City Dreams 1
Gao Xiaowu
高孝午
Production date
2006
Object Detail
Media
fibreglass, stainless steel
Measurements
264 x 77 x 132 cm
Notes
Influenced by the Colombian sculptor Fernando Botero, to whose work Gao Xiaowu and his classmates at the Central Academy of Fine Arts were introduced by their teacher, Sui Jianguo, the rotund figures in the City Dreams series contrast ideas of flight and weightlessness with their corpulent, earthbound bodies. Balloon-like, they appear to float, with arms and legs thrust upwards, yet their tiny wings would clearly be incapable of bearing their weight. Gao says, ‘It’s precisely because of their city dreams that they cannot fly.’ As a simple country person, he says, coming first to Xiamen and then to Beijing exposed him to the very different values and social expectations of the city, and to a newly aspirational and materialist consumer culture. People’s desires are continually expanding and inflating, which ironically prevents them from achieving happiness as they want more and more. This work, says Gao, reflects his own responses to a society that encourages such insatiable desire.
Accession number
2006.009