Danful Yang
Fake Armchair
Danful Yang
Born in Shanghai in 1980
Fake
2007
Stained and varnished wood, wood covered in gold leaf, fragments of handbag knock-offs (leather, vinyl, cotton, Ultrasuede, polyester, polyester velour, lacquered metal rings, brass, and chrome-plated metal chains, clasps and rings)
94.8 x 76.5 x 77.3 cm
Produced by XYZ Design, Shanghai
Purchase, the Museum Campaign 1988-1993 Fund, inv. 2009.10.1-2
Decorative Arts and Design
The work of the XYZ collective often parodies globalization and “Made in China” from a Chinese perspective. Here, the designer Danful Yang plays on the concept of imitation (shanzhai) by brilliantly joining a Louis XVI-style golden frame and a traditional Chinese wooden chair. The seat is covered in a patchwork of pieces of fake handbags, identifiable as knock-offs of originals by Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Burberry and Coach. Yang’s aesthetics of cultural hybridity refers not only to the current relationship between the West and China but also, in its reference to contemporary values and status symbols, to questions about how power morphs through time.
