The Dim Sum Club

Dear CAFAM members,

Here is an event you may like to come to:

The Dim Sum Club

Curated Conversations On Chinese Contemporary Life

Join us on Chinese National Day for the launch of The Dim Sum Club, a bi-monthly curated speaker series about life in modern China. Organized by Fox Intercultural Consulting in collaboration with Portland’s grooviest new Chinese restaurant, Empire, this lunch series features distinguished speakers on a diverse range of topics, in an intimate group over tea and dim sum.

Launch Event: Tuesday, October 1, 12:00pm-1:30pm

The Emergence of the Chinese Avant-Garde With Guest Speaker, Valerie C. Doran

In celebration of the work we are doing with Maine College of Art in building relationships with the China Academy of Art (Hangzhou) and the Academy of Visual Arts (Hong Kong), our first event focuses on Chinese contemporary art. Since the mid-1990s, the phenomenal rise on the international arts scene of mainland Chinese contemporary artists such as Gu Wenda, Wang Guangyi, Xu Bing and Zhang Huan, among others, has been exemplified in the major exhibitions, museum collections, books and auctions in which their work has appeared.

What has perhaps been less available to a general audience, however, is a fuller understanding of the complex cultural and historical contexts from which these artists emerged. In this general overview, Valerie C. Doran focuses on the seminal period of the 1980s and early 1990s and presents a discussion of the art of the Chinese avant-garde as a re-examination of, response to and deconstruction not only of the experiences and memories of the Cultural Revolution, but of aesthetic and philosophical issues with roots in the pre-revolution period and beyond. This is an excellent opportunity for those with an understanding of Chinese art and those entirely new to it—to gain a useful grounding of context with which to understand the Chinese art of today.

When: 12:00-1:30pm

Where: Empire, 575 Congress St, Portland, ME 04101

Cost: $25 includes dim sum, tea, and conversation

Limited Spaces available: To reserve your place, please email Clare Morin at clare@foxintercultural.net or call (207) 233 8612; http://www.foxintercultural.net

Best,
Alex