Ars longa, vita brevis (Hippocrates, 460~370 B.C.)

Today is 25 September 2024.

I have worked for more than 10 years in UIC. The following events and activities have been illustrated my precious time and memory in UIC. Now I desperately feel the Frida Kahlo’s (surrealist painter) quote Nothing is absolute. Everything changes, everything moves, everything revolves, everything flies and goes away.

Time goes by so fast. Referring to the Persistence of Time or Persistence of Memory (Dali, 1931), thus, Art is Long, Life is Short.

A 1^st Site-specific Exhibition (15 May 2015)

In May 2015, a site-specific Exhibition Art in Anywhere UIC”/ 艺术在何处 (see also Fig. 1) was held in Greenwood, Old UIC campus. This exhibition was displaying the art works from the students work of Present State of the Art and Concepts in Contemporary in Culture, Creativity & Management (CCM/ DBM). The students used various kinds of visual media, for instance oil paintings, sketches, collages, photomontages to create their visual image. As art theorist Gombrich (Meditations. 1964) stated, All art is “image-making” and all image-making is rooted in the creation of substitutes. The students eventually substituted the human emotion (anger, joy, peacefulness, depression, human energy, femineity, and illness) revealing their artistic creativity and imagination. In this artistic process, I could contribute the students to discover/ to document/ to develop their artistic style from the course work. Mostly important they actively reflected and re-discovered their self-awareness through expressive art work.

   

Fig. 1. An Exhibition View and Student’s art work in a site-specific Exhibition Art in Anywhere UIC

A 1st DCC Faculty Exhibition (7 Nov 2016)

This Faculty Art Exhibition: Surface (see also Fig. 2) featured the creative work of Mr Craig Voligny and myself. Both the East and the West have long and complex histories in which painting has evolved in tandem. These artistic histories can be viewed as equal but different or overlapping and complimentary. Actually, both definitions can apply, the former more relevant to the far past, and the later definition more relevant to our contemporary globalized culture. Painters in the West have drawn inspiration from the East for at least 150 years, from Paul Gaugin to Brice Marden. The list is equally as long (or longer) amongst Asian artist influenced by the West. In this exhibition these ideas were once again explored and intermingled. Themes of scenography, consumerism and cultural ambiguity were also explored through the Surface of painting while making reference to both Eastern and Western art histories, from Dadaism to Classical Chinese Painting. It is also mutually explored and experimented in the aspects of Culture and Creativity via these Faculty Exhibition works. In this exhibition, I extended the thought-forms of scenography and the controversial statement that defined and redefined the new and cross-territory contexts of Western-Chinese painting.

Fig. 2. A Poster Design of Faculty Art Exhibition: Surface

A New-born DCC (2016)

Going back to 2013, UIC was a small institution within Beijing Normal University Zhuhai campus. In 2016, A new-born Division of Culture and Creative (see also Fig. 3 & 4) is firstly established by emerging the programmes of Cinema & Television (CTV), Culture, Creative & Management (CCM), and Media Arts and Design (MAD). As one of mission stated, DCC is to establish the students in the contexts of liberal arts education, cultivate stimulating learning environments, attuned to industry needs, and empower the DCC students in their intellectual, creative, social and personal journeys, leading to transformative impacts on society. The Poetry of Image was curated by Prof Aaron Chiu, Dean of DCC, to promote a brand-new faculty and the significance of Arts and Design education in UIC. In general, I had a good experience to exchange visual ideas and artistic production with DCC staff and students.

Fig. 3. Photos of New Campus

Fig. 4. A Poster Design of The Poetry of Image

A 1st Mentor Care Programme (MCP) Art Trip (17 Apr 2018)

This OCT Contemporary Art Terminal (OCAT) Shenzhen trip was organized on 17 Nov 2018 as a MAD-MCP ice-breaking activity for 1^st year MAD students. It was hoped that the trip would also include 3 kinds of art experiences: guided art visits/ art conversations/ appreciation of the contemporary art scenes. Definitely the OCAT provided artistic grounds and broaden perspectives to initiate the MAD student’s creativity via a series of gallery visits and artists’ works etc. It was also to nourish their art awareness and visual experiences, and upgrade their art appreciation. The students also had face-to-face sharing with the gallery practitioners (see also Fig. 5) that made up the student’s future expectation and attitude towards more liberal arts life in UIC. The OCAT also was demonstrated high professionalism and a very positive impression to the UIC students. It is hoped that there would be more students to join and discover more a wide range of professional skills in creative and cultural industries e.g., exhibition design, critical art writing, art marketing, and gallery practicum etc.

Fig. 5. One of OCAT staff shared the artistic exhibition with the MAD students

A 1st Oversea Art Trip (17 Apr 2018)

The first Oversea Art Basel Hong Kong was supported by DCC on 17 Apr 2017. According to attending “Art Basel Hong Kong 2017”, it was the most significant and eye-catching art event in Hong Kong. It was our pleasure that the organizer generously provided 15 complimentary tickets for our students and staff (originally costs HK$300). Upon this occasion, the staff and students (see also Fig. 6) would participate to enrich and cultivate their art and cultural life. The activity aims to explore the student’s creativity and insight. It is also designed to provide a platform by overviewing of the art creation and artistic expressions as exemplified in our community and the art world. Finally, the students develop an individual visual language and awareness through exploration of artistic environment and discovery.

Fig. 6. MAD students participated Art Basel Hong Kong 2018

A 1st Collaboration with Hall and SCC Activity (May 2021)

Drumming-Beating-ON-Your Heart/ 鼓动你的心 was collaborated by SAO and SCC. This artistic activity aimed to facilitate/ to nourish/ to promote the Healthy-Creative-Liberal University through students’ active participation and their rhythmic expressions. This musical activity would also flourish the students’ positive emotions, positive psychological functioning, and positive social functioning (Keyes 2007). Finally, Drum Circle (Drumming-Beating- ON-Your Heart/ 鼓动你的心) (see also Fig. 7) has be developed as Healthy-Musical-Collectives and cultural state of mind/ appreciations. As Crawford et al. (2013) proposed that the arts may enable new ways of enabling recovery in community contexts, providing forums of compassion, trust, and shared understanding in which people can find the opportunity to express and understand their experiences and rebuild identities. There has also been growing evidence that music is an enabler of mental health recovery among diverse populations (MacDonald et al. 2012a). Engaging in active musical activity (e.g. singing or playing an instrument) can contribute to demonstrable improvements in factors such as subjective wellbeing (Creech et al. 2013), anxiety levels (Hars et al. 2014), depression and mood (Seinfeld et al. 2013), and morale and loneliness (Cohen et al. 2006).

Fig. 7. UIC students participated in Drumming-Beating-ON-Your Heart

A 1st Research as Art @ UIC LRC (26 Oct-11 Nov 2022)

Research as Art was one of Reading Week events to provide initiatives and a platform for the UICers to start and establish their reading Arts & Culture habit. Especially this activity would also help the UIC/ SCC/ DCCD (MAD & CCM) students to start their research on Final Year Project (FYP) that established with extensive readings from individual, social, cultural, to creative work of inquiry. This also introduced a new Practice-based Research (PbR) claimed (Candy, 2006 & Borgdorff, 2010) as art making via research or as a primary mode of enquiry.

The 100-Book selections from LRC had formulated the crucial parts to address the research aspects in relating to arts education, art history, creativity and innovation, research methodology, and philosophy etc… Of course, these 100-book selections would furthermore challenge the nature of artistic enquiry, applied arts research, and creative outcomes. As consequences, this event also facilitated the UIC-public: an introduction-understanding-appreciation about painting, photography, architecture, new media, art & design etc (see also Fig. 8). Thus, I could employ Practice-based Research (PbR) and extended knowledge to flourish a better liberal-arts environment in UIC.

Fig. 8. Dr Jiang, Prof Mao, Dr Fung (from left) and MAD students participated in Research as Art @ UIC LRC

A 1st Expressive-Art Activity (23 May 2023)

This Expressive Art-based Interventions aimed to facilitate/ to nourish/ to promote the Healthy-Creative-Liberal University through employing hand-printed flower painting. This activity was also as an extension from ME Hall-Blossom-Now// 绘花 种花 德雅花绽放 in May 2022. HandYouFlowersWithFragrance that signified as an ICON for natural beauty & appreciation and a most popular theme for artistic creation such as Vincent van Gogh Sunflowers (1887), Andy Warhol Flower Series (1964), etc. As Cartmill et al (2012) stated, the movements we make with our hands both reflect our mental processes and help to shape them. Our actions and gestures can also affect our mental representations of actions and objects. Thus, the participants need to make their hand gesture as self-expression and then create hand-printed flower painting as artistic awareness and intervention. The activity also aims to facilitate an active-expressive and collective-creative environment in UIC. It is hoped that this Hand-Printed Flower Painting activity (see also Fig. 9) would help the participants to release their tension, anxiety, imagination, and creativity via implementing art as catharsis and purification (Aristotle’s Poetics, 335 BC). Finally, ONE creative public art space has been established as a collective-artistic icon for cultural state of appreciations and artistic actualization. This activity also has been employed my psychological and educational research into practice.

Fig. 9. UIC students participated in hand-printed flower painting

A 1st Painting with Flow Psychology (20 May 2024)

The concept of FlowPainting aims to relieve the participants’ tension via paying more attention to their emotional feeling, and extinct any unsatisfactory, negative moods, or excessive emotional energy through Flow (as psycho-energetic structure) to re-set to people’s well-beingness. Flow was proposed by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990). FlowPainting helps people focusing on painting and gaining joy and satisfaction from the process. This experience seems to flow out automatically, so it is called Flow. In Flow, people have the best inner feeling, that is, they focus on painting and temporarily forget about other things, so as to establish a cognitive order, and to overcome challenges. This is often the most pleasure moment. The Opening is the final step to complete this large-scale painting. The Participants (see also Fig. 10) created their Signs and Flow that stayed their memory from UIC. As Csikszentmihaly said, there is a Flow in one's soul.

Fig. 10. President Prof Chen, Provost Prof Chau, Prof Cho, Prof Wong, Prof Tao, Mr Philip Yeung and MAD students participated in the Opening Ceremony

Since I have arrived in Zhuhai in 2013. The wind was salty and the sun was so bright. I was walking along the small UIC campus and passing through several teaching buildings, administrative building, and student residential buildings. Ten years have passed in the blink of my eyes.

Now the 1st and 2^nd-phases of campus had been completed 400,000 square metres that would host the bases of science, engineering, interdisciplinary subjects, cutting-edge technologies and industrial transformation, forming three clusters of scientific research buildings, teaching blocks and residence halls.

It is really different every day.

During of my UIC life, I have witnessed the Changes from time to time that shape my extended knowledge and philosophical thoughts. I have also been enjoying to share my educational background and artistic production that contributes a new page of my life.

Thank you UIC.

Thank you SCC.

Thank you DCCD/ MAD.

I hope that …

UIC will continue to introduce scientific research talents, strengthen cooperation between industry, university and research, and transform scientific research results. It will also continue fostering high-quality talents to help develop the Greater Bay Area and China.

Fig. 11. Art Walking Along UIC with the Founding President of UIC Prof Ng Ching-Fai, the UIC second President Prof Tang Tao, and the UIC third President Prof Chen Zhi…

By Dr. Andydada (UIC/DCCD/MAD)