CAA identifies 5 key events planned for 2024
The China Academy of Art Report was released on April 8 in coincidence with the university's anniversary.
This year, staff and students gathered at Nanshan Campus to celebrate the premier art school's 96th birthday. The CAA Report identified five significant events scheduled for 2024.
They are the CAA Centennial Masterpiece Creation and Research Project, the CAA Yangtze River Delta Art Action, and the establishment of an AI Center, the Photography Center of Better China Institution and the Research Center of Art-Synesthesia.
"These events will help us comb through historic resources and explore future possibilities," said CAA President Gao Shiming. "I hope the university can be rooted in the land of China and open the vista of art."
Last year, the university launched the CAA Report, featuring a public forum for creators and designers, a community event, and a mechanism for the interaction of art and technology, science and philosophy.
"The CAA Report will grow into a public festival celebrating China's creative and artistic industries. I think it will outperform the university itself," Gao said.
CAA President Gao Shiming delivers a speech, tracing the university's history back to its founder, Cai Yuanpei.
Over the past 96 years, CAA has grown into a national institution of higher education in fine arts, with over 10,000 students and professors across five campuses: Nanshan, Xiangshan, Xianghu and Liangzhu in Hangzhou, and Zhangjiang in Shanghai.
The university's history is regarded as the developmental route of Chinese modern art. Zao Wou-Ki, Wu Guanzhong, Yan Wenliang, Pan Tianshou, Wu Dayu, Lin Fengmian, Lin Wenzheng, and Huang Binhong were among the prominent artists who created history here.
In the 1920s, Lin Fengmian, Wu Dayu and Lin Wenzheng studied painting in Europe. They came back and became the CAA professors, introducing Western art to China. The history of the academy's oil painting department epitomizes Chinese oil painting history.
The CAA Centennial Masterpiece Creation and Research Project began with the Zao Wou-Ki exhibition last September and is set to continue until 2028, coinciding with the academy's centenary celebration.
This year, visitors will be welcomed to the 120th birthday exhibitions of Lin Wenzheng and Wu Dayu, as well as Yan Wenliang's 130th birthday exhibition.
Learning about predecessors' art and ideas is a critical component of the process. CAA will offer academic seminars, workshops and artistic festivals to educate the public about their accomplishments.
A plaque unveiling ceremony was held for the opening of the Photography Center of Better China Institution, as well as the release of the China Academy of Art Report, at CAA's Nanshan Campus.
In future, AI will be a focal point for art creation at CAA. Last year, the academy introduced the CAA Cosmos, an online art community that enables real-time multi-person interaction; and the Meta Art Academy, a mixed-reality interface for single-person immersive experiences.
Users can learn, socialize and play games by creating their own digital identities, sharing creative artworks, and organizing and engaging in art activities through the CAA Cosmos.
The Meta Art Academy's hyper-immersive-themed world courses, realistic audio-visual exhibitions and performances are intended to create a virtual art academy that will provide users with a multiverse and degrees that combine the arts, technologies and sciences.
The AI center, with branches in both Hangzhou and Beijing, will specialize in AI-generated content tailored for novel application scenarios.
Another trial for the academy is the Photography Center of Better China Institution, which encourages young artists to experience and create art in villages and impoverished communities.
For years, CAA has conducted widespread field studies, from high-altitude plateaus to remote villages, gathering hundreds of artistic projects rooted in grassroots people and a close interaction between humans and nature.
The faculty has also formed groups to investigate collaboration techniques with governments and businesses, aiming to pave an innovative path toward enhancing the integration of social development and education in rural areas.
The photography center will select notable examples to establish a think tank of role models for engineers, scientists and artists.
