ZHONG BIAO: Reflected on Air    May 7 - Jun 25, 2011

• Beijing and Chongqing based artist, recently featured in The New York Times.
• Second exhibition at Frey Norris highlights evolution of content and methods in painting, rooted by Chinese philosophical and    cultural sources, but depicting universal themes.
• 9 new canvases range from small to epic in scale, reflect developments in immersive installations utilizing mirrors, video    projection, such as Mirage project for the Denver Art Museum, integrated into Daniel Liebeskind’s architecture.
• 20 page catalogue with essay by Maya Kovskaya, essayist, curator and art theorist based recently in Beijing and now in New Dehli.

“I am attempting to draw close to the variable origins “I am attempting to draw close to the variable origins of change."
– Zhong Biao -

SAN FRANCISCO, CA. First exhibited at Frey Norris in 2003, Zhong Biao has developed into an iconic Chinese artist, his imagery reproduced around the world in publications like the Economist and in conjunction with events like the recent World Cup in South Africa. His massive installation, Mirage, including a 13 x 60 foot painting, wall of mirrors, video and sound projection for the Denver Art Museum's Embrace exhibition (2009), responded thoughtfully to Daniel Liebeskind's design of the galleries, spatially resembling shards of quartz crystal. Other recent exhibitions have included Zhong Biao's art throughout Asia, Europe and the Americas.

Reflected on Air is Biao's first solo show with Frey Norris since his American debut in 2007. Seven paintings reflect a sensibility tied to new ideas around time. Biao's vision embraces a simultaneity of time, past, present and future, and the imagery projects something of both the transcience of chronological time and its transcendence, all at a frenetic and celebratory pace. Depicted children, young and old travelers spin and float in bewildering spaces that bring the materiality of paint on canvas to the forefront through abstract and explosive constellations of vividly colored brushwork over areas of raw canvas.

A 20-page catalogue is available with an essay by Maya Kovskaya, PhD. Maya Kovskaya is a Beijing & Delhi-based scholar, art critic, curator, writer, and translator with over a decade of experience in China. She is the author of China Under Construction: Contemporary Art from the People's Republic (2007). She is currently curating exhibitions in Bombay, New Delhi and Cochin.

For additional information and images please contact the gallery (415) 346-7812 or email