Zhang Kun reports that the library hosts a multi-level show on animal depictions in art and animation.
Young visitors can get into the spirit of the Zodiac Art Exhibition, which features 300 depictions of the animal at the Shanghai Library's Pudong branch. SUN ZHONGQIN As 2023 is the Year of the Rabbit, according to the Chinese zodiac, more than 300 depictions of the animal in paintings, cartoons and digital programs are being shown at the Zodiac Art Exhibition, an exhibition of artworks at the Shanghai Library's Pudong branch, which will run until February 19.
The exhibition is being hosted by the Shanghai Art and Cartoon Association, the Shanghai Animation and Cartoon Association and the Shanghai Library.
Sun Shaobo, director of the Shanghai Animation and Cartoon Association, said that the exhibition organizers had received 2,500 submissions on rabbits from China and another 200 from 40 other countries and regions in a month.
Young visitors can get into the spirit of the Zodiac Art Exhibition, which features 300 depictions of the animal at the Shanghai Library's Pudong branch. SUN ZHONGQIN Each section of the exhibition features a unique theme - Chinese festive rabbits, avant-garde designers' rabbits and rabbits by renowned artists.
The Pudong branch of the Shanghai Library opened in September and was officially opened to the public. The largest single library construction project in the country has a total of 115,000 square meters. The artworks are scattered in open areas over the building's seven stories.
The chairman of the Shanghai Artists' Association, Zheng Xinyao, has been making a series of cartoons of Chinese zodiac animals each year, and his latest piece, a rabbit drawn with a few simple strokes, is one of the first artworks to greet visitors.
Young visitors can get into the spirit of the Zodiac Art Exhibition, which displays 300 depictions of the animal at the Shanghai Library's Pudong branch. SUN ZHONGQIN We have put together rabbits on a wide variety of media, from ink and oil paintings to wood prints, sculptures, paper-cutting and so on, Sun says.
Sun adds that the rabbit is one of the most versatile animals for cartoon and animation art.
Overseas artists have created cartoons of rabbits that have been liked by children through generations, such as Peter Rabbit, Bugs Bunny and Miffy.
In China, cartoonist Du Jianguo created a bunny named Fei Fei, the leading character in comic strips serialized on the Good Child pictorial in the 1980s and the 1990s. Fei Fei is presented on the ground floor with another rabbit from the 1980 Chinese cartoon movie The Snow Child.
From armor-clad robot rabbits to a huge black rabbit perched on top of the library building in the exhibition poster, the show at the library presents different personalities and images of the animal.
Young visitors get into the spirit of the Zodiac Art Exhibition, which features 300 depictions of the animal at the Shanghai Library's Pudong branch. SUN ZHONGQIN Last month, artist Huang Yongyu designed a postal stamp in celebration of the Year of the Rabbit, sparking heated discussion online.
Some criticized the image of a mischievous blue rabbit as vicious and ominous Xu Jiahe, art critic with Xinmin Evening News, a Shanghai-based newspaper, arguing: Why can't rabbits be cynical, weird or even fierce? Art has to go beyond catering to people's expectations and what is recognized and accepted to create novel imagery that is interesting.