This painting may first appear alluringly tranquil—and natural—but the context behind it is anything but. The work is included in Gordon Cheung’s latest exhibition at Edel Assanti gallery in London, which continues the artist’s exploration into China’s twenty-first-century status as a global superpower. He hones in on numerous infrastructure projects, which are mammoth in scale, rendering cityscapes from satellite imagery and creating stunning constellations marking out future geopolitical maps in the sky. Cheung is inspired by the combination of enticing aesthetics and dark undercurrent that runs through science fiction, and his heavily layered works include pages from the Financial Times—a nod to the powers that drive this “progress”. Beautiful and terrifying viewing.
