Meet the Artist: Tang Shuo

Tang (b. 1987, Guangxi, China) works from memory, depicting his childhood experience of living in the countryside, using his own image to play the different people who lived in that place and their lives.

What's your relationship to autobiography in your work? What drives you to rework the same figure through different iterations?

I treat my image as a medium to portray different characters in my work. Sometimes I am telling my own story, but more often I use my image to play different roles, all of which come from the small village where I grew up.

Your submitted artwork Busy Farming Seasondraws parallels with the work in your recently passed solo show The Narrators at BEERS London. What research went into this series and is this a subject matter you intend to stay with?

There are indeed similarities in the composition of the works. A Family tells the tragic story of a family, while Busy Farming Season depicts the scene of sudden rain during the busy farming season, where people have to leave their work to find shelter. All of my works belong to the same series, as I explore my village as the subject rather than focusing on a specific form of artwork.

Your paintings almost exclusively take place in an outdoor setting. What does this environment do for you symbolically?

As a farmer, working outdoors is almost a daily part of my routine, so I chose to set the backgrounds of my works in outdoor environments. The house I lived in in the village was built in the early 20th century. People at that time didn't design bright windows or colorful walls for aesthetic purposes; they built a safe fortress for themselves because it was a time of war. As a result, the interiors were almost dark, which is why I can't capture scenes from inside.

Do you have any projects on the horizon you would like to share?

I will have a solo exhibition at Steveturnerla on November 23rd this year, and I also have a group exhibition currently at König Gallery.