This place was a factory before it turned into the artsy part of Beijing, where there are more places to drink coffee than tea (who’d have thought??). It’s full of galleries displaying art for all tastes, as well as weird and wonderful stuff just on the street.
An alley:
Getting cuddles from a gorilla-type thing
:
A giant transformer – made out of car parts:
Geoff and Arlo with a giant plant pot:
The Great Wall:
Read into this what you will…:
Sludge in the pipes:
A train wreck. Actually, this is part of Hope Tunnel, description as follows:
“Every so often there comes an event that rattles our faith, shatters what we have built and shakes us to our very foundations. The 2008 Sichuan earthquake was one such tragedy. No one who witnessed the terrible destruction and loss of life will ever forget it.
Yet in the aftermath of tragedy there is hope, a reminder of what people working together can achieve. Zhang Huan’s Hope Tunnel, a curated social project at UCCA, was conceived and designed by an artist who believes that art has the power not just to move us emotionally, but to galvanize us into positive action.
When we behold the train that Zhang Huan purchased, refurbished and installed here, we may find ourselves dwarfed by the scale of the wreckage, dismayed by the destructive force of nature and daunted by the challenges that lie ahead. Perhaps we should feel humbled by the shadow of that awesome bulk, but as the title reminds us, while we may be small, we are not powerless. Through remembrance, reflection and concerted action, each one of us has the power to help and to hope.”
-Jerome Sans, UCCA Director
On a lighter note, my favourite piece of art here – a yarn tree!!
Oh wow!! You’ve been there! This is one of the places I would most like to visit in China 🙂
(note how deteriorated is my English after perusal of information boards as photgraphed for my pleasure above)