Charles Billich Bing Mah Yong Exhibit |
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Charles Billich, an internationally acclaimed artist from Australia, is the Official Sports Artist for the Beijing 2008 Olympics. A previous recipient of the United States Sports Academy's 2000 Sport Artist of the Year Award, he has served as the official artist of the Olympic Games before, earning the honor during the 2000 Sydney Olympics. He was recently named the official artist for the World Rugby Championships, which were held in 2004.
The Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee's successful bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games was won while using a Billich painting entitled "Beijing Cityscape." Following this success, Billich created a series of paintings based on the "Bing Ma Yong" terra cotta warriors. Here we see Billich "manipulating reality" by featuring the terra cotta soldiers of ancient China as modern Olympians. This is in keeping with how Billich describes his work. He states, "I manipulate reality. I turn it into some kind of symbolic analysis, which works on several levels of meaning. There is a touch of irony in what I paint as there is in all surreal art. It contains a fair amount of humor."
View a Flash slideshow of Billich's Bing Mah Yong exhibit.
Other Featured Exhibits:
- The Road to the Beijing Olympiad 2008 Through Art
- Wyland — Faster, Higher, Stronger
- Cristóbal Gabarrón — 100 Years of The Modern Olympics
- Charles Billich — Bing Mah Yongs
- Bruce Larsen — Found Object Sculptures
- Jim Ridlon — NFL Assemblages
- Stephen Holland — Hockey Series & Woodblock prints
