70 Underground Artists’ Works Amazed the City on the 2nd Red Eye Art Festival

Chongqing- Unlike those who cooperate with galleries and curators, underground artists usually don't have any agency to release or propagandize their works, which makes it harder for their artworks to contact the public. Thanks to the internet, now we have more and more artists in China that are willing to promote their concepts and products on social media. But online viewing is not enough for art appreciation. An offline exhibition means a lot to artists and the audience. It provides a magnificent presentation and experience for both creators and visitors, and it couldn't be replaced by the virtual world. 

On May 1st, the 2nd Red Eye Art Festival started in a big shopping mall called Shin Kong Place in Yubei District, Chongqing. The 1st festival was held in E'ling Testbed 2 last year, which is a trending spot in downtown Chongqing. Over 40 artists have attempted the event, and most of them were from Chongqing. This year, there were 70 artists, some of them were from other cities and provinces in China. Those artists considered Chongqing as a fascinating city and a potential art market, even though only a few of them have sold works. The top issue for artists to gathered here is the communication with the audience and peers. Many have claimed that it was the first time for them to go out and show their works in a real scene instead of the internet. And it was quite a challenge for them because they use to connect with their fans through Weibo and Instagram. The free atmosphere helps the audience better understand the works without worrying about the manners in the museum or gallery and buying the copy products for a reasonable price. 

Dianling, one of the founders of the festival, is an artist herself. She got inspired by joining the Singularity Plan in Guangdong Province, which is the first and famous underground art festival in China. It continues promoting the Chinese underground art and culture for 5 years. Illustration, comic, animation, print, sketch, installation, sculptures, designer's toy, sofubi, carving, and independent publication were all welcome as art forms in the Singularity Plan. Dianling has taken part in it 2 times, and she couldn't wait to hold a Chongqing-version in her hometown. She believes that there should be a chance for local artists. The 1st festival gained support from a lot of artists, and it caused concern from the public. This has given her more confidence to start a career as an "underground curator".

This year, Dinaling's team Oridea Visual Design and her partner Hongguang Fazhan Support, an event planning company, have worked together to make the festival operating as a bigger program. They've already held a pre-exhibition in December 2020 in a shopping mall in Guanyinqiao, tried to blend the artworks into a commercial area. In the official exhibition, they put a live performance like swing dance and folk bands, workshops like painting skateboards and shoeboxes, and cosplay shows like Middle-Ages custom besides the exhibition, to increase the diverse experience for the audience. They also invited local illustrators to cooperate with the independent game called "Dyson Sphere Program", which is a popular game on Steam this year, to create 3 works and display them with Huawei. This area showed a unique vision of the Red Eye Art Festival since the game industry has a lot of connections with contemporary art. 

Carles God, a Spanish artist who lives in New York City, has joined the live stream with iChongqing's reporter and toured around online in the 2nd Red Eye Art Festival. As a foreigner who was deeply influenced by Asian culture, Carles has been in China for several years. He has also joined the Singularity Plan to present his illustration artworks. Now that he continues studying and working in NYC, he tried other kinds of art besides the illustration, such as NFTs, a unit of data stored on a digital ledger, called a blockchain, that certifies a digital asset to be unique and therefore not interchangeable. Since NFTs can be used to represent items such as photos, videos, audio, and other types of digital files, they created a new art form and market.

During the live stream, Carles talked with artists, explained those works from his point of view, especially in the pandemic time, about how he survived through the dark and changed his idea of art creating and living. Our audience from abroad has shown big interest in those young Chinese artists' works, they also appreciated the new animation of Carles.