Four years since his first visit to Shanghai, French urban artist Seth Globepainter recently spent two months in the city creating outdoor and indoor works for his major solo showing, Like Child's Play, at MOCA Shanghai. Consisting of 20 public interventions in the old neighborhoods of central Shanghai and 14 installations within MOCA building, the complex and involved show aims to "summon childhood memories that question the evolution of this massive city over the past few years."
Over the years of travelling around the globe and creating small interventions as well as painting large murals, Seth developed a recognizable language that uses children as characters and carriers of emotions, thoughts and visions. For this particular project, the artist used the same concept, but made sure he explored and included specifics of local culture and immerse himself in its traditional cultural spirit of Shanghai. Using the walls of the last old working-class neighborhood as his canvas, the works are portraying the effects of country's modernization, seen through the eyes of local children. Directly inspired and based on actual objects found at the location, these pieces are tributes to times passed not that long ago, when these streets belonged to children playing on them.
The indoor show at MOCA consists of photographic documentation of his outdoor interventions, as well as series of 14 elaborate, mostly sculptural installations. Continuing onto his recognizable aesthetics and visual language, the new pieces are lifting Seth's work into a whole new sphere through clever use of sculpture. Imitating the labyrinths of the alleys of old Shanghai, the exhibition resembles an initiatory journey though corridors, halls and tunnels packed with site specific works that directly connect to his public installations. Created using materials collected in the neighborhoods where they were originally painted, the transformation of Seth's practice and oeuvre has come the full circle with this milestone installation. —Sasha Bogojev
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