I chose to do my art review on the artist Cai Guo-Qiang, who is a Chinese artist who does most of his art in the form of explosions and large scale projects such as this one, which bring attention to problems in society dealing with violence and terrorism. In his piece titled Inopportune: Stage 1, Guo-Qiang displays 9 identical cars, which are tumbling through the air in different positions, with large lights sticking out, resembling that the car is exploding only to conclude with the car being in tact and in perfect condition following the fall.
He makes these works of art in an attempt to resemble a car bomb, which occurs all over the world daily. This piece shows the entire process the vehicle would go through during a bombing, yet brings it into one piece, showing as the artist called it, a “dream” of a car bomb due to the fact that it never really takes place. Guo-Qiang created this to show the process behind a horrific event such as this.
He uses the lights to symbolize flame and explosion which brings out the power behind the piece. While he doesn’t condone these bombings he wants the world to see what they are like and in turn bring attention to these problems occurring in our world today. This artwork makes people question things occurring such as this and can give people a better insight on what is happening and what can be done to help put an end to these problems, as Guo-Qiang does with many of his other works of art.
