Leo Xu

Background

About Leo Xu

Leo Xu is Senior Director at David Zwirner Gallery in Hong Kong. Prior to joining David Zwirner by the end of 2017, Leo Xu was running his eponymous gallery Leo Xu Projects in Shanghai from 2011 to 2017. The gallery fostered careers of young Chinese artists from its roster, who have since been showing and collected globally. The gallery also introduced to a broad Chinese communities the works of international artists from its representation. Leo Xu Projects had a strong presence in international art fairs (Art Basel in Basel, HK, Miami; Frieze in London and New York; Artissima in Turin; Art021 and Westbund in Shanghai, etc), in addition to its artists constant visibility in biennales and international museum shows. Xu is also a curator and writer responsible for many exhibitions and projects that took place in Mainland China and abroad. Xu’s curatorial strength is new media and the inter-disciplinary, and his research covers the youth cultures and queer cultures in the visual art and its representation. His curatorial endeavors include "The Tell-tale Heart"(2010) a critically well-reviewed exhibition exploring the latest trend in video art, and "Alex: A Tribute to Alexander McQueen"(2010-2011) a show celebrating the cultural legacy of the late designer Alexander McQueen."Boy: A Contemporary Portrait"(2012) re-investigates the cultures and sub-cultures that define young men in the first decade of 21st century."A New Ballardian Vision"(Metro Pictures, 2017) reflect recent social, technological and environmental developments through the lens of author J.G. Ballard’s (1930–2009) writings. Xu is also a critic of contemporary art, and writes extensively for many publications and journals, such as Harper’s Bazaar, L’offciel Homme, Numero, Leap, Art China, Art World, Modern Weekly, Oriental Morning, among many others. He also writes essays for and edits books and exhibition catalogues, such as "Chinese Artists: Texts and Interviews (Chinese contemporary Art Awards)"(2004),"33 Artists: Spanish Printmaking"(2006),"Blog It: New Wave of New Wave"(2008),"Tan Dun's Organic Music"(2008),"YUN-FEI JI: Mistaking Each Other for Ghosts"(2010),"ZHANG HUAN: East Wind, West Wind"(2011),"ALEX KATZ"(2011), etc. As an artist of photography, Xu has exhibited at various venues, like Pinyao International Photography Festival (Pinyao, 2005) and Mono (Duolun Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai, 2005), among many others. Xu also lectured at New York University (NYU) and the photography program School of Visual Art (SVA) in Shanghai.