The first place the twenty-year-old Yan Pei-Ming visited in France in 1980 was Ornans, the birthplace of the French Realist Gustave Courbet. Thirty-nine years later, he takes the 200th anniversary of the birthday of his hero as an opportunity to show monumental reverence toward him and his masterpiece, An Interment in Ornans (1849/50) at the Musée d’Orsay. Yan Pei-Ming transforms and translates this scene into a contemporary Interment in Shanghai, the city where he grew up, and where his mother is buried. The artist’s book documents this undertaking in 290 divisible fragments. When assembled, they form the painting in its original size, which is more than six meters wide and three meters high.

YAN PEI-MING (*1960, Shanghai) grew up during the Cultural Revolution in China. In 1980 he went to France to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Dijon. He has had solo shows at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing; the Musée du Louvre; and at the David Zwirner Gallery in New York. He also participated in the Biennials in Venice (1995, 2003), Seville (2006), and Istanbul (2007).

EXHIBITION
Musée d’Orsay, Paris
​October 1, 2019—January 19, 2020

YAN PEI-MING (*1960, Shanghai) grew up during the Cultural Revolution in China. In 1980 he went to France to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Dijon. He has had solo shows at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing; the Musée du Louvre; and at the David Zwirner Gallery in New York. He also participated in the Biennials in Venice (1995, 2003), Seville (2006), and Istanbul (2007).