刊登媒体：环球时报（2009年8月7日出版）

A unique student art exhibition that aims to give young Chinese artists a chance to show their talent opened yesterday, a move coincide with the 60th National Day celebrations.

“Giant Cup” Today National Art Students Annual Awards 2009, organized by the Today Art Museum, exhibits 300 works of 296 college students from all over the country.

Besides using red, which is often overused in contemporary art because of its cultural and political significance, these students were determined to broaden the color spectrum, mixing black and white to express their own thoughts on art.

“Although these young artists are still finding their mature voices,” Zhang Zikang, the director of Today Art Museum said at a press conference, “their work is brimming with imagination and creativity.”

Zou Liuhao, 23, a student at the Academy of Arts & Design at Tsinghua University, won first place for his work “Luna,” which depicts a girl and many different paths her imagination can take.

Getting first prize struck him like lightning. Zou found himself awestruck on stage, saying nothing but “Thank you very much.”

“It’s the conservative artwork that always seems to get rewarded in China,” Zou told the Global Times after the awards.

When asked about his style, Zou answered with a shrug.

“You can paint whatever style you want, but in the end it’s up to the university or ‘experts’ to decide if it’s good or not.”

Some works by students willing to take risks in subject matter were not so welcome at the exhibition.

The second-prize winner Yu Ying, a student at the same university, is frustrated that yet another one of his works, this time depicting two naked women intimately lying together in a bedroom, was banned from the exhibition by his college.

Inspired by the homosexually charged Chinese film Butterfly, Yu “secretly” finished his graduation projects and brought them to the exhibition himself.

Still, his Tsinghua professors managed to remove his “inappropriate” artwork off the walls at the last minute.

“They said it’s too erotic.”

Yu said he understands his college’s concerns, and maybe his professors know how things work in the Chinese art world, for one of Yu’s “appropriate” works took home second prize.

Cai Jixuan, another student at Tsinghua, felt frustrated when he saw the title of his painting, Edison Chen, was changed to People’s Series No.16.

His series of paintings is based on the scandals of 16 different celebrities, all of which were exposed and discussed ad nauseum on the Internet. Among those included in his series include Chen, known for his Hong Kong Internet sex scandal, and Zhou Zhenglong, a farmer from Shaanxi Province who faked a photograph of what is believed to be an extinct species of tiger.

He had also made mosaic masks over the eyes of the celebrities he believed to have had bad influences on society.

“They say the eyes are the window to the soul. But how well do we really know these celebrities,” Cai asked.

“The things we get from the media are not always correct,” he added.

About 40 out of 296 college students won prizes in four different categories including Chinese painting, oil painting, woodcarving and sculpture.