Duration: 2012-08-26 -- 2012-08-26
Location: 207 exhibition hall of 2ndfloorXinjiang International Exhibition Center,No.167 Youhao North Road, Wulumuqi

The Liu Xiaodong Hotan Project is an on-site painting project created by the artist Liu Xiaodong. Making use of methodology involving fieldwork and interviews, Liu Xiaodong located a number of jade hunting laborers and their families residing in and around the city of Hotan, and with the Yurungkash River as a backdrop, worked on putting scenes relating to their lives to canvas. The four oil painting works produced in this manner are to be displayed at the Xinjiang International Exhibition Center in Urumqi. The hunting of jade in Hotan and the jade trade forms an economic chain that effects social classes and segments of various level all across the nation, and Liu Xiaodong begins from the lowest end of this chain, using the ways of the artist to make a thorough investigation of the unique and distinctive region of Xinjiang as well as its economic and cultural relationships with the interior. In order to provide this project with a deeper and more profound source of resources for contemplation, project curators Hou Hanru and OuNing initiated a 10-day survey and research session, interviewing a great number of writers, historians and folk artists from both Northern and Southern Xinjiang. The “In Xinjiang: Art and Society” discussion seminar has been mobilized with the power of the greater base of knowledge that this research survey has to offer, as it provides a diverse, cross-disciplinary jigsaw puzzle of information for better understanding the complexities of Xinjiang’s history and its present, and for making investigations into the possibility of launching within Xinjiang an closer kind of interaction between Art and Society. The discussion seminar shall make use of spatial arrangements and decorations which are rich with local flavor and characteristics, with the speakers and the audience sitting on carpets on the floor, and within an open, relaxed and free environment, aims to unfold the sharing of knowledge and discussion of ideas, and hopes to use Liu Xiaodong’s works as a spark to light the furnace for casting critical thinking, and to fire up a wider perspective of knowledge of the region of Xinjiang.

 

First Module: Multi-ethnic Culture
10:30 am –12:00 pm

Xinjiang is a region where many different ethnicities live together with each other. Different peoples with their different languages, cultures, religious beliefs and lifestyles all coexisting in a single geographic space and sharing the same social resources forms a situation demanding that these people seek out some kind of way to get along with each other in greater harmony. At the same time, the coexistence of different cultures in one place is beneficial for mutual influence and absorbance across these cultures, as they make use of each other’s best aspects and make up for each other’s deficiencies. It is even more beneficial for the creation of a diverse and heterogeneous new culture more representative of Xinjiang’s distinctive and unique characteristics. This module invites authors, intellectuals and folk artists of different ethnicities to share, from the perspective of their own ethnicities, their experiences of living and working in Xinjiang, aimed towards creating a discussion investigating the possibilities of peaceful ethnic co-existence as well as the cultural renewal of the region.
Moderator:
A Cheng, author

Invited Speakers:
Ilham Rehim, Uyghur Muqam Musician
Dilimulati Tailaiti ,Uyghur Writer and Translator
Yerkesy Hulmanbiek, Kazakh Author

 

Second Module: The Ecological Environment, Historical Preservation and New Economic Movements
12:30 am – 2:00 pm

Xinjiang possesses an enormous land area and rich natural resources. Being subjected to little in the way of modern pollution and contamination, its ecology and environment have been conserved to an exceedingly high degree. The region also has historical resources stretching back for ages, bringing together remnants of civilizations from a variety of historical eras. Yet, caught up in the currents of a continually concentrated and singular world economic system, the changes occurring by the new modes of production brought about by the new economic movements and so on have caused the state of this ecological environment to become increasingly fragile and led to difficulties for historical preservation work. How to reach a mre ideal balance of the distribution and proportions of the nomadic, agricultural, manufacturing and tourism industries, how to better coordinate and complement urban renewal and historical conservation projects, how to develop the economy and at the same time protect the ecology and historical resources- Xinjiang faces all these and other serious challenges. This module invites artists, writers and researchers in the field of urban-rural relations to discuss and explore these extraordinarily pressing issues.
Moderator: Hou Hanru, curator
Invited Speakers:
Liu Xiaodong, artist
Ding Yan, writer
Feng Yuan, scholar

 

 

Third Module: Contemporary Xinjiang Literature
 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm

As a powerful cultural force, contemporary literature in Xinjiang has constantly sought out and traced the history of the area, presented records of reality, constructing a distinctively styled contemplative background for this unique land. From the Western Region Poetry of the 1980s to the essays by Zhou Tao, Liu Liangcheng and Yerkesy of the 1990s, to Dong Libo’s novels of the new century, to the national-scale obsession with Li Juan’s personal writings of today- Xinjiang’s contemporary literature has always been a flash of dazzling radiance within the national literary scene. What exactly goes into its immensely unique DNA? Where precisely is its link with the spirit of these lands built up? What is the nature of its mutually life-giving relationship with Xinjiang’s history and present realities? This module invites representative Xinjiang authors to delve into and explore the riddles of the contemporary literature of the region.
Moderator: OuNing, curator
Dong Libo, author
Yerkesy, Kazakh writer
Ding Yan, writer

 

1 :Moderator: Hou Hanru, curator Invited Speakers:Liu Xiaodong, artistDing Yan, writer Feng Yuan, scholar
2:Moderator:A Cheng, author Invited Speakers: Ilham Rehim, Uyghur Muqam Musician Dilimulati Tailaiti ,Uyghur Writer and Translator Yerkesy Hulmanbiek, Kazakh Author
3:Moderator: OuNing, curator Dong Libo, author Yerkesy, Kazakh writer Ding Yan, writer