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Liang Shao Ji began with abstract creations in textile art over three decades ago, later became an enthusiastic student of Verbanov while at the noted Central Academy of Fine Art in Hangzhou, and has since explored the endless aspects of conceptual artistic creation whether with multi-media, installation, spatial/sculptural works or photographic/video pursuits. The artist possesses an articulate language which encompasses the employment of raw materials directly drawn from nature herself, found objects and a rather extreme sense of contrast in the realization of his concepts.

In observation of this restless soul at work in his studio, one witnesses a quasi-scientific examination of not only the latent potential behind each concept, yet equal ardour to render an intelligible and possible means of creation which adheres to his personal affinity towards nature and intended visual statement.

A seminal series entitled, “Cloud Mirror”, arose following the artist’s meditations near the summit of the mountains where he observed with a remarkable detachment and lucidity the transient nature of time. Entirely still, he had placed several panes of square mirror plate in a symmetrical manner atop an even rock surface found on the mountains terrace. Liang was given to contemplation as he watched the passage of nimbulus clouds as they dissipated, wavered, reformed and were carried from sight by the winds which incessantly sweep the vestige of the mountain range. The artist applied his knowledge and fruit of his scientific curiosity which has proved predominant for the past thirteen years in a bizarre execution merger of performance and documented installation. For well over a decade, Liang Shao Ji came to speculate on the particular and poetical beauty of silk, and began a laborious endeavour which would come to signal a zenith in his transitions as an artist. He studied historic tomes, devoured literary and poetic texts which spoke of the importance and unique demands created by silkworm cultivation and silk manufacture. The artist later adopted and employed numerous weaving techniques more often associated with folkloric artisanry & later abandoned them for the irremediable and random traces of silk left by the silkworms themselves as the creatures became familiar with material substances otherwise entirely foreign and unknown.

“Cloud Mirror” is an epitomal expression of nature at work in the hands of an artist who is,rather than her master, her student. Having placed the ensemble of mirrors atop the mountain, Liang left the silkworm to wander and stray invariably towards their death as they span out their lengths of silk in accidental patterns which yet somehow wear near identical to the movement of the white cloud masses above. The refractions and layers of the artificial planes of silk and natural oscillation of the clouds were captured by way of a remote video surveillance, and the artist himself left to reflect upon his own experiment. This continued to an extreme where poetic inspiration found him and he began to compose minimalist poetry with profound implications upon what has been otherwise been called “… the experience of life itself …“

The same insatiable curiosity which would lead the artist to international acclaim (and extreme innovations upon the theoretic interpretations of diverse influences such as Chinese literati, Joseph Beuys and post-War European abstraction) led to an apparently more profound hermetic aestheticism in art and life. Caring less for the materialistic world and commercial viaduct known by contemporary “Masters” of Chinese art, Liang has in truth abandoned himself with the gradual accumulation of an intrinsic experience, one which proves to be both deeply spiritual while in avoidance of ritual. Art and life seem indivisible, Liang having chosen silk as his chief material has had to challenge himself with the incredible proximity of nature and visceral strengths of the material as well as its production.

Silk itself echoes throughout the ages in the broad and erratic history of China, it holds its own unique symbolism to the Chinese conscious and poetic and spiritual connotations are manifest in their own wisdom. The artist at first sought to pursue a series of abhorrent experiments in quest of the introduction of this most ancient and revered technique of production to that of the most prolific and environmentally catastrophic creations of humankind. In the vicinity of his solitary studio adjacent to the historic Buddhist enclave of Guoqing Si (one of the first well sources of Zen Buddhism in the Far East) exists a small machinists’ factory. Metallic shavings which have fallen from differing lathes and the labor of industrial manufacture were amongst the first objects which the artist introduced the silkworms to: the crossed over, wove within and without, were cut, severed and met with death as they ascended and descended amidst the spiral metal as an unknown territory.

Towards empathy & with a vested curiosity, the artist sought to emulate their passage and following nights preparation, withdrew his protective footwear and walked slowly across the floor of shavings, his feet and ankles suffering multiple lacerations which led him to hospital and emergency treatment of the wounds. The horrific contrast of nature and industry & subsequent repulsion led to the demise of the experiment. He would find alternative objects towards the articulation of his simultaneous artistic and scientific odyssey. Employing less hostile found objects as varying as the metal cask helmets worn by mine workers ( a work brought about in testament to the atrocious industrial accidents which have claimed the lives of countless anonymous men and women in the wastelands of rural China), sewing machines (an obvious & humorous comment) , aluminum and steel frames (wherein the silk itself acts as palette and screen for their own display) and countless other materials of metallic origin won considerable commentary and acclaim not only from the artistic sphere yet also those whose scientific knowledge. Ages old wisdom of the art of silk production now met with the inexplicable creation of a new dimension in the process itself: the artist managed to breach the rift which existed between the insatiable & endless journey of the silkworm and a substance which he until then proven impossible as a host.

Liang Shao Ji’s conceptual innovation yet defies this discovery and he had not rested in his intimate exploration of materials derived from nature. The impressive installation, “Broken Landscape”, which holds direct references to traditional ink-wash painting and scenic composition, conceptual artistic practice and the demise of nature in the contemporary mass urbanization witnessed throughout the P.R.C. , left a direct impact upon the conscience of numerous spectators during its installation in Beijing, 2007. The brutality of man and of industry by the presence of colossal timber from millennia old trees near fossilized in the depths of the mountain lakes which erratically surface throughout the region of his home. Worn with the effluvium of time and water’s erosion, their surface appears supple yet the warmth of fresh wood is replaced by a deathly grey and streaks of black due to natures’ alchemy. Placed on concrete floors opposite one another and with another suspended in mid-air by invisible means, their curious presence was in stark contrast to the silk sheet which lay between the unmoored wood, similar to an ascending river path with a silken veneer.

For the opening ceremony, Liang sought to render homage to question of nature in a performance which acted as a near travesty of an ancient poem from the Song Dynasty, where Qu Yuan calls for the answer from the heavens. The artist submerged the broad hairs of an enormous calligraphy brush and repeatedly wrote an invisible questions mark upon the walls outlying the gallery…with water.

If we may consider the ephemeral, nature and transience as pivotal & timeless questions amongst the collective experience of humankind, then Liang has pierced the fabric of time and sought to find a vocabulary of simultaneously brilliant and modest means. The artist finds catharsis in the delight of discovery and lays testament to the beauty, fragility and strength of nature. What is recalled from several days spent at his studio and discussions into the night about life, the experience of China, questions of either a practical or philosophical nature remains foremost a heightened sense of the tenuous nature of all things and beauty of instance. Liang has found his environment, surpassed the limitations of self and engendered a conceptual process which shall perpetuate itself without fear, horizon or latitudes of perception.