Sun Yuan and Peng Yu (born 1974) are artists living and working collaboratively in Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

.

Sun was born in Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

 and Peng in Heilongjiang

Heilongjiang

For the river known in Mandarin as Heilong Jiang, see Amur River' is a province of the People's Republic of China located in the northeastern part of the country. "Heilongjiang" literally means Black Dragon River, which is the Chinese name for the Amur. The one-character abbreviation is 黑...

. Sun and Peng are contemporary conceptual

Conceptual art

Conceptual art is art in which the concept or idea involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns. Many of the works, sometimes called installations, of the artist Sol LeWitt may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions...

 artists whose work has a reputation for being confrontational – they have previously used live animals in their installations.

As their contribution to the 2005 Venice Biennale

Venice Biennale

The Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...

, the duo invited Chinese farmer Du Wenda to present his home-made UFO at the Chinese Pavilion.
They won the Contemporary Chinese Art Award in 2001.

Their 2009 solo exhibition, "Freedom", at Tang Contemporary in Beijing, was seen by some critics as a memorial to the Tiananmen Square incident. The installation featured a large fire-hose hooked to a chain that erupted water spray at a distance of 120 meters. .

Selected exhibitions

2009

Unveiled: New Art Fom The Meaddle East, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK

2006

Liverpool Biennial, Tang Contemporary Art, Liverpool, UK

2005

Venice Biennale

Mahjong: Chinese Contemporary Art from Uli Sigg Collection, Art Museum Bern, Switzerland

2004

Between Past and Future: New Photography and Video From China, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, USA

Australia: Asia Traffic, Asia-Australia Arts Centre

The Virtue and the Vice: le Moine et le Demon, Museum of Contemporary Art, Lyon, France

All Under Heaven: Ancient and Contemporary Chinese Art, The Collection of the Guy and Myriam Ullens Foundation, MuHKA Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp, Belgium

2003

Second Hand Reality: Post Reality, Today Art Museum, Beijing, China

2001

Get Out of Control, Berlin, Germany

Yokohama 2001 International Triennial of Contemporary Art, Yokohama, Japan

External links

• The artists’ official site
• Sun Yuan and Peng Yu on ArtNet.com
• Sun Yuan and Peng Yu’s contribution to the 2001 Yokohama Triennale
• Further information from the Saatchi Gallery