Beijing celebrates German art in rare display

"Our aim is to invite people to take a careful look at how a country's art responds to the questions of history, reality and environment."

The Central Academy of Fine Arts' art museum is hosting an exhibition, titled Paradigm of Art, in which contemporary German art makes a collective appearance through paintings, photos, sculptures and installations.

At the Imperial Ancestral Temple Art Museum that neighbors the Palace Museum, the exhibition Traces of Memory focuses on contemporary German paintings. It shows pieces by 10 masters, such as Georg Baselitz, Joseph Beuys, Anselm Kiefer and Gerhard Richter－many of whose works are being exhibited in China for the first time.

The museum is operated by Beijing Working People's Cultural Palace (formerly Taimiao) and the Central Academy of Fine Arts. The school helps plan at least three exhibitions at the museum annually.

Yuan Jieqiong, the museum's director, says the show displays rarely viewed and emotionally expressive works by Beuys and Richter.

"The paintings encapsulate Germans' collective memories," Yuan says.

"They also demonstrate innovations in the longstanding traditions of German painting. They conduct a resounding conversation with the Imperial Ancestral Temple, which is some 600 years old."

The other five exhibitions are running at privately-funded contemporary art museums and galleries, including the 15-year-old Today Art Museum and the Red Brick Art Museum that opened in Beijing three years ago.

Red Brick Art Museum founder Yan Shijie says Deutschland 8 should become a milestone for China's contemporary art museums which, through their participation, can show their strengths in improving public cultural services.

Fan says many exhibitions target professional audiences but fail to appeal to the general public.

Deutschland 8 should be an opportunity for Chinese museums to reorient their mission－staging shows that are academic yet also interest ordinary viewers.

He also hopes Deutschland 8 can be developed into a series of projects. Perhaps France 8 and Britain 8 are on the horizon.