Francis Alÿs: La dépense

This is the first large-scale solo exhibition in China by the Belgian artist Francis Alÿs, curated by Yuko Hasegawa.

For the occasion, the artist presents about 1300 works, including videos, paintings, drawings, sketches and installations, some of which have never been shown to the public before. As the curator Yuko Hasegawa notes: “In a China transformed by a fast-paced transition to capitalism and the efficiencies of technology, excessively ‘non-productive consumption’ (dépense improductive) is just as important in human activity as productive consumption.” Such a notion is tightly wound into Alÿs’ artistic practice, which Hasegawa commends for “courageously grappling with the status quo; casting doubts on our visual sense; rethinking the meaning of the labor of manual work and what it means to consume time: these are among the subtle messages from Alÿs’ work that can be applied to the situation in China.”