NARRATOR:
Let’s take a look at this red chair. Something about the way it is presented makes it seem ceremonial. When artist Gu Dexin displayed it for the first time, he actually filled the chair with fat extracted from a pig’s internal organs, which will decay over time.
HOU HANRU:
This chair can be understood as a straightforward expression of the worship of power and money. It’s also about the pursuit of noble status, explaining the presence of the red carpet on the floor.
NARRATOR:
Art critic and curator Hou Hanru is a close friend of artist Gu Dexin. The two of them have worked together for years. Here, Hou Hanru shares with us that the meat in this work is a symbol of the shifting states of life. Meat is no less a product consumable by humans than it is a medium of decay. From birth to death, it embodies a fate that no one can escape.
HOU HANRU:
People have always wanted to see the fanciest, grandest narrative of what life is about, and to believe that eternity exists. But that’s just a dream or an illusion. What the artist was trying to do was to shed this illusion, shatter the false reality, and reveal the truth to the audience. Going from hope to decay in life—that’s the kind of transition the artist had experienced himself.