Portfolio Review: Invisible Artist Liu Bolin Shares the Stories Behind "Hiding in the City"

Beijing-based artist Liu Bolin's work explores the relationship between the grand scale of cultural development and the place of a single individual within it. Best known for his Hiding in the City series, he has been named the "Invisible Artist" after creating a project where he has disappeared into over 100 locations in New York, California, France, Italy, Germany, Sweden, and Russia.

As he explains in his recent TED Talk, Hiding in the City began as performance art protesting the 2005 destruction of Suo Jia Village by the Chinese government. The largest congregation of artists in Asia, Suo Jia Village was Liu Bolin's workplace and home at the time of its destruction. In Hiding in the City No. 1 Liu Bolin camouflaged himself into the ruins of his destroyed studio space.

Hiding in the City, in addition to his work in other mediums, comments on human beings' relationship to their environments (socially, culturally, ecologically, and politically). His works show how broader cultural development has been redefining the role of individuals in ways we need to examine and change before it's too late.

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Portfolio Review: Invisible Artist Liu Bolin Shares the Stories Behind His Work

All images courtesy Eli Klein Fine Art, © Liu Bolin

"This sculpture is typical of my style during my time spent at Suo Jia Village. The sculpture is now located in Beijing's 798 district."

(Iron. 94 1/2 x 86 5/8 x 63 inches/240 x 220 x 160 cm)

"Every person living in modern China has a similar feeling—it's a feeling of constant change. We share a common joy, but perhaps not knowing oneself is the greatest happiness. We are accustomed to being blindfolded, and to blindfolding others. Red is our eternal theme."

(Fiberglass. 47 1/4 x 11 7/8 x 7 7/8 inches/120 x 30 x 20 cm)

"From 1998 to 2000, over 21 million workers in China were laid off, including the six people in this photograph from the 706 factory. The slogan above their heads reads 'The Communist Party of China is the core driving force behind the leadership of our cause,' and it had motivated them to work with great passion while employed in the factory. China's recent economization marginalized these people; they are slowly eliminated, replaced, or laid off. This left the aging former workers living hand-to-mouth and facing the cancellation of their medical benefits."

(Photograph)

"When I created this piece, it was impossible to lie down on a real street; I selected a newly constructed road that had not been used yet. I painted traffic signs on the road, and before I was finished, the construction worker came to stop me saying, 'This is not OK! You cannot paint here, you cannot paint an arrow here, what if cars come and accidents start to happen?' At the time, I wasn't done painting yet so I said, 'I promise you that I will clean all this up, but I have to finish this work first.' Impressed by my insistence, he respected me and allowed me to finish my shoot. One or two hours afterward, when I finished all of my work, they helped me clean up the paint."

(Photograph)

"In this series, I chose 10 significant photographs from official Chinese newspapers and represented them as oil paintings. I feel that these photographs capture the media's portrayal of China in 2007. This painting depicts the images used by the media with a story on a seven-day military drill held by the Red Army division of Jinan Military Region. During the drill, a new battle tank was being fired, and defects of the Red Army were exposed."

(Oil on canvas. 57 1/8 x 78 3/4 inches/145 x 200 cm)

"This first Supermarket photograph incorporates an assortment of instant noodles. At the time I had just learned that instant noodles contain a lot of preservatives so they can be stored at room temperature. Since then, I stopped eating pre-prepared food. Now when I go to the grocery store, I don't know what to fill my stomach with. I have a phobia of supermarket foods."

(Photograph)

"At first, the dragon represented aggression and dominance. Over time, the dragon became the symbol of China. Every emperor has presented himself as the son of the dragon, sent from heaven to rule his people. Nowadays, no one asks about the story of the dragon. Chinese people live in and for the present, but still consider themselves to be descendants of the dragon. Does this mean we are descendants of aggression and dominance?"

(Photograph in nine panels)

"As China's economy has developed, issues surrounding the mining for coal have increased. For example, many coal mines operate illegally, and many are in production without the proper safety equipment which causes numerous accidents each year. Miners make very low salaries and are often killed in the mines. The respect for people's lives is overshadowed by the desire to make money. "

(Photograph)

"This is in Venice, Italy. It is said that Venice will disappear in a few decades due to rising sea levels caused by global warming."

(Photograph)

"This particular spot on the Yellow River is my birthplace and holds many childhood memories. The Yellow River has become heavily polluted since I was a child, and it can no longer provide drinking water for the people."

(Photograph)

"I photographed this work in the fall of 2011 outside of a construction site in Beijing's Chaoyang District. In Beijing there are many construction sites where the outer walls are printed with bright, colorful images to hide the disorder within. This type of decoration is cheap to produce and usually depicts a prosperous China, an image of Tiananmen Square, or fireworks celebrating our great nation. This one also shows three young, gun-toting girls dressed as Chinese servicemen during a military parade. This work is about how, compared to 20 years ago, we may now live in a seemingly more colorful and abundant world, but many elements behind the scenes have become increasingly chaotic."

(Photograph)

"I like to think about how fashion and propaganda influence various cultures of human communities. In this photograph, all the magazines were purchased in New York in June 2011. The covers and people in the news at that time created history, and are created by history."

(Photograph)

"In traditional Chinese culture, the peony symbolizes wealth, good fortune, and prosperity. Conversely, in this work, I have eliminated the wealth and good fortune that the peony represents and given this symbol a negative connotation. For me, the flower now symbolizes our materialistic obsessions and our inability to exhibit self-control."

(Stainless steel, mobile phone charger cables. 126 x 63 x 11 7/8 inches/320 x 160 x 30 cm)

"For this photograph, I purchased toys of well-known American cartoon characters in New York City. All of these toys are Made in China. This photograph subtly references American outsourcing."

(Photograph)

"In the Mask series, I appropriate the packaging of soft drinks and junk food commonly found in Chinese supermarkets to create traditional Peking opera masks. My phobia of pre-packaged food gave me the inspiration to portray these tempting, colorful, and detrimental products onto a face mask. In an attempt to emphasize my internal conflicts and struggles, I combined the contradictory elements of damaging food products with a protective welding mask."

Acrylic on glass, plastic, and vulcanized fibre. 15 3/4 x 9 7/8 x 5 7/8 inches (40 x 25 x 15 cm)

"I was inspired by thoughts about how the concept of Chinese red fit into my life. I wanted to see who could burn to the point of turning red, proving their immortality. I'm using this sculpture to show that Chinese people were burnt out under the state's political control."

Bronze and pyrotechnics. 63 x 20 7/8 x 17 3/8 inches/160 x 53 x 44 cm)

"These photographic works are able to freeze the moment when everything comes together: the surface of a man-made asphalt road, the rainfall, the outline left behind from my body, as well as the gradually emerging upside-down reflection of the distant buildings and street lamps on the watery surface. The reversed reflections that emerge on the surface reflect my attitude: inversion is a negation and suggests a questioning attitude. Resistance and criticism against the artificial are possible."

(Photograph)