DEMETER

Project for Obihiro
Sky Bound UFO and Shrine (2002)

From the 30m diameter UFO, hangs the shrine which appears in the sky at the racetrack.
Cai Guo Quiang's project for Obihiro displays a strong concern with connection between
the human being and the universe.

Cai Guo Qiang presented the above plan for Demeter, but for safety reasons the UFO launch was cancelled because of structural damage to the balloon caused by the typhoon winds that were blowing during installation. The 30-metre UFO was filled with air and installed on the ground as a work of art that will serve to remind us of the dream.
The event using the UFO and gunpowder was also cancelled because of the change in the content of the exhibition piece.
(Takashi Serizawa: General Director, Demeter).

Born in Quanzhou City, Fujian Provice, China, in 1957
Lives in New York City

While Cai is well known for his large-scale projects with gunpowder explosions, materials for his other works interestingly vary from Chinese medicine, automotive scraps, and Chinese traditional therapists, to Fengshui masters. What is common in the background is "the dialogue between nature and people." He interrogates the proof of history and infinite life force on the surface of nature and creates artworks out of them. A perfect system appears when people, artwork, and nature become one.

2001	Yokahama Triennale(Yokohama, Japan)
2000	Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale(Nigata, Japan)
1999, 1997, 1995	Venice Biennale(Venice, Italy)
1998	Taipei Biennale(Taipei, Taiwan)
1997	Istanbul Biennale(Istanbul, Turkey)

On August 26th, Cai Guo Qiang flew from Osaka to Sapporo and came to Obihiro the following day on the train. This is Cai's second time in Obihiro. He is very relaxed and accompanying his wife, Wu Hong Hong and his daughter Cai Wen You. The family enjoyed the grand landscape of Tokachi from the train. After a day later, Shigeaki Iwai and Winter & Hoerbert joined us in Obihiro and it became one big party. We all walked on the racetrack on the grass. Winter asks Cai, "Have you come up with any plans?" Cai smiles and answers, "Not yet." These artists began to be conscious of one another. "Working in Europe and the United States, I think of social issues, but in Japan, I don't know why but I think of the universe," Cai said and looked up in the sky. Pure white shining clouds were lined like a flock of sheeps and the blue half-globe was spreading over us.