Zhou Yan Contemporary Chinese Art Archive 周彦当代中国艺术档案
Preview
![image preview](https://digital.kenyon.edu/zhou/1173/preview.jpg)
Date
5-1994
Format
Photograph
Date of Exhibition Event
1994
Location of Exhibition Event
Dongcun, Beijing, China
Materials
Photograph
Description
Fen·Ma Liuming is an alter ego of the artist Ma according with the female societal conventions. The alter ego was born out of a coincidence in 1993. As Ma was hanging out with a group of friends that year, a female friend from Hong Kong invited Ma to exchange clothings with her. After seeing the photos of himself in a beautiful dress (Ma back then kept long hair), the artist was greatly inspired and decided to create a female alter ego for his(her) artistic expressions. Fen·Ma Liuming was born under such an occasion. Fen (芬)in Chinese shares the same phonetic as Fen (分), meaning separation. Assigning Fen (芬)as his alter ego's first name, Ma may wish to highlight the separation existed in the conception of "feminine beauty" and his own sex that circulated in his society. (Jin,Art of Ma Liuming 马六明的艺术,2016,Meishu Wenxian 美术文献, issue 10, ISSN:1673-4858); see also (Luo, “雌雄同体”的行为艺术家马六明, artvisions, available on https://artvisions.fr/zh/portfolio-item/entretien-avec-%E9%9B%8C%E9%9B%84%E5%90%8C%E4%BD%93%E7%9A%84%E8%A1%8C%E4%B8%BA%E8%89%BA%E6%9C%AF%E5%AE%B6%E9%A9%AC%E5%85%AD%E6%98%8E/) (Lv, 芬·马六明的诞生, 2015, available on http://www.artda.cn/view.php?tid=9656&cid=21) (Jerry Wu'23).