Yang Yong

“Women are born to be art,” Yang Yong from Shenzen seems to say. The quickly growing metropolis near Hong Kong offers everything that makes for a modern, swank life in breathtaking artificiality, but for all that – or exactly because of it – every corner reveals gaping holes of paralyzing boredom, where the protagonists of Chinese photography’s picture stories cower. Yang Yong’s models are young women from the province, friends of the photographer who often finance their existence through prostitution, with whom he spins a kind of high-gloss romance of his impressions of loneliness. The products are series such as Diary of a Dreadful Youth (2001), a portrayal of a typical day in the “new urban life,” that convey the image of tritesse in luxury and give an account of the conflict between predetermined social roles and the vacuum of a metropolis culture molded by the West.
Yang Yong (*1975 in Sichuan) initially studied oil painting before making an international name for himself in photography in exhibitions at Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof and the at Venice Biennial. He makes no secret of his admiration of women, to whom he dedicated his 1999 solo exhibition Women are Beautiful Always and Forever. Of all of the socio-political intimations, one is unavoidable; these images focus on the beauty that becomes even more poignant when amplified by sorrow. Yang intones a universal melody of loneliness and need of protection that wistfully fades away and yet always has an effect – on all cultures equally.

Dr. Boris von Brauchitsch

Solo Exhibitions

2006	Anonymous Still, Tang Gallery BKK, Bangkok
2005	Guangzhou Photo Biennal 2005, Guangdong Museum of Art, China
	City Myths, Goedhuis Contemporary at The Annex, New York
2002	From China-Personal Plan of Yangyong, Art Design Institute Linz, Austria
	Co-held Art Exhibition
	Yang Yong solo exhibition- Sleeting Shadow Gallery Eastlink, Shangai
1999	Women are beautiful, Always and Forever Boarhers Bookstore, Guangzhou
1995	Gray/Pessimistic Space, Sichuan Art Institute, Chongqing

Group Exhibitions

2006	Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin- The Victoria and Albert Museum, London
	The Second Guangzhou Triennal, Guangdong Museum of Art- Triennal, China
2005	Double Vision-1st Lianzhou International Photo Festival, China
	Zooming into Focus: Contemporary Chinese Photography and Video from the Haudenschild Collection, NAMOC National Art  Museum Of China, Beijing, China
	Irreality, Para Site, Hong Kong, China
	Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, The Venice Biennale, Venice - Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, USA - Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago - The David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art, Chicago
	The Chinese: Photography and Video from China, Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg
	Contemporary Art from Greater China, Goedhuis Contemporary, New York
2004	Posers: CourtYard Gallery Artists Group Exhibition, CourtYard Gallery, Beijing, China
	Is It Art?-Black Show, Noanoa Center, Xian, China - Shanxi Provincial Art Museum, Xian, China
	Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video from China, ICP International Center of Photography, New York
	Chinese Eyes: Contemporary Chinese Photography, Goedhuis Contemporary, New York
	Reality Spells- Exhibition of Chinese Conceptual Photography from 90´,Hong Kong Central LIbrary, Hong Kong