Arthub Favorite: Week 115

Snowy White Dove
Hu Yinping

Duration: 2018 August 18 – October 5.
Venue: Arrow Factory, 38 Jianchang Hutong (off Guozijian Jie), Beijing

Arrow Factory is pleased to present Snowy White Dove, the sequel to Xiao Fang (2016), by Beijing-based artist Hu Yinping. In Xiao Fang, Hu conned her mother into knitting a multitude of fanciful hats on the pretense of a hat broker “friend,” Xiao Fang, who bought them at above market rates. Since then, this woolly project has continued to grow in its entanglements. Once word spread of Hu’s mother’s good fortune, the township’s ladies were also keen to participate, and the project grew. The concept expanded from a single knitter into a weaving collective of fifty of the women in Hu Yinping’s hometown. To further harness their creativity, Xiao Fang fabricated a French Bikini Competition and set up guidelines for the knitters. The ground rules stated there were no limits on color, shape, size or content. It also included a suggestion to design bikinis for respective family members. Making swimwear offered a more open format for expression and allowed those of varying skill levels to participate.

Hu has chosen eighty-five of the best bikinis to photograph, photoshop onto digital images of world-class models and present on a large LED screen. Several of the highlights also hang on the wall. This virtual catwalk of Snowy White Dove is a slideshow of the pieces selected for the French Bikini Competition. The competition has yet to take place.

Snowy White Dove and Xiao Fang are windows into a complex web of well-intentioned deception that is altering the dynamics of individual lives and the larger economy of a local township. A room in the center of town has been designated a gathering space where knitters can go for advice, to stock up on yarn and socialize. This social space has become so popular that the local mahjongg parlor has shuttered its doors. The small monitor in the center of the room shows edited footage from a security camera in the knitter’s gathering space. The ripple effect of this activity also extends out to individuals. The older matrons are finding an outlet for their creativity and being financially rewarded for their results. They regain their self-esteem and connect to a social circle. The artist, Hu Yinping is still undercover as Xiao Fang, collecting the knitted pieces as one-of-a-kind items, and as a physical record of the passage of time.

About the artist

Hu Yinping (b. 1983, Chengdu, Sichuan) earned her MFA from the Sculpture Department at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in 2010. She channels chance meetings and fortuitous situations into insightful scenarios. Her work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at Arrow Factory (2016) and Mocube (2016), and was included in group exhibitions such as “Unlived by What is Seen” at PACE Gallery (2014) and the Kommunale Galerie in Berlin (2017). She is a founding member of the “@PARTY” collective (2012). Hu lives and works in Beijing.