The Explosive Genius

Photography by Noah Laroia-NguyenWritten by  Marissa Beaty Let’s face it, we love a good explosion. Be it a car erupting in a torrent of wild flame as a suit- clad hero carries his damsel to safety, or a ship bursting to sawdust in the middle of an ocean, or any Nic Cage movie, there is something magically gratifying about an instant and destructive eruption of chaos. But do we consider these explosions, despite their chaotic beauty, as art? While most classical art historians would turn over in their grave at the thought of a fiery implosion standing alongside a Renoir or Matisse,  one artist is doing just that - well, that is, creating masterpieces with explosions. Meet Cai Guo-Qiang, the 61- year- old contemporary artist pushing the boundaries of art by painting with, believe it or not, gunpowder. Originally born in Quanzhou, China, the current New York resident, began his work in gunpowder in 1984. In 1989, he first debuted his work as a public explosive event. In the twenty years that have elapsed since his introduction into the art sphere, Qiang has perfected the practice, combining contemporary subjects with an ancient tradition, but I’m jumping the gun here a bit. The thing that makes Qiang’s work so fantastical is not necessarily the explosion itself (although, that is mind-blowing) but also the fact that he uses gunpowder to connect two vastly different histories together.In the 9th century AD, Chinese Alchemists were searching for the elixir of life. They instead created gunpowder: pause for the irony. Gunpowder came to be a huge source of wealth and power, not only for China, but to every other country and individual who could gain access to it, and had to do so by purchasing it from the source itself. By utilizing gunpowder, then, Qiang is directly tying his work to a centuries old narrative - propelling the significance of Chinese history into the modern era. His art, however, goes even further than historical attribution to social and political commentary. In 1996, he debuted a work called The Century with Mushroom Clouds: Project for the 20th Century, which, in its three second display, exhibited a similar shaped smoke cloud as that of the explosions of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He erupted the works through the United States, pushing for the general public to consider the smoke cloud and all of the devastation and after effects that existed because of it. In addition to this, however, he creates pieces that are undeniably beautiful. For example, his work called Black Ceremony from 2011, when erupted, filled the air with a cacophony of pigment, which for just a second - before the wind blew the colors together-, displayed the well- known symbol of goodwill: the rainbow. His work is more than just history or politics or even aesthetics. Through a careful articulation of chaos, Qiang has managed to create an art that draws from all three. Though the explosion is temporary, Qiang’s name will stand as a permanent figure in the narrative of art history. If you think Cai Guo-Qiang is as amazing as I do, or if you just want to see things be blown up, I urge you to check out his new documentary “The Explosive Genius.” You will not be disappointed.