Newman Huo

    A BLOCK of volcanic stone from Iceland, and a volcanic rock from Hainan Island in China. Halldor Asgeirsson, a 54-year-old artist from Iceland, welded the two pieces together to make “Melting Two Lava Stones From Iceland and China Into One.”

    Asgeirsson’s work, placed on a round table with a piece of red cloth, is now being displayed at the Big Tree Foot exhibition at the J&Z Gallery at OCT-Loft, Nanshan District through Nov. 19.

    The exhibition features pieces by a group of four international artists who have participated in this year’s OCT Contemporary Art Terminal (OCAT) International Residency Program.

    Besides Asgeirsson, the other three artists are Grant Stevens from Australia, Keren Shavit from Israel, and Luo Yongjin from Shanghai.

    Born in Iceland in 1956, Asgeirsson has been exhibiting his art around the world over the past 30 years.

    He has worked mainly with four elements: earth, water, air and fire, which he expresses through different media, such as paintings, films, poetry and performances.

    In 1992, Asgeirsson began to weld volcanic stone after discovering what effects the welding process could produce by applying a 2,000-degree welding torch to solidified lava.

    When he came to Shenzhen in August this year, he brought one block of the stone from his home country. After a visit to Hainan Island at the beginning of September, he brought back a volcanic stone he found near the city of Haikou.

    “Art and culture are common expressions of human beings no matter where they come from,” he said. “Culture is based on the dialogue between the humankind and nature, unified in the same world,” he said.

    Stevens, from Australia, received his Ph.D. in fine art from the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane in 2007. His work has been exhibited in many solo and group shows around the world.

    His art is primarily based on video, through which he often animates texts, images and sounds to explore the “languages” of popular culture.

    As a resident artist in Shenzhen, Stevens is interested in how various aspects of youth culture intermix with traditional Chinese values and attitudes.

    He has developed a new video which explores the uneasy translation of some well-known philosophical sayings from Confucius, Laozi, or Chinese Buddhism into English, and then into modern Chinese.

    Shavit is a multidisciplinary artist, living and working in Tel Aviv, Israel. Her work includes still images, video, sound, collected objects, archive materials and texts. She has participated in art exhibitions and screenings in Israel, the United States, Poland, Norway and Iceland.

    At the joint exhibition at the J&Z Gallery, Shavit is showing a series of six videos titled “The Devil Is in the Details.”

    Her videos during her residency at OCAT deal with iconic subjects, such as rice, chopsticks, a panda toy, and a smile.

    A teacher of photography at the Shanghai branch of the China Academy of Fine Arts, Luo has formed a peculiar art language and style by keeping a keen interest in architecture over the past two decades.

    Born in Beijing in 1960, Luo initially achieved fame with a series of black-and-white photographs documenting the lives of ordinary people from behind a detached, neutral lens, but finally abandoned figure photography entirely, embarking on a long series of architectural shots devoid of people.

    Behind the apparent objectivity of Luo’s approach is a complicated mixture of sympathy, nostalgia and disdain.

    At the joint exhibition, Luo is showing a series of black and white photographs titled “Night Watch at Shenzhen,” which are night scenes of a few landmark skyscrapers in the city. 

    Dates: Through Nov. 19

    Time: 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday

    Add: J&Z Gallery, 101 Building F1, OCT-LOFT, Overseas Chinese Town, Nanshan District (南山区华侨城文化创意园艺术方位画廊）

    Metro: Hua Qiao Cheng Station (Overseas Chinese Town Station, 华侨城站), Exit A. Around five minutes’ walk along the Enping Road.