Cai Guo-Qiang
I Want to Believe
Introduction
This Resource Unit focuses on Cai Guo-Qiang: I Want to Believe, a retrospective exhibition featuring the work of one of today’s most significant international artists. Cai’s work is global and even universal in its scope and considers history, social activism, folklore, current events, and even the possibility of life beyond our planet. This Resource Unit is designed to help educators discover some of the many ways Cai’s art can resonate in the classroom. more
Biography
Cai Guo-Qiang (surname pronounced tsai, given name pronounced gwo chang) was born in 1957 in Quanzhou, Fujian Province, China. Even as a child he was interested in art and would sketch landscapes around his house in watercolors, and later in oil paint. Cai was part of a theater troupe as a teenager and also appeared in two martial arts films. At the age of 24 he entered the Shanghai Drama Institute to formally study stage design and related disciplines including architectural drawing, lighting and costume design. During the summers he and his future wife Hong Hong Wu would travel to the far corners of China to experience nature and primal memories of the land. His experiences were reflected in works that incorporated rubbings of natural objects such as rocks and tree roots. more
