My job is not one thing, but my life.

Xie Deqing: My job is not one but my whole life.

1974 One day, on the Delaware River near Philadelphia, a young man jumped off a cargo ship bound for the United States from Taiwan Province Province and sneaked into the United States.

In 2009, new york Museum of Contemporary Art and Guggenheim Art Museum respectively reviewed two different works, one-year performance 1978- 1979 and one-year performance1980-10/,which were created by the same artist in new york. These two works, one is16 pm on September 30th, 97816 pm on September 29th, 979. In a cage less than 6 square meters in an attic in Brooklyn, the artist imprisoned himself alone for a whole year. Under the supervision of a notary, he cut off all contact with the outside world, and for a year he didn't talk to anyone, read, write, listen to the radio or watch TV. During this period, only friends regularly deliver necessities and occasionally open public visits. The other started at 6: 00 pm on April 1980, and he punched in his studio once every 1 hour, 24 times a day, 365 days without interruption. Similarly, the artist's performance time is "one year", and the artist completed three more works in the next few years. Through these works, artists try to explore the most essential problems of human existence, such as "the existence of life" and "the passage of time". In these works, art critics and the public read about the exploration of people's self-isolation, contact with boundaries and the bottom line of life, as well as the extreme restraint of artists, and a strong temperament of chronic self-destruction.

The protagonist of these works, the artist Xie Deqing, is a young man who sneaked into the United States from Taiwan Province Province. As early as the first day of 2000, he announced the end of his sixth performance, Xie Deqing 1986- 1999 (Thirteen-Year Plan), and stopped his artistic creation.

No longer doing art, Xie Deqing began to face life with a low profile. It was not until recent years that important American art galleries had a strong interest and extensive discussion on performance art that Xie Deqing's works and their influence were brought to the core stage as an important part of the historical context of performance art. Marina abramovic, a highly sought-after master of performance art, praised him as a "master" in the history of performance art and her personal "hero". Xie Deqing laughed in the interview and said that his early "underground" state was not concerned, and it was widely recognized later. "Just like the arrival of the Amnesty for illegal immigrants in the past, it was too late for me and there was not much excitement."

If you give up writing, your life will go on. Now Xie Deqing and his wife live in a two-story building in Brooklyn, new york. In addition to daily affairs, he has been sorting out his early work records and handling irregular exhibitions and academic invitations. The scene of the performance no longer exists. For those physical records and speeches bearing the meaning of the works, Xie Deqing still maintains a cunning and strong artist's judgment, carefully distinguishing which ones are conducive to the interpretation of the works, which ones are visible to the public and which ones are not open. He also joked that he is now like an art dealer, "managing" his early works, thus maintaining a fairly good quality of life and the right to freedom.

Even if he wanted to run his own works like a businessman, Xie Deqing, who was born in Taiwan Province Province, refused many exhibition invitations and classified descriptions about "China people" and "Oriental people", and also rejected suggestions to create other works with more market potential. He insists that his works are artists' solutions to artistic problems within the scope of artistic essence, rather than the "prosperous business" in the industry, not to mention the shallow division between the eastern system and the western system. The only criterion of his creation is whether he can "put forward new topics and directions for art"; If not, he would rather resign. Because art is not a profession for him, but the most basic freedom and right that a person should have to think about life. On the contrary, "retirement" became his outlet to keep the purity of artistic philosophy.

In recent years, when Xie Deqing's creation came to an abrupt end, artists in China began to gallop forward. From 2000 to now, contemporary art in China has become a global fashion topic, the focus of exhibitions, the hot spot of sky-high auction, and the treasure that collectors scramble to grab. There are also many arguments about whether to return to the oriental tradition or get rid of the oriental background and return to the essence of eastern and western art.

At this time, Xie Deqing's "stillness" seems to be more frank and requires considerable courage. He was not even afraid, and admitted that "Jiang Lang was at the end of his rope". He said, "If you ask me what to do now, I will end my life."