Drawing and Quartering, from the series Five Capital Punishments in China,

2000–03

Incensed by the Tiananmen Square Massacre of 1989, Zhi seeks to prevent history from repeating itself by using a language that merges traditional Chinese painting, Renaissance figuration, and twentieth-century protest art. In the series Five Capital Punishments, Zhi questions the efficacy of state-sponsored execution while critiquing public indifference to—and enjoyment of—such events. The series includes five monumental canvases presented as if they were scrolls, each depicting a different method of execution: flaying, starvation, decapitation, drawing and quartering, and the firing squad. Here, a throng of gleeful onlookers watches as Chinese officials tie the limbs of a motionless man to the saddles of four horses. Like David Wojnarowicz, whose work is also on view in this gallery, the
artist seeks change by drawing attention to such events and thus engages in an act of fundamental hope.