ART-PRESENTATION:Li Songsong-Beihai

Li Songsong’s signature style encompasses deconstructing found imagery, such as popular media photographs and film stills, and reassembling them into original paintings. By removing the context, historical significance and societal symbolism from these images, the artist creates refreshing and new interpretations that are devoid of preconceived notions or bias.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Pace Gallery Archive

Featuring Li Songsong’s latest works and important works in last three years, the solo exhibition “Beihai” marks the artist’s return to Beijing after four years. Though Li’s paintings may appear to be of abstract images, with their dispersed layers of color, they are, in fact, detailed studies of physical subjects. Li works on one panel at a time, completing each one individually before moving on to the next. In his paintings, the artist’s aggressively applied brushstrokes are juxtaposed with the soft, subdued, pastel colors of his palette. Li methodically deconstructs the found images he uses as subjects, and reassembles them like a patchwork grid. Individually, each grid-block appears to be nothing more than a shape or color study, but when combined they morph into a continuous flowing image, made from many layers of color, like a single memory that is made from many layers of ideas. In his solo exhibition the decipherable images come back again, yet has done nothing to diminish the artist’s keen interest in toying with “Interpretation First” viewers, multiple groups of paintings originating from the same image sources transform second interpretations of historical images into regulated games of form. If considering a single work of art as the independent entrance into the artist’s world, the delightfully exploratory exhibition venue created by multiple works is thus the grounds for a visual game that both the artist and the viewers participate in. With the rules of the artist’s “game” in place, any clichéd standard of interpretation is in danger of continuous failure. However, by relying on one’s sensibility and intuition, one can ultimately discover the ephemeral, hidden value located beyond the meaning of art.

Info: Pace Beijing, 798 Art District, No. 2 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, Duration: 10/12/16-11/2/17, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 10:00-18:00, www.pacegallery.com