Witness the Moment of Detonation! Artist Cai Guo-Qiang Launches NFT Artwork Created through Explosions, Proceeds from Auction to Benefit the Shanghai Bund Art Museum

Artist Cai Guo-Qiang is internationally renowned for his "explosion art" created with gunpowder. He has collaborated with the Shanghai Bund Art Museum, TR Lab, Amber Group, and Christie's to turn 100 explosion moments into an NFT artwork.

"Eternal Instant - The Detonation of 101 Gunpowder Paintings"

The artwork will be released on TR Lab's online platform trlab.com on July 14, 2021, and will be available for online charity auction for 48 hours, continuing to be exhibited until August 14 of the same year.

Cai Guoqiang stated, "‘Eternal Instant’ is the existence of the detonation of gunpowder paintings itself; it is not the traditional recording of the moment of explosion that can be permanently preserved in images and photos, nor is it the physical gunpowder painting born from the explosion... The moment of explosion is chaotic in time and space, as if connecting to the ‘primordial fireball’ of a newborn cosmic nova, accompanied by piety and unease, awaiting the sense of fate of the unknown. The detonation moment of each work is unique, each one condensed with the environmental climate of the time and place, containing a small divination of fate experienced collectively by me and the people around me, experiencing a brief dislocation and trance... Can we create more forward-looking, formal, and conceptual art projects starting from the core values unique to NFT technology through this project?"

Larys Frogier, Director of the Shanghai Power Station of Art, stated, "In 2010, Cai Guoqiang transformed inventions made by ‘low-tech’ farmers into the exhibition ‘Peasant Da Vincis,’ which toured the world after its debut at the Shanghai Power Station of Art, with a stop in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, becoming the most visited exhibition by living artists worldwide in 2013. Today, over a decade later, the artist combines the birth moment of gunpowder paintings with ‘high-tech’ NFT to create an art project, continuing the discussion on the boundaries of art: what is the artist's work, what is the art project? Also, it symbolizes the ‘moment and eternity’ of the digital age represented by NFT and the core question of ‘value storage.’ In the era of isolation during and after the pandemic, this serves as a contemplation on the weight of the temporary existence in the river of time."

It is claimed that half of the auction proceeds will be donated to the Shanghai Power Station of Art, and the other half will be gifted to the Cai Guoqiang Foundation in New York.

About Cai Guoqiang: