Li Tianbing

Li Tianbing explores fiction and reality haunted by selected childhood memories in a suffocating society and charged political setting. Using photographs as a medium to illustrate his reflections on the past and his multicultural experiences, Li layers the present using oil painting in a timeless duality. Reflections on loneliness are addressed in a symbolic fashion across Li’s art, suffering instilled by the single child policy. This state of confusion engulfs the artist and he loses the frontier between his own authenticity and invention. The interpretation of his work incorporates personal identity and drama in a tale with the infiltration of multicultural factors. His composition interweaves the contrasting themes of China today: East and West, communism and capitalism, ancient culture and modern consumerism.

Born in Guilin, China in 1974, Li Tianbing studied at the Institute of International Relations in Beijing before graduating in 2002 from the Ecole Supérieure Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His solo exhibitions include: L&M Arts Gallery, New York; Galerie Albert Benamou, Paris; Galerie Loft, Beitou; Kashya Hildebrand Gallery, Zurich; Galerie Deborah Zafman, Paris. A selection of group exhibitions include: Today Art Museum, Beijing; Museum of Contemporary Art, Shanghai; National Museum of Fine Arts, Beijing, China and Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno, Spain. The artist lives and works in both Beijing and Paris, France.