churningly terrible. CRI's William Wang takes you on a tour to galleries which showcase high caliber art, art which impresses via its subtleties, shock-value, craftsmanship or… inaccessibility.
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Red dinosaurs outside of UCCA mark the nerve center of 798 art district. [CRIENGLISH.com/William Wang] |
![Red dinosaurs outside of UCCA mark the nerve center of 798 art district. [CRIENGLISH.com/William Wang]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20120628/001422373e191156089236.jpg "Red dinosaurs outside of UCCA mark the nerve center of 798 art district. [CRIENGLISH.com/William Wang]")
UCCA
The 798 art district is China's premiere art hub, and the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art is its nerve center. Tucked in off the main street, three caged trademark tyrannosaurus rexes stand as the landmark which has come to represent not only the UCCA, but 798 itself.
Technically, the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art is not an art gallery at all. It showcases art, but doesn't sell it. This distinction actually allows for UCCA to take a unique approach towards art, where profit is not a focus. In fact, the art scene has always been a difficut market to make profits in so UCCA fortunately has the funding to promote art without considering whether it is saleable or not.
Many art installations (particularly large ones) are extremely difficult for private collectors to purchase, but UCCA takes its adopted role to push Beijing's art scene forwards seriously, presenting new exhibits and experiences to audiences. Avant-garde artist Gu Dexin's installations included meat and vegetables in their composition, giving pause to the temporal, while refusing to be art that seeks to be sold.
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