Sun Xun at Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

Sun Xun (b. 1980, Fuxin, China) is one of China’s most exciting young artists, best known for his stop-motion animations that are based on thousands of ink paintings, charcoal drawings and woodcuts.

Containing very little dialogue, these hand-made films use combinations of image, sound and text to raise questions about what we perceive as truth and explore the slippery dynamics of memory, history, culture and politics.

Sun Xun’s works often highlight the absurd incongruities between authorised histories and personal recollections, and are particularly concerned with how history can be manipulated, interrogating the  differences between official narratives presented by public agencies, politicians and the media — and more marginalised accounts that stem from ordinary people’s experiences.

This is Sun Xun’s first solo exhibition in Australia. The exhibition includes a number of the artist’s most important animated works and encompasses both the MCA’s Level 1 North & South Galleries. MCA Curator Anna Davis has invited the artist to create a major new work for the exhibition, which will involve him and a small team working ‘in residence’ over one week to complete a large-scale installation in view of the public.