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2018-2019 Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year” award ceremony held in ShanghaiYoung Artists of the Year Awards Announced

• 2018-2019 Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year” the four award-winning artists were officially announced on 7 November;

• Young artists in this year's YAOY show their individual style of expressiveness, creativity, and constructive and critical innovations, indicating their bright future;

• Art should be the foremost force of social progress, therefore Porsche China and ART021 practice a strong commitment to cultivating young Chinese art talents.

Shanghai/Stuttgart. On 7 November, the 2018-2019 Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year” award ceremony ushered in the most important moment of the year – the big reveal of the four award-winning artists at the Shanghai Exhibition Centre. The four young artists, Chen Baoyang, Liu Wa, Liu Xinyi and Miao Ying, were crowned the winners of this year's programme, owing to their individual style of expressiveness, creativity, and constructive and critical innovations.

The 2018-2019 Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year” Award Ceremony was held under the auspices of distinguished guests. Dr. -Ing. Jens Puttfarcken, President and CEO of Porsche China, Ms. Jojo Tang, Vice President Public Relations and Press of Porsche China; Ms. Kylie Ying, Co-founder of the ART021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair; Ms. Zhou Ying, Art director of the ART021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair; Professor Qiu Zhijie, Dean of the School of Experimental Art of the Central Academy of Fine Arts; Ms. Yu Miao, art historian and critic; artist Liu Jianhua; Dr. Yeewan Koon, the chair and associate professor of the Fine Arts Department, University of Hong Kong; artist Xu Zhen, and experts from cooperative art institutes were present at the ceremony. In addition, young actress Miss Li Meng also attended the conference as an advocate and supporter of youth art projects and presented awards to the winners together with Dr. -Ing. Jens Puttfarcken.

Dr. -Ing. Jens Puttfarcken offered his congratulations to the award-winning artists: "Congratulations to these four talented young artists, their artistic creations in this selection and their reflection on a series of social issues were truly enlightening. These young artists represent the youthful artistic power of contemporary China and even the world. I look forward to seeing more young artists stand out in the Porsche ‘Young Chinese Artist of the Year’ and express their energetic talents on a broader stage in the future.”

Ms. Kylie Ying also expressed her wonderment at the artistic talent demonstrated by the nominated artists: “In this year's selection, the nominated young artists showcased the extraordinary imagination of interdisciplinary artistic thinking, the breakthrough of cross-disciplinary art application and creativity in cross-material art practice, which filled us with hope for the future of art, and especially for our expectations of young Chinese artists.”

The young artists’ work showed a great deal of diversity
The four award-winning artists have interpreted the popular topical issues through different forms of artworks such as moving images and installations. They also responded to the group theme of this year's exhibition “What Is it that makes today's LIFE so different?”, showing their in-depth thinking and judgements on society.

Chen Baoyang is an artist who works at the intersection of art and technology. He often hacks the technology he utilises by altering its default application, to further fulfil his artistic vision. His work “Baoberg TM” examines the boundary between us, machines, and beyond, in-between perceptual and embodied space.

Liu Wa is an artist who explores the interdependence between mentality and physicality through interactive installation, performance and painting. In her “Racing Thoughts”, she analyses and visualises her emotional changes through a brainwave headset (electroencephalogram) during her aimless Internet surfing. Simultaneously, her hand-drawn animations interact with the screencast of her computer, blending imagination with reality.

Liu Xinyi works on various medium including installation, moving and still image and context-specific project. His artwork “Guerrilla Squad” is about the long and intriguing relationship between ingredients, spices and space power.

Miao Ying’s works run the gamut of artistic media: installation, oil painting, video, VR and AI. Her most recent solo exhibitions include: "Hardcore Digital Detox", M+ Museum; “Miao Ying：Chinternet Plus”, New Museum. "The formalized abridgment of the supposed sub-stratum of the rational truth” highlights the attempt to discuss mainstream technology and contemporary consciousness and its impact on our daily lives, along with new modes of politics, aesthetics and consciousness created during the representation of reality via technology.

Art shoulders the pioneering responsibility to boost society
Art is an important force driving social development, which is an important reason why Porsche China has been committed to undertaking corporate social responsibility projects with a focus on art in recent years. Ms. Zhou Ying, Art director of the ART021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair, and curator of the Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year” nominees’ exhibition, emphasised the importance of art to social change: "In the past 100 years, the changes that have taken place in the world are undoubtedly the fastest, biggest and most thrilling changes in human history. And in terms of art, I believe that art should take the lead and frontier responsibility."

The winner announcement does not mean the end of the 2018-2019 Porsche “Young Chinese Artist of the Year”. After six months of preparation, conception and creation, the four award-winning artists will present their new artistic works at a special exhibition session of 2020 JINGART in Beijing.

11/7/2019

Further information and pictures for journalists and media representatives can be found on the Porsche press database at http://presse.porsche.de/.