Solo Exhibition
Kunstraum Nürnberg, Nuremberg, Germany, 2025
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This exhibition presents the latest works by the Berlin-based artist duo Ce Jian and Yuzheng Cheng. This project, which began in 2018, explores the language of the art world and its conventions. It is based on a collection of over 1,500 international press releases published on the platform dailyartfair.com in 2017/18. Using frequency analysis software, the 15 most common terms in these texts were identified and visualized as a site-specific wall installation. The walls are covered with colorful rectangles representing the list of words. The space thus becomes a living map of the linguistic habits of the art world. The regular shapes reflect the hierarchical and logical relationships between the terms. The structural patterns and subtle ideologies embedded in the language of art are translated into a visual experience.
In an adjacent room, the audience encounters a fascinating interplay between art and bureaucracy. Here, a document issued by the Shanghai city government titled “Recommendations – Promoting High-Quality Tourism Development in Shanghai” is presented. This text was also subjected to a word frequency analysis by the artists. The most frequent words from this document were replaced with terms extracted from the analyzed art press releases. The resulting text, read by an AI-generated voice, merges the formal style of an administrative document with the expressive terminology of the art world. The outcome is a peculiar and often humorous fusion of two linguistic universes. The official and ideologically charged tone of the government text collides with the poetic and often exaggerated language of the art scene.
This play with language and meaning is also reflected in a series of works that the artist duo developed from the transformed text: photographs, collages, works on paper, and objects that explore the absurdly ambitious spirit of the new document.
Curated by Ronald Kiwitt
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Worklist
Image 1: Exhibition poster, Kunstraum Nürnberg
Image 2-3: Words of Art, 2025, wall painting, dimensions variable
Image 4 (back): Inspiration, 2024, mixed media on paper, 15 pieces, 42 x 29.7 cm
Image 4-5: Even Bigger, Almost Nothing, 2025, toilet paper rolls, spray paint, model figures, dimensions variable
Image 6: Words of Art, 2019/2024, digital print on colored paper, 16 pages, 29.7 x 21 cm
Image 7-10: High-Quality Painting, 2019/2024, pencil, marker, collage on paper, photographs, dimensions variable
Image 11-13: Ambition, 2019/2024, 42 Polaroid photographs
Image 14-15: Objects used for Epic Pieces, 2019/2024, various materials and model figures, dimensions variable
Image 16-18: Epic Pieces, 2019/2024, single-channel video, 1:36 min
