Reporter: Anais Martane Editor’s Note: In the post-pandemic era, environmental issues remain as challenging as ever. As human society gradually returns to normal operation, the countdown to the depletion of Earth’s resources has not stopped, and environmental pollution remains a global problem. “Artistic expression is a powerful way of communication, which, compared with conventional calls, can arouse people’s resonance and concern for environmental issues, create a space for the public to feel and explore, and guide the public towards nature conservation and natural sustainability.” Contemporary famous environmental protection performance artist and famous environmental protection video planning artist Zhi Hongbo has created many extremely inspiring environmental protection performance art works with novel and unique perspectives and rich artistic expressions, presenting environmental protection concepts to the public in the form of art, and awakening people to continue to pay attention to and value the environmental issues. The “MEDUSA, la Gorgone” Art Prize Exhibition 2024 was held at the headquarters of the Villa Trossi Uberti Art Foundation in the picturesque city of Livorno. This exhibition is jointly organized by ISOLART GALLERY, the Italian “Trossi-Uberti” Art Foundation, the Livorno Municipal Government, the Italian National Art Association, the Italian NOMYA Cultural Development Association, and other professional institutions, bringing together outstanding artists from all over the world. In the exhibition, Zhi Hongbo’s video work “Ruins, Ocean, Burning” stood out among many participating artists and won the Premio di Dinamico Visuale Eccellente. Taking this opportunity, the famous French art reporter Anais Martane interviewed the artist Mr. Zhi Hongbo. Reporter: Anais Martane (hereinafter referred to as A), Artist: Hongbo Zhi (hereinafter referred to as Z) A: Hello Mr. Zhi; First of all, congratulations on your work winning the Premio di Dinamico Visuale Eccellente Award! This will be one of the highlights of your career, and people are very concerned about what kind of touch made you choose to cross the border from an entrepreneur to use the form of performance art to speak out for the environment? B: When I was very young, I was deeply affected by the polluted river in my hometown. Industrial effluents from upstream were discharged into the Suzi River in our village, which made me and my friends suffer from the pain of playing in the polluted water. We were often covered in big red itchy bumps that would take a week or sometimes months to relieve, and more often than not, we even had to go to the hospital for treatment! The area where I live on the map of China has become a hard-hit area. Many of my childhood friends later engaged in environmental protection work, including me, who was also engaged in the purification of environmentally friendly materials. Because of this, I have been paying attention to the government’s environmental policies and publicity. However, the results of years of publicity in various areas have been minimal, so I have been looking for a better way to publicize environmental protection in a way that can really penetrate people’s hearts and visually shock them. Gradually, I planned and organized a team of environmental performance interpretation, speaking out for the environmental protection through the presentation of performance art interpretation and video recording! It has been more than 10 years since I started my journey, and the difficulties and achievements I have gained have greatly inspired me, which is also the biggest reason that really touched me to cross the border to do environmental art. A: Why have you chosen performance art, such an imaginative and freeform style, to advocate for environmental concepts? B: While thinking about speaking out for the environment, I wanted to try to use the form of performance art to call for attention because I really love performance art. Moreover, I believe that performance art has a stronger visual impact that can shake the senses of the public. By viewing environmental protection through an artistic expression that is full of philosophical concepts and rich in abstract meaning, it can thus affect people to join hands in environmental protection. Environmental protection is imperative, and I am really anxious. The Earth needs the collective efforts of humanity to bring about change, and my own power is too limited. That’s why I keep creating and planning performance art works to advocate for the environment, hoping to awaken everyone to participate in environmental protection. This is also the responsibility of every citizen. A: This form of performance art has caused quite a bit of controversy outside. How do you view these different voices? B: Everyone has different feelings after seeing it, and I accept all evaluations of me completely! What I just want to do is to use performance art interpretation to attack or even exaggerate the phenomenon of pollution. If people still don’t pay attention to environmental protection, how miserable our planet will be. Our children and grandchildren will become extinct, and our present life will be unsafe! A: Where do you mostly draw inspiration for your environmental-themed works? What profound meanings do your works convey? What stories lie behind the creation? B: When I see some polluted phenomena I will have sudden inspiration or even language descriptions, which will give me the impulse to create environmental performance art works. Each of my works contains rich implications. For instance, in my work “Ocean,” there is a boundless sea where a horse stands with its four hooves submerged in the water. A person is clinging to a rock, half his body submerged and pressed down by a thick slab, with the surroundings filled with discarded beverage bottles and tiny pieces of trash left by humans. In the scene, the horse turns its head to look into the distance, and the person also stares intently and painfully in the same direction, as if hoping for the dawn of life and yearning for relief from their suffering. The models use their body language, immersed in the scenario, to perform an environmental performance art that is dynamic yet tranquil, and tranquil yet dynamic, aiming to deliver a significant visual and sensory shock to the audience. In this work I convey two layers of meaning to the viewer: first, the ocean, the horse and the man represent nature, animals and human beings respectively, at the same time the ocean symbolizes the water of life, the hope of life, their destinies are closely related and complementary, and together they form a complete symbiotic circle of the earth. The brownish seawater symbolizes the source of life that has been polluted. The horse and the human looking into the distance together bear witness to the destruction of the symbiotic circle, the disruption of harmonious relationships, and a strong yearning for life. On the second layer, the models conveys his feelings of pain to the viewers with intuitive expressions, and the desire for harmonious symbiosis and the light of life with tense eyes and arms tightly climbing on the rock. I use brown, gray and black as the main colors of the whole work, which makes the warning meaning stronger and the moral effect deeper. In the framework of the conception of the work, I used the multi-dimensional abstract art expression with the ocean as the guide, the characters as the main expression, and the horse and the discarded garbage as the auxiliary expression, so that the whole picture is integrated, which is rich in realism and humanism, and amplifies the visual art form to the extreme, so as to make the idea of protecting the environment penetrate into the hearts of the people more deeply. A: What should we do for the environment? Have you received the expected attention? B: We need to learn the scientific knowledge of environmental protection, start from ourselves, start from the small things around us, develop good habits, and be a positive and optimistic environmentalist. As an artist, I use each of my artworks to advocate for the environment and awaken people to reflect on the destructive actions they have taken against the environment. In the process of social modernization and civilization, although it has benefited human beings a lot, at the same time, it has brought a lot of destructive environmental pollution, which is very worthy of reflection by human beings. I haven’t thought about the expected effect of the attention, and I only put my heart into the expression. Now more and more people support me, too much better than in previous years. And there are many professional environmental public welfare organizations have opened their arms to me, hoping to join hands to call for environmental protection, I believe that the combined power of all of us is endless, and I believe that man will prevail over God. Screenshot As a cross-industry environmental artist,Hongbo Zhi has always believed that exploring different fields and combining various elements is a creative challenge. With his unique creative method and through the form of performance art, he has created meaningful environmental art works that convey profound environmental thoughts and respect and protection for nature to society and individuals. He said: “We often forget that humans are a part of nature. Nature is closely related to us, so if we become detached from nature, it also means that we have lost ourselves.” The post Exclusive Interview | Hongbo Zhi: Reflecting on Human Responsibility through Artistic Behavior appeared first on LA Weekly.