“Using gunpowder as a medium became a way to liberate myself.”
A modern day Old Master who paints with gunpowder
Cai Guo-Qiang is a living icon, an Old Master of our time. His pioneering firework events and explosion paintings have brought Cai (and gunpowder) to the summit of the contemporary art world. Cai first experimented with explosives in the 1980s as a young Chinese artist living in Japan. He merged his skill as a painter with the lawless mark of explosion by firing rockets at his canvases and lighting gunpowder from underneath them – a technique he still uses today. Invented in China by ancient alchemists, gunpowder is a symbol of both celebration and destruction. It's an integral part of traditi...
Cai Guo-Qiang is a living icon, an Old Master of our time. His pioneering firework events and explosion paintings have brought Cai (and gunpowder) to the summit of the contemporary art world. Cai first experimented with explosives in the 1980s as a young Chinese artist living in Japan. He merged his skill as a painter with the lawless mark of explosion by firing rockets at his canvases and lighting gunpowder from underneath them – a technique he still uses today. Invented in China by ancient alchemists, gunpowder is a symbol of both celebration and destruction. It's an integral part of traditions in Chinese celebration but also evokes the violence of The Cultural Revolution that Cai grew up in. Beyond history, Cai has a spiritual connection to gunpowder: "I do get somewhat nervous, but in the moment of ignition, it seems to go beyond nerves, becoming an energy that is sudden, spiritual and also cosmic. A feeling of the invisible world is sparked within that instant."
Over the decades, Cai's rise to international fame has seen him work with many different organisations, from countless public museums and universities to the global streaming giant Netflix. Cai has no unworthy audience: the passer-by, the multi-millionaire collector and the Netflix subscriber are all equally valued. In 2008, this approach led to criticism of his collaboration with the Chinese government on the Olympic Ceremony. Some critics felt it diluted the political aspects of his work. But for Cai, working "from the inside" is his politics. It's about finding ways to reach diverse audiences to transcend the systems of power that art exists within – much like his explosions transcend into a spiritual world. Genuinely boundary-breaking, Cai's work masterfully nurtures contradictions that not only coexist, but actively fuel one another – opening that gap to make an invisible world seen.
Bio
Cai Guo-Qiang was born in 1957 in Quanzhou, China, and has been based in New York since 1995.Career
The artist's expansive practice is the subject of Netflix documentary Sky Ladder: The Art of Cai Guo-Qiang, released in 2016, and in 2007 he sold an artwork for $9.3 million USD at Christie's, Hong Kong.
Did you know?
With the whole world watching, Cai was the Director of Visual and Special Effects for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics in 2008.