Show curated by Wu Hung named one of the defining exhibitions of the 2000s by Art in America
December 11, 2020
In a survey of ground-breaking shows that have led the way to the present, Art in America recognized “Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China” as one of the exhibitions that defined the discussions of contemporary art in the first decade of the twenty-first century. Co-curated by Wu Hung (Harrie A. Vanderstappen Distinguished Service Professor of Art History and the College and Adjunct Curator, Smart Museum of Art) and Christopher Phillips (Curator, International Center of Photography), the show was co-organized by the Smart Museum of Art and the International Center of Photography, New York, in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the Asia Society, New York.
“‘Between Past and Future’ accurately reflected both the burgeoning world-awareness in China and the increasingly conceptual nature of photography and video there in the early 2000s,” notes Richard Vine in the article. “The survey traced those developments from their 1970s photojournalist origins to the threshold of the computer- and internet-based art that today most forcefully counters the Great Firewall and the increasingly conservative (which in China means Party-centric) and nationalistic (verging on xenophobic) cultural policies of the current government in Beijing.”
Link to story on the department website.
