Guan Wei / 关伟

Chinese born 关伟 / Guan Wei migrated to Australia in 1989. His internationally significant practice spans more than 30 years, drawing on his personal experience of Chinese and Australian culture, as well as an informed socio-political awareness and knowledge of art history. Across painting, sculpture and installation, his work conveys stories of loss, migration, identity, and notions of boundaries and place, interweaving an understanding of tradition and the past in the face of overwhelming global change. (1)

A prolific maker and the recipient of numerous awards, the Arthur Guy Memorial Painting Prize (2015), the Sulman Prize (2002) and the Clemenger Contemporary Art Award (2009), to name but a few, Guan is represented by ARC ONE Gallery and Martin Browne Contemporary.

In the virtual space for Silent Dialogue / 沉默的对话, Guan presents Plastic surgery – A portrait of an immigrant artist / 整容术 -- 一个移民艺术家的肖像， 2015 (Plastic surgery / 整容术 2015), his monumental self-portrait first shown and short-listed as a finalist for the Archibald Prize in 2016.

Speaking of the artwork, Guan said:

Plastic Surgery 2015 is related to my experiences as an immigrant artist. It consists of four canvases.

The first canvas depicts memories of my mother country – home. My self-portrait is featured on the cover of a huge personnel file. The government keeps a secret file on every individual in China, which includes all aspects of your life.

The second and third canvases reflect my life after arriving in Australia and illustrate my attempts at fitting into this new, strange land. There are diagrams featuring my DNA and blood type along with a chart of Westerners’ features.

The fourth canvas represents confirmation of my new identity. It includes immigration form #887, a certificate of Australian citizenship, bank account details, passport – all the documents necessary to prove a new identity. The name change on the business card from “Guan Wei” to “David Guan” illustrates the pressure to adapt. Naturally all immigrants desire acceptance and recognition, to become just another Australian.  

Plastic surgery 2015 was executed from my imagination fusing reality, experience and memory. Receiving “plastic surgery” myself in a humorous way represents a change in my identity from Chinese to Australian. In doing so I have faced the challenges all immigrants sooner or later must face and deal with. From these challenges is honed a new perspective of self-existence, surroundings, and time. 

Alongside this, Guan presents a new video work. Introducing a sense of movement and engagement with the body, The Metamorphosis / 变形记 (2020) continues the artist’s search into the themes of self-identity and related ideas of transformation, re-birth and belonging.

From 13-16 January 2022, The Metamorphosis / 变形记 2020 will be presented at Missing Persons art space, alongside works by fellow artists 傅红 / Fu Hong, 欧阳昱 / Ouyang Yu and Echo Cai / 子轩. Check out our Exhibition Program below.

ET—1) In their essay for the Silent Dialogue / 沉默的对话 book, entitled ‘We Need New Names’, writer Jinghua Qian reflects briefly on Guan’s work:

Guan Wei’s work Plastic surgery – a portrait of an immigrant artist (2015) plays with assimilation, loss, and transformation in both somatic and bureaucratic dimensions. Referencing the imagery of identity documents and biometric data, the four canvasses explore a one-way trajectory from a Chinese face to a white one, from ‘Guan Wei’ to ‘David Guan’. As the artist has said, the name change ‘illustrates the pressure to adapt’.

Picking up on Qian's point, the artwork can be read from left to right, and this interpretation certainly conveys the sense of there being a 'one-way trajectory'. However, perhaps one might also look the other way? Or, indeed, look both ways; in search of a hybrid representation of cultural identity.

Hung a few centimetres apart, as Guan describes in his statement above, each canvas conveys a different part of his migration story. The distance between each canvas is key. It gives a sense of time passing, of movement from one stage of life to another, a feeling of disconnection between these different, embodied stages of being. At the same time, a connective narrative can be found through colour.

Uniform but tonally graded to distinguish between the panels, the background colour of the composition implies a connection. It invites the viewer to see the faces collectively, coalescing the individual 'selves' into a multivalent, collective identity. The viewer then begins to notice other connections in features. The scale, shape and placement of the faces mirrored across the canvases. 

The comparatively brighter colours and the paraphernalia of Australian life and citizenship draw the eye from the left to the final canvas on the right, following a conventional Western way of reading. However, vertical and horizontal gridded line-forms intersect the third and second panels (from right to left), which simultaneously draws the eye back the other way.

As one continues to look, an association between the rectilinear shape of the gridded forms and the frame surrounding the face in the first panel emerges - a traditional Chinese frame, a symbol of cultural heritage. It is only momentary, but it's enough to elicit attention and then invite a comparison between the first and final canvases, which are made connective by their shared omission of the gridded forms. 

The canvases are culturally different; the Chinese characters and English words underscore this. But, even in differences, there are connections to be found across cultures. Some Chinese characters are presented vertically, whereas the English words are presented horizontally. The awareness of this convention reveals stylistic connections, such as placement of the Chinese characters in place of the red dots in the final canvas.

As with most preconceptions of culture, in both canvases, there are examples of divergences from the predominant way of presenting and understanding language. In the upper left of the first canvas, the Chinese characters appear horizontally. In the middle of the final canvas, the ABN, identify number and the word "Medicare" presents vertically.

Both decisions go against conventions; they encourage the viewer to question their understanding of culturally biased ways of looking. The purposeful placement of text also brings a sense of balance to the composition, which is difficult to explain but is nonetheless palpable. This search for balance and synthesis is also expressed through the literal meanings of the textual narrative. 

"奖" (award) in the upper left of the first panel signifies the awarding of Guan's Chinese identity papers. In contradiction, the blue text at the base "作废 201" (void) simultaneously voids them, and this presents a tension; are Guan's identity papers being awarded or voided? Elsewhere on the canvas, a reader of Chinese might notice the characters "注销", meaning to destroy, in the context of documents or papers.

注销 is repeated four times above and below "奖" (award), enclosed in a traditional Chinese frame, signifying the official nature of the script. The literal translation and repetition allude to an insistent or dominant narrative. China does not recognise dual citizenship, and thus in becoming an Australian, Guan forfeits his Chinese citizenship papers.

In this subtle confrontation of opposites, Plastic surgery 2015 questions the dominant reality. The use of the character 奖 reveals deeper feelings. Whilst generally understood to mean 'to award', it can also mean a "financial reward bounty" for someone wanted by the government. Thus, perhaps in forfeiting his citizenship but not his heritage or desire to return his motherland, Guan remains the subject of government surveillance.

Whilst one can spend time with each canvas, uncovering the layers of a complex, lived experience, by looking at the sum of the painting's parts, there is a deeper sense of connection, transformation, and balance to be found. Here, we find a space for thinking about Guan's Chinese identity in conjunction with his evolving Chinese-Australian identity, which can be understood not in terms of left to right ('Australian') or right to left (Chinese), but both.

In a review of the artwork, the art historian Joanna Mendelssohn situated the work in Guan's adherence to the principles of Feng Shui, a traditional practice of ancient China that uses energy forces to harmonise individuals with their surrounding environment. She wrote: 

Guan's art suggests it is far better for those moving between cultures to adopt another path – to find harmonious connections, to seek humorous twists in even difficult circumstances – and be guided always - by the equilibrium of feng shui.

There is no doubting that humour is at the foundation of the work's effectiveness. Featuring biometric data and imagery, the second and third canvases depicting Guan's transformation lighten the mood. Whilst the viewer might appreciate this sense of humour regardless of linguistic competency, if one reads Chinese, a deeper understanding of the function of humour can be found in the gentle mocking of Westerner's features, namely:
勾鼻: hook nose
薄唇: thin lips 
露齿: toothy

It is through humour that the otherwise confronting notion of changing oneself, one's very appearance, to belong to Australian society, is made approachable. In the context of the reality faced by the migrant artist, his loss of Chinese citizenship in place of his becoming Chinese-Australian, the gentle mocking is key. It is a gesture that balances the sense of loyalty and tolerance at the heart of the narrative. It makes this a work for people from different cultures to enjoy and learn from, regardless of citizenship and migration trajectory.

Thus, returning to Qian's commentary, whilst the work reflects on the sense of loss that comes from the transformation of the self into a new society (and the feeling of no longer fully belonging in the country of one's birth), it also seeks to present the oppositional viewpoint; what can be gained, as explored through the mode of humour, but also the strength and endurance of the immigrant artist in a tolerant society.

Guan, would you comment a little on this interpretation; in particular, the centrality of humour and the situation of your work within the mode of Feng Shui and broader Chinese philosophical thought?

ET—2) Guan, one of the interesting things about this work, which is perhaps lesser commented upon but enormously powerful, is the way it addresses the sense of movement in the migration experience - the understanding that over time migration stories change with the individual.

As the Phillipine-Australian writer and academic Dr Merlinda Bobis explained: 

“Migration story cannot be fixed. It moves with time…The storyteller changes. Their worldview changes. The very style of the story changes all the time…We’re in fact migrating as we are telling a migration story. The very act of telling is an act of migration”.

I think your quote from the 2003 Meanjin interview above conveys this reality. This point is so vital as it can offer a way of building a greater sense of empathy and understanding for one another. But often, it is under-explored in the conversations around migration.

One small detail I noticed in the third canvas of your transformation was the blue stamp. The stamp reads: “东南西北中”. Meaning East, South, West, etc., it conveyed a sense of moving in all directions, of belonging nowhere perhaps. It’s a small detail in a much larger picture, but I wondered if you would also comment on this?

ET—3) Guan, your new AV work The Metamorphosis / 变形记 2020 delves further into the sense of movement and transformation at the heart of the migration experience. The work draws its inspiration from Plastic surgery 2015, incorporating an original sound score to animate the original painting.

The work starts with the sound of a man breathing and a composite image that presents one half of your face from the first panel of the original painting, alongside another half of your face from the final panel - your Chinese identity alongside the Western representation of your ‘Australian’ identity. 

The work shifts momentarily to an animated image of your present-day portrait, and the music begins. The portrait dissolves. The music continues as the work begins to cycle through the stages of transformation, zeroing in on the details of each of the painting’s canvases in succession from left to right.  

The moving images invite the viewer to notice details; the official stamps, the border surrounding the first portrait, the Chinese characters, etc. Dissolving in and out of the picture, we notice the differences and continuities between the canvases - shape and size of the faces, the blinking eyes, hair. Combined with the music and sound of breath, these associations cultivate a sense of synthesis and harmony. 

There is a slight change in the musical score in the final panel, as the viewer zeros in on the paraphernalia of Australian citizenship before returning to the sound of breath, which marks the return of your contemporary portrait. 

Although the work cycles through from the left to the right of the painting, from what might be described as an East to West trajectory, the work continues on repeat. For me, this repetition conveys a sense of the transformation process being ongoing, a continuous synthesis of parts, rather than one replacing another. 

I love the way the work animates the process of thinking about the human experience at the heart of this transformation. The sound of the breath is powerful in conveying this sense. Regardless of our cultural identity and where we are in the transformation process of life’s journey, that breath is a reminder of our collective humanity. 

Would you reflect a little on this for us?

ET—4) Guan, in the context of COVID-19, Plastic surgery 2015  feels enormously relevant to our times. 

In an earlier interview with Ouyang Yu for Meanjin, you touched on whether there is a universal ‘Chinese’ identity. In response to the question: Do you think there is such a thing as universal Chinese culture, or are the differences between the mainland, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong and other parts of the Chinese-speaking world too great for that? You said:

From my personal experience, once a culture goes to another place, whether it is a new place or a remote place or some other place, it will certainly undergo some change and change its taste. Take a simple example with the language. Even when they all speak Chinese, the accent will vary from region to region, like my daughter now, who speaks Chinese with an Australian accent. This is obvious of the region’s influence, which is great. And, it is only in this way that is interesting as the Chinese culture originated in the North Shaanxi yellow earth plateau and then spread to the whole world, evolving into various kinds of Chinese culture, different but of the same culture, in a number of groups but more multifaceted, more varied and interesting. Our generation has gone through several decades of revolution, so for us everything, fortunate or unfortunate, is combined and whatever we do has many layers. So these things Chinese have regional influences, as well as the personal and the influences of the times as a result of the great changes. And so they can’t be completely the same and there is nothing (Chinese) that can apply as a universal thing. 

In our particular age, I think your response is illuminating and important. It feels like an apt extension of Plastic surgery 2015, although the interview predates the painting, of course – having been published in Meanjin in 2003. 

Why do you think this gap in understanding of Chinese cultural identity continues to prevail and what role (if any) do you think art has to play in cultivating greater understanding?

ET—5) Another question you explored in the 2003 Meanjin interview was around what you see as the main characteristics of ‘Australian’ culture. At the time, you said:

It is hard to say at the moment that there is an ‘Australian’ culture because, after all [contemporary] ‘Australia’ [as opposed to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australia] is a very young country. From the artists I have come into contact with, Australia is now searching for what is the Australian spirit or culture. Possibly I think, in several decades time or in a hundred years, we may have a clearer view of what this culture is, and this multiculturalism of Australia may come into fruition and evolve into a unique Australian culture.

Have your sentiments changed with regards to this? Where do you see us now sitting with regards to Australia’s development of its art and culture?