WEINING CAI

The interpretation of the series – sex objects can be addressed from three perspectives – politics, feminism and religion.

Firstly, through the window of politics. As a Chinese, during my overseas experience, I noticed ideological contrasts among people from different cultural backgrounds. China, in comparison to Europe, is far more traditional and close-minded when it comes to sex and certain political views. In my work, the reason why I made a connection between food and sex is the special bond I have with rice - the staple food of the Chinese.  Especially from the experience of living in European countries, rice is the most important food in my daily diet.

Interestingly, the Chinese cannot talk about sex openly in China. However, China has the largest population (1.4 billion) in the world. In this case, I suspect that there are millions of sexual activities happening in China every day, just like we eat rice every day, which fulfils one of the basic human needs to eat.

My artwork contains black humor. Except for the comedic visual effect, the installation conveys a critical idea – ‘No food, no honey’, as a metaphor of sex.

In terms of feminism, my idea is to address the objectification of women. The visual effect of the sex objects is also a metaphor of the objectification of women. Most of the time, women see themselves through the eyes and aesthetic judgment of men, such as charming, tender and sexy, so that women don't know how to see themselves through their own aesthetics.Tights and rice are two crucial materials in my artwork. Tights are one of the women's lingerie, and they are associated with ‘sexy’ to some extent. I use tights instead of using skirts, cosmetics, and other iconic feminine objects to represent women. As a Chinese, rice is the staple food for me, so I connected food to sex as a metaphor addressing the universality of sex. It is also an objectification of women's breasts in Chinese buns.

Childbearing has been taken for granted by women since ancient time. For example, in the Bible story - The garden of Eden describes when God heard that Adam and Eve had eaten the 'forbidden fruit', as punishment, God gave Eve the pain of childbirth and drove her into the human world. In the story, childbirth has been a woman’s responsibility since ancient times. How should females view themselves? Could they gid rid of males' gaze?

Last but not least, from the perspective of religion – Christianity. My work also questions the relationship between sex and Christianity. The idea of the work derived from my living period of Poland, which is a predominantly Christian country. The reason why I exhibit the work in the church is because I wanted to question whether the governor should govern the country by the rules of religion. From the perspective of Christianity, Christians cannot have sex before getting married. However, I install the sex objects in the church is provocative. Some radicalists may feel interested in by the installation of sex objects within a church. However, old believers would feel it is a blasphemy of the God.

So, how do we interpret sex from different situations?