Palais de Tokyo presents the very first solo exhibition in France of Chinese young artist Tianzhuo Chen (born 1985, lives and works in Beijing, China), one of the most promising artists of his generation.

Tianzhuo Chen uses a colourful, grotesque and kitsch imagery, dominated by direct references to drugs, LGBT hip hop, the London rave scene, Japanese Butoh, voguing in New York and the fashion world, to forge an intimate connection between his works and the collapse of moral attitudes and beliefs we see around us.

Tianzhuo Chen’s characters may seem strangely familiar. This is because they are caricatures of our celebrity-filled daily lives. Everything a celebrity says or does becomes a new mythology and creates a new system of beliefs which fans follow blindly. For his solo exhibition at Palais de Tokyo, Tianzhuo Chen is putting together a collection of hitherto unseen works, including a performance with artist and dancer Beio and the artist collective House of Drama from Paris.

Mixing painting, drawing, installation, video and performance, his works incorporate a number of religious symbols into iconographic elements borrowed from several urban subcultures which are shared by a global youth culture.

Curator: Khairuddin Hori, deputy programming director at Palais de Tokyo