INFO
| Name | Xin Cheng (she/her) |
| Born | 1983 |
| Country of Birth | China |
| Place of Residence | Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland |
| Ethnicities | Chinese |
| Artform | Visual arts, Design |
| Decades Active | 2000s, 2010s, 2020s |
ABOUT
Xin Cheng is an artist whose practice encompasses design, sculpture, writing, teaching and curating, among many other activities. Initially studying ecology and psychology before undertaking a fine arts degree at Elam School of Fine Arts, Cheng’s practice is both studio and field based. She is inspired by people from all walks of life getting on with their day-to-day lives, and especially those finding ways to live in harmony with the land. Her expansive practice is a process of continual research where the joys and beauty of making are celebrated and explored, through encounter and collaboration.
Cheng is a prolific organiser and many of her projects include collaboration and conviviality. A concern for the impact of human consumption in a more-than-human world is an enduring aspect of Cheng’s practice. From the cool shade of trees in an urban environment to street vendors making-do with ingenious fixtures, Cheng is well versed in perceiving the richness of detail in the environments we inhabit.
Often making utilitarian objects or things that can be interacted with, there is a lightness of touch to what she makes alongside a studied appreciation of the details and textures inherent in any given material. She regularly uses discarded materials, repurposing things such as bicycle inner tubes, cardboard, or off-cuts of felt from mattress manufacturers.
Propositions (2013), for the group exhibition Freedom Farmers: New Zealand Artists Growing Ideas, transformed the white-walled space at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki with materials not often seen in such an institution. Numerous native plants in an open bamboo structure held together with bicycle inner tubes and self-made tyre bungee cord, felted mats, stacked tyre seats, lampshades made from upturned coconut fibre baskets and ingenious bike chain shelves created a nest-like space in an otherwise cavernous gallery. A tyre tree, something Cheng gleaned from the book Playgrounds for Free (1974) by Paul Hogan, adorned an otherwise sombre structural column.
Cheng travelled to Cambodia in 2014 after first visiting as a conservation volunteer and becoming fascinated by the makeshift roadside furniture and ingenuity she observed. Taking part in the Sa Sa Art Projects residency with a focus on experimentation over final outcomes, Cheng spent two summer months in Phnom Penh, living in the now demolished, historic modernist White Building.
Such intrepid and varied experiences recorded through pages of photographs and writings, such as on the makeshifting Cambodia & Aotearoa website, continue to inform her practice, which often circles back to making use of materials at hand.
The five-part artist's book a seedbag for resourcefulness (published by Materialverlag, Hamburg, 2019) is the culmination of twelve years of mostly peripatetic travels in Europe and the Asia-Pacific. Designed, printed and assembled by Cheng with the help of teachers and friends at the Hamburg University of Fine Arts, Germany, the publication includes drawings, photos, stories and thoughts stitched together “to inspire caring and making of your own surroundings”.
Born in Kunming, China, Cheng moved to Aotearoa with her mother and father in 1996. Cheng has been awarded numerous grants which have facilitated the many projects she has undertaken both locally and internationally. These have included residencies in Norway, Cambodia, Switzerland, South Korea, Japan, Italy, and Mexico, as well as locally at Enjoy Contemporary Art Space and Te Whare Hēra Wellington Artist Residency with the Dowse Art Museum in Te Whanganui-a-Tara.
Cheng was a co-director of the longstanding artist-run-space RM between 2007 and 2012. From 2016–2019 she undertook a Master of Fine Arts at the Hamburg University of Fine Arts (HFBK), Germany, where she took part in Design for the Living World, a class on participatory practices by Marjetica Potrč, studied typography with Wigger Bierma and collaborated with fellow film students and dancers. Cheng’s stories about her many experiences overseas can be read on Asian New Zealand art and culture platform Hainamana.
LINKS
Key works / presentations
2023 — Folded Memory, Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery, Wellington, curated by Susan Ballard and Sophie Thorn
2022 — IsLand Bar - Ratava, Taipei Performing Arts Center Opening Season, Taipei, Taiwan, curated by Tang Fu Kuen and Joyce Ho, in collaboration with Fang Hui Hwang
2021— Fathomless: artists converse with the more-than-human, Victoria University Wellington & Adam Art Gallery, curated by Janine Randerson
2020 — From the Ground Up, Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt, with Adam Ben-Dror, curated by Grace Ryder
2020 — Greywater, Mokopōpaki, Tāmaki Makaurau, with Eleanor Cooper
2019 — Seeing Like a Forest, single-channel HD digital video, videograpy by Jesús Pulpón
2019 — Following the Rubber Trails/Auf den Spuren des Gummis, Frappant Galerie, Hamburg, Germany, with Heidi Salaverría, Jesús Pulpón, Jozefina Frljić, Natalia Golubtsova, Sigrid Bohlens, Tam Pham
2017 — In Solidarity: Living, Making, Together, MUCA Roma, Universidad Nacional Autonomade Mexico, Mexico City, with Design for the Living World
2016 — a welcoming terrain for relaxing, making, eating and being.together, for ‘Changing Lanes’, commissioned by Auckland Council & Heart of the City, with Chris Berthelsen
2014— A Stimulus Terrain! for Widening the Margin of Play, installation and workshop for split/fountain's distracted workshop at 26th International Biennial of Graphic Design Brno, Czech Republic, with Chris Berthelsen
2013 — Freedom Farmers: New Zealand Artists Growing Ideas, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, Tāmaki Makaurau, group exhibition
2011 — Mixtures, split/fountain, Tāmaki Makaurau, solo exhibition
Key awards
2021 — Creative New Zealand Artist Tautoko Programme (with mentoring from Layla Tweedie-Cullen)
2020 — Te Whare Hēra Artist Residency, Pōneke with Dowse Art Museum
2017 & 2013 — Stazionedi Topolò, Topolò, Italy (residency and festival)
2016 — New Zealand Japan Exchange Programme grant for Zero Yen Tour with Chris Berthelsen
2015 — Asia New Zealand Foundation and Creative New Zealand grant for residency with Seoul Museum of Art, South Korea
2014 — Residency at Utopiana, Geneva, Switzerland
2014 — Sa Sa Art Projects Residency, Phnom Penh,Cambodia
2014 — Summer Residency at Enjoy Contemporary Art Space, Pōneke (with Kirsten Dryburgh)
2008 — Residency at Nordic Artist’s Center NKD, Dale, Norway (with RM project)
2008 — Summer Residency at Enjoy Contemporary Art Space, Pōneke (invited by Laura Preston)
