ART CITIES:Philadelphia -Cai Guo Qiang
For more than 25 years, Cai Guo-Qiang’s work spans a wide range of media, including drawing, installation, video, and performance, and drawn from Chinese traditions in medicine, art and place making. The artist is perhaps best known for his use of fireworks and gunpowder on a massive scale and the development of signature explosion events, including the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and “Sky Ladder” (2015) in his hometown of Quanzhou.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Association for Public Art (aPA) Archive
On the occasion of the centennial of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, Cai Guo-Qiang presents his new site-specific work “Fireflies”, commissioned by Association for Public Art (aPA). The work invites the public to actively experience the grand boulevard as a nocturnal dreamscape conjured from the languorous movements of bobbing clusters of glowing handcrafted Chinese lanterns and groups of customized peddle vehicles. “I hope this project is particularly meaningful, given the context of this history and the national flags that line the city’s artery”, says Cai Guo-Qiang. “I am shedding the conventions of large-scale celebrations to inject childlike playfulness and laughter into the centennial’s festivities”. For the opening ceremony Cai Guo-Qiang orchestrated a light and movement Performance, 27 customized pedi-cabs with 900 luminous colorful lanterns attached in clusters, glided along the Parkway, moving as an ensemble and sending the lanterns into swirls and bobs, creating a luminous choreography. The lanterns in “Fireflies” have been handcrafted in Cai Guo-Qiang’s hometown of Quanzhou. Their bright, twinkling lights evoke the artist’s own childhood memories. Among them are orb and star shaped lanterns, as well as designs of emojis, pandas, roosters and tigers, space aliens and UFOs, cars, trains, boats, submarines, helicopters, and rocket ships, and hamburgers, sushi, and donuts. Transported to Philadelphia, their various colors and shapes evoke the diverse cultures and peoples that come from all over the world to take root in the United States. The key participatory element of Fireflies commences is the public are that is invited to board the vehicles to take rides up and down the Parkway from Sister Cities Park to Iroquois Park near the Philadelphia Museum Art.
Info: Starting Points: Iroquois Park, 550 N 24th St, Philadelphia or Sister Cities Park, 210 N 18th St, Philadelphia, Duration: 15/9-8/10/17, Days & Hours: Thu-Sun 18:00-22:00, www.associationforpublicart.org
