Zane Mellupe was born in 1981, in Latvia, one of the Baltic States and now a member of the European Union. But she grew up in the Soviet Union, which occupied Latvia (1939-1991). This is important, as transformation as a process visited upon an object or person, rather than as a matter of subjective instigation, consistently figures in her art. After finishing school she studied Chinese, and eventually moved to China, where she continued her studies at the Shanghai Theatre Academy and the Shanghai Teachers University. Later she studied photography in London but China pulled her back. In recent years, she has been curator, gallerist, and creative director. But she has always been an artist.
In her first solo-exhibition in China, Mellupe presents us with photographs, found objects, sometimes combined, luminescent electrical wire sculptures, and short stories that accompany the various works. She presents herself in her family home in Latvia and settings from her adopted home in Shanghai. The stories and works read as personal histories— “As a child I believed that I used to be a dog in my previous life”—
emphasised by the use of the first-person voice. Fragmented impressions have been gathered together and almost sound sincere. But pause a moment. The exhibition is titled ‘In memory of the perfect wife’, which references a memory from a school lesson but also nothing at all, that is, the everyday of everyone and yet no one in particular. We think we know, it seems so familiar, so we profess to already understand. But do we? Perhaps we have just fallen through the mirror (the artist’s Doppelgänger will be ‘performing’ at the opening, so you might ask this ghost for her opinion).
extract of "Zane Zane" (july 2011) by Christopher Moore, art critic
click here to read the full version of Christopher Moore's article,
other texts by Alexis Kouzmine-Karavaïeff and Zane Mellupe
and more information about the exhibition.
 download press release |
