Artists Xiangjing and Qu Guangci, Liu Jing and Kang Xiaoliang, on view at “Migratory Birds 300”, Aranya Theater Festival 2023

2023-06

June 15th sees the opening of the Aranya Theater Festival 2023 with the new theme, “howls and whispers” at Aranya community, Qinhuangdao, Hebei Province.

The whole agenda in fact kicked off slightly earlier, with “Migratory Birds 300”, the major art program of the festival and on view starting from June 12th. While attending this large-scale public art event, a visitor will see 131 groups of artworks and 194 theater shows by 300 artists from all over the world. These works vary in many forms from video to installation, animation, performance art, and theater; they were the result produced by 300 authors who had departed from their own daily life, migrated to the camp like birds, and shared a living for 300 hours at the art residency camp.

Next to the “Migratory Birds 300” camp, where one side of the sand labyrinth of Ma Yansong’s design met the sea, rises the work, Liu Jing and Kang Xiaoliang, by artists Xiang Jing and Qu Guangci. Invited to be on exhibition at the Festival, this 2004 sculpture set depicting the young faces of two ordinary Chinese folks, after nearly 20 years, stands at the seaside before a crowd of youth who grew under another time of rapid changes – yet, it still intrigues some new inspiration of the minds, and shares a moment of witnessing at this art spectacle happening in front of us all.