The towering and undulating silos create a new space with a strong sense of spatial awareness, breaking free from everyday architectural forms. Amid the bustling traffic carrying grain and goods, within a city constructed of railways, bridges, and cranes, a massive, vertical concrete structure suddenly rises, contrasting and complementing everything around it under the flourishing city skyline.
As the inaugural exhibition of the gallery's new grain warehouse space, "Silo, Computing Power, Vertical Dream" begins with the establishment of this unique exhibition space: the silos, built at the turn of the century, have transitioned from storing reserve grain to focusing on the production of contemporary cultural content.
The architectural transformation of the space and the shifting contexts represent a change in the functional application of social space. The exhibition views this as a projection of the transformation of social activities and economic development, specifically showcasing the dynamics of postmodern labor and production relations under the dominance of emerging technology industries, algorithmic logic, and platform economies. It aims to outline and explore the nonlinear connections between social relations and spatial structures, addressing the current development status and challenges faced by contemporary cities.
The exhibition brings together paintings, videos, sculptures, and site-specific installations by 12 artists, analyzing and responding to the dramatic changes in social production structures and the resulting temporal and spatial fluidity that characterize contemporary social production relations and organizational forms. It aims to offer interpretations, reflections, and approaches for understanding the emerging social spatial practices that are present today and will become more prevalent in the future.
The predecessor of the new grain warehouse, the Anhui Mechanical Grain Storage Facility, was initiated in 1992. It served as a hub for grain procurement, storage, processing, and trade, facilitating grain reserves and circulation in response to the social context and demands of that time.
Today, the former six grain silos are repurposed as artistic spaces, while new silos are being rebuilt into cultural and commercial hubs as part of urban renewal. The transformation of the silos' functions symbolizes the translation of micro-social living environments, representing changes in social practices. The concrete walls, still bearing the remnants of rice husks, stand as a monument recording the shifts of an era. The qualities and meanings of the space itself become indices revealing the social and production transformations of the area.
