Regular Fragile: Interview with Liu Jianhua
By Wei Hao Qi
Portrait of
Liu Jianhua was one of the first Chinese artists that I met when I moved to Shanghai in 2016. By coincidence, he had just returned from my hometown in New Zealand where his exhibition, “Transfer” had opened in February that year. Seated together at a dinner, we spoke at length about his time in New Zealand, and despite my terrible Mandarin, we discussed doing an interview for a book I was planning. The book didn’t happen and the interview didn’t take place until we met again in the summer of 2018 and he reminded me of it. Liu is one of those people who emits calm and befriends everyone. As my taxi pulled up to the gate at his Shanghai studio complex in August for our long overdue conversation, the suspicious demeanor of the guard melted like butter when I explained who I was there to see. “Please go inside” he smiled, “don’t keep teacher Liu waiting!”
