DPhil Student
St Catherine’s College
Thesis: Rethinking the Spaces and Places of the Contemporary Art World: The Art Field in Rural China
Research
Driven by a consistent interest in the interrelation between the artworld and reality, my DPhil topic revolves around contemporary art practice in non-urban settings, especially in rural China. In particular, it focuses on the emerging Art Fields (dadi yishujie, or ‘open-air art exhibitions’) in rural areas. These events involve the installation of site-specific artworks outdoors or in local houses across villages and collaboration with the villagers, which provide alternative ways for artists to create art, for visitors to explore the region, and for local governments to undertake endeavours for rural revitalisation. As the exhibition continues over a longer period, art becomes an integral part of the local landscape, transforming the village into ‘a roofless art museum’.
Based on year-long fieldwork in villages of Guangdong and Jiangxi Province, this research aims to investigate the roles and agency of various parties involved in the making of an Art Field, and how their interplay reshapes our conventional understanding of the urban-grounded artworld. Meanwhile, it explores the ways in which art can reconfigure people’s experience of a specific place and participate in the process of place-making. Additionally, through long-term and repeated observation, it examines how art is socially engaged with and locally interpreted by the community in everyday life. Overall, this research aspires to incorporate a rural narrative as well as a temporal perspective when considering the production, distribution, perception and maintenance of art within the anthropological discourse.
Previous education
MPhil in Visual, Material and Museum Anthropology, University of Oxford (2022) with distinction
MA in Museums and Galleries in Education, University College London (2016) with distinction
BA in Film Studies, Peking University (2015)
Email: jingsi.wang@anthro.ox.ac.uk
