A new generation of video artists are redefining Shanghai’s contemporary art scene.

As the first generation of post-Cultural Revolution artists come to the fore in China, it is not clear what ideas and concerns are going to grip their imaginations. But a community of video artists in Shanghai have decided that what is important is the personal.

Since around the year 1000, the city has been one of the world’s leading seaports. So it should come as no surprise that a crop of artists working in this megalopolis of over 18 million have a thoughtful, non-alarmist view on the challenges of multiculturalism and the realities of large-scale economic integration.

Residents of the city, which is known for its immense markets, are exposed to nearly everything consumer culture offers, from clothes and jewelry to pirated DVDs and electronics.

But these days, Shanghai is also known for its cutting-edge arts scene, which is creating its own paradigm for the modern metropolis by emphasizing contemporary art and art institutions.

The city’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), which opened in 2005, bills itself as “the first non-profit, independently operated contemporary art institution in Shanghai.” And the 2008 Shanghai Biennale, to be held at the Shanghai Art Museum this fall, focuses on the “unprecedented scale of urban growth.”

In the face of so many macro-concerns, a determined group of Shanghai artists are emerging with an insistence on pursuing their own idiosyncratic visions. Their perspective is the personal, concentrated on what they see in the world around them and on what they perceive as their “connections” to other people, places and things.

Through the use of video, these artists have found the perfect medium to capture their ideas. The cameras they use are fairly cheap and accessible. But more importantly, they are small and can be taken anywhere without getting in the way of the action—a crucial capability when documenting the spontaneous and eclectic events and moments this group strives to capture.

FLYP asked Denis Zhu, a video curator based in Shanghai, to sit down with four video artists and talk to them about their work and the city in which they toil.

Watch an interview with Song Tao, and watch his short film, 4.7 GB: Part 3 – Four Country.

Song Tao

Finding lyricism in his environment, Tao reconstructs everyday events, like evening strolls or playing board games with friends, into films that are visually and sonically poetic. “My main concern now is the present condition in Shanghai: people my age, growing up in this environment, and their relationship to the city.”

Tao uses observation to connect himself emotionally to his environment, while making a point of not distinguishing between filming the city and filming himself.

“Maybe to people outside the city—people from places other than Shanghai—you are filming Shanghai,” he says. “But to me, I am filming myself.”

Watch an interview with Liang Yue, and watch her short film I Love Oleander.Liang Yue

Yue’s videos are intensely personal statements. One of her recent works, I Love Oleander, documents an evening spent with her friends as they eat, drink and play together.

The spontaneously moving camera—sensitive to the flows of conversation and social dynamics—records a complex social sphere that rapidly cycles through topics from real estate and sex to consumerism and alienation.

Yue began making films because she feels that video is “simple feelings, fast motion and quick. You see the results quickly. You see immediately what you just felt.”

Watch an interview with Zhou Hongxiang, and watch his short film Cornland.
Zhou Hongxiang

For Hongxiang, Shanghai is a city plugged into the wider world. “It has become a great international city. What’s more important is it gives me a sense of diversity…The city brings me culture.”

Hongxiang’s Cornland, a video triptych, presents images of him taken over an extended period of time, set against a series of pictures and words that highlight how global communication networks influence individuals.

Watch an interview with Lu Chunsheng, and watch his short film A Square which is Loaded with Nuclear Power is Going to America.Lu Chunsheng

Influenced by David Lynch, Lu Chunsheng is interested in the surreal and absurd. Perhaps paradoxically, he uses these ideas, which have been appropriated from Western art, in order to reject the equalizing, homogenizing tendencies of multiculturalism.

“I don’t really care about putting my work into an [artistic] environment. I don’t really care about melting into that world,” he says. “Just act naturally! To whatever extent you can, just do that! No matter the criticisms or compliments.”