Huang Yuanqing
HY: They have a very close relationship. If we say culture is the soil, the art is the tree that grows from it. So culture is definitely bigger than art, but the two have a mutually beneficial relationship. Art can push culture forward, change the environment. Art is like a tree. When there is only one tree, the soil can be washed away by floods. But when there is a forest, the whole environment changes. I think this is the relationship between art and culture.
Li Xiangyang
LX: Culture is a big concept. If culture is a tree, then art may be a flower on the tree.
Liang Yue
LY: They both belong to a big context. Don’t separate the two. They are both things you need no an emotional level. Art is the offspring of culture.
DQ: Is it a pious offspring or a rebellious offspring?
LY: It’s hard to say. There are both sincerity and falsehood within it. The children of culture must include both good ones and bad ones.
Song Haidong
SH: The relationship between art and culture is really too… Just now what I said about the itch scratcher became the ruyi. Whether it is Buddhism and Taoism, whether emperors, officials or the literati, everyone would carry a ruyi in his hand.
Shi Yong
SY: It sounds reasonable. And I think it’s hard to depict. Actually, contemporary art is a catalyst of culture. Culture is like a river, or a lake. And art is like a stone that is cast into the water. If it’s good, then more people will follow suit in casting stones. If is bad, it will not have any response and just simply sink. That is the relationship. In general, culture is not a fixed concept. It is continuous, evolving and changing all the time, and it is being influenced by a lot of factors. Contemporary art is only one of those factors. We cannot say contemporary art controls culture.
Wang Nanming
WN: Art is one part of culture. And I think art is the most sensitive part in culture, because art is, up to now, the most dynamic, the most pioneering. Today’s artists, such as myself, will study law, philosophy, literature and other subjects, whereas people in other academic disciplines will not touch other subjects they have relation to.
Xu Longbao
XL: They are intertwined. Some people may think that art produces culture, that is, there are lots of small bits of art which then gradually become a kind of culture. But it is difficult to say whether the chicken comes first or the egg comes first. You can have different answers to this question during different periods.
Xiang Liqing
XL: How should I say this… Art is an organic thing, a catalyst, well I cannot really say this clearly. It makes you think about certain issues, it provides you with a direction.
Yang Fudong
YF: Just like the sweater you wear, there are an inner side and an outer side.
DQ: Is art an inner side or outer side?
YF: You better ask those who make sweaters.
Yu Xiaofu
YX: Art and culture seem to be… culture is like the uncle and art is his nephew. Art is part of culture; they take good care of each other and they rely on each other.
YX: It is an uncle. They are not the straight forward father and son type of relationship.
Yang Zhenzhong
YZ: (Laugh…) It’s too big. I think it is a question that I would consider. I just feel that it is enough for me to do my business, my artwork.
Zhang Haitian
ZH: If you look at traditional Chinese art they are all very closely related to culture, or almost the exact equivalent of culture. Children normally do not like ink paintings because they express the cultural consciousness of adults or older folks, and they lack clear images or bright colors. Without these, paintings are plain, subtle, the toy of cultural folks. So at that time, I felt that the relationship between art and culture should better not be that close, and the visual function should be strengthened. Yet, later on I discovered that it was really not possible to separate the two. When I realized this point, I probably took the initiative to move closer to culture.
