Pristine Na veté 

37 years ago, a twenty-six year old Dutch artist first set his foot on newly open-up China. Pedro Bakker visited Chongqing China again 37 years later and has made himself home in Huangjiaoping Street for eight months, enjoying hot pot and noodles in local stands and strolling supermarkets in pajamas.

It is said dull people are blessed in this real world. Being dull may save  people from being miserable while some misery can be lethal.

But Bakker was born extraordinary sensitive. He shouldn't have been so exquisite that all the harm wrought in his long life became so real. It is really a fortune he is endowed in creation and painting the reality he has devoted most of his life to resurrect his past, reality itself and his mother. He spent so much time in painting he could not tell which is the real past. The reality , where his mother remains the same way he loved the most, created by himself has been stared too long to believe if stories over that women in grave ever existed or just his own fantasy.

We can see the works of Bakker are reflection of his life and fantasy.  They are so real that we have to exchange with our own life to see it through. The reality of life revealed in front of us by Bakker make us all purified and pristine.

We can see the works of Bakker are reflection of his life and fantasy.  They are so real that we have to exchange with our own life to see it through. The reality of life revealed in front of us by Bakker make us all purified and pristine.

Here are colored painting works of his narrating the story of a woman trying to take control of her fate but eventually doomed. Bakker revived Shumeng, who once was an actress from Shanghai In the 30's, in daily life scenes as dancing in the square and having hot pot with friends. Shumeng was placed in an old-fashioned wedding background from her movies with staffs from Shifang Art Center where her character was created in na veté.  Bakker emphasizes  and restructures on comparison of black and white scenes from movies to interweave historic public images with his imagination to an entirely real masterpiece where all people are pristine and naive.

Shumeng eventually married someone in power after three times failure. Was she happy? Was she comfortable in the uniform of power which started from romance? Did she love her ever rising husband better than her dancing, piano or photography? She had nothing to do with power until one day she turned Yangko dance into a feast parade. Red accompanied her destruction while she grew more comfortable in the uniform. Did her madness originate from retaliation or desire?

Would her pristine na veté perish with her?

Bakker with Shumeng, 8 months, 244 days.

Come for answers tonight（13th June）.

- Tu Zeng

Jun, 2015

Pedro Bakker’s eight month's residency is funded by the Mondriaanfund and supported by Het Materiaalfonds and Voordekunst.