Cai Guo-Qiang: Fallen Blossoms is the result of a close collaboration between the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Fabric Workshop and Museum.

Conceived as an homage to the late Anne d’Harnoncourt, former director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the exhibition gracefully addresses time’s passing and the role that memory and memorials play in attending to the past. Internationally renowned artist Cai Guo-Qiang has engaged with these themes in a profound and lyrical manner.

At the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the exhibition will consist of two components: a series of gunpowder drawings titled Light Passage, and an explosion event, Fallen Blossoms: Explosion Project, scheduled for December 11th on the Museum’s East façade. A video projection of this explosion event will be on display at The Fabric Workshop and Museum in addition to two new works: Time Scroll and Time Flies like a Weaving Shuttle. These works, like the rest of the exhibition, gracefully address time's passage and the role memory and memorials play in attending to the past.

photo: Cai Guo-Qiang, Light Passage—Autumn, 2007, gunpowder on paper, 400 x 600 cm (157.48 x 236.22 in.). Collection of the artist. Photo by Tatsumi Masatoshi, courtesy Cai Studio.

Curators
Carlos Basualdo • the Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Curator of Contemporary Art
Adelina Vlas • Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art

On View: December 11, 2009 - March 21, 2010
Explosion event: Friday, December 11 at 4PM, East Terrace, Main Building
Exhibition: Gallery 172, first floor

Venue: Philadelphia Museum of Art
26th Street and the Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, PA 19130
Tel. 215-763-8100
http://philamuseum.org

The Fabric Workshop and Museum
1214 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107
215.561.8888
http://fabricworkshopandmuseum.org