Carl Cheng

Cheng was born in San Francisco, California in 1942.{{Cite web |last=Dalbow |first=Tara Anne |date=2024 |title=Carl Cheng : A Ceaseless Encounter With Nature, An Enduring Vision |url=https://www.flaunt.com/post/carl-cheng-close-encounters-issue |access-date=2025-01-09 |website=Flaunt Magazine |series=Issue 194}} His parents were immigrants from the Guandong province of southern China.{{Cite web |last=Liou |first=Caroline Ellen |last2=Holyoak |first2=Vanessa |date=2022-04-24 |title=The Experimental Laboratory of Artist-Inventor Carl Cheng |url=https://hyperallergic.com/726479/the-experimental-laboratory-of-artist-inventor-carl-cheng/ |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=Hyperallergic |language=en-US}} He was raised in the San Fernando Valley with his two brothers.{{cite web |last1=Whittaker |first1=Richard |date=May 2, 2004 |title=A Conversation with Carl Cheng, by Richard Whittaker |url=https://www.conversations.org/story.php?sid=58 |access-date=22 December 2021 |website=Works & Conversations}}

Cheng attended the University of California, Los Angeles in the 1960s for his bachelor's (1963) and master's (1967) degrees, initially studying fine art and industrial design before moving into photography and new media.{{Cite web |date=2016-10-27 |title=Carl Cheng |url=https://www.lacountyarts.org/carl-cheng |access-date=2025-01-09 |website=LA County Department of Arts and Culture |language=en}}{{Cite journal |last=Damman |first=Catherine |date=Spring 2021 |title=Art, Technology, Crisis: The Work of Carl Cheng |url=https://journalpanorama.org/article/asian-american-art/art-technology-crisis/#markerref-11480-5 |journal=Panorama: Journal of the Association of Historians of American Art |volume=7 |issue=1}}{{Cite web |title=Exhibition History: UCLA Arists in the Hammer Museum Collections |url=https://hammer.ucla.edu/collections/ucla-artists-in-the-hammer-museum-collections/resources/exhibition-history |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=Hammer Museum |language=en}} During his time at UCLA, he became deeply influenced by the technological advancements and environmental concerns of the era, which would become central to his artistic practice.{{Cite web |last=Davis |first=Grace |last2= |first2= |date=2025-01-08 |title=First Major Museum Survey of Carl Cheng Opens at ICA Philadelphia |url=https://hyperallergic.com/979960/first-major-museum-survey-of-carl-cheng-opens-at-ica-philadelphia/ |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=Hyperallergic |language=en-US}} He also spent time studying the Bauhaus-style curriculum at the Folkwang School of the Arts in Essen, Germany and briefly worked for designers Charles and Ray Eames.

In the late 1960s and 1970s, Cheng created work under the pseudo-anonymous moniker John Doe Co., incorporating his studio under that name in 1967.{{Cite web |title=Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses |url=https://thecontemporaryaustin.org/exhibitions/carl-cheng-nature-never-loses/ |access-date=2025-01-09 |website=The Contemporary Austin |language=en}}{{cite journal |last1=Masters |first1=HG |title=Research and Development |journal=Art Asia Pacific |date=2021 |issue=124 |pages=52–61}} A range of practical and conceptual explanations for this decision by both Cheng himself and art critics, curators, and historians writing about his work, including that the move was a critique of corporate culture,{{Cite web |title=Alex Klein: The Austin Contemporary |url=https://teigerfoundation.org/grants/2023/alex-klein |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=Teiger Foundation |language=en}} that accountant advised him that it would be beneficial for tax reasons, and because other hi-tech companies were more likely to respond to his requests for material samples if it came on company letterhead.{{cite web |last1=Whittaker |first1=Richard |date=2004-05-02 |title=A Conversation with Carl Cheng: The John Doe Company |url=https://www.conversations.org/story.php?sid=58 |access-date=22 December 2021 |website=Works & Conversations}} His choice of the name "John Doe" also reflected a desire to highlight and undermine anti-Asian discrimination in the wake of the Vietnam War.{{Cite web |last=Hannah Sage |first=Kaye |date=2024-12-06 |title=Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses |url=https://brooklynrail.org/2024/11/artseen/carl-cheng-nature-never-loses/ |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=The Brooklyn Rail |language=en}}

Cheng produced John Doe Co. brochures to advertise his works during this time, using the language of tools, machines, devices, and products to describe them.{{Cite web |last=Masters |first=HG |date=2021-07-01 |title=Carl Cheng: Research and Development |url=https://artasiapacific.com/issue/124-feature-carl-cheng-research-and-development?locale=en |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=ArtAsiaPacific |series=Issue 124}} Early Warning System (1967) incorporated a projector system and responded to weather reports. Sculptural "nature machines" such as his Erosion Machine series (1969) simulated natural processes, offering viewers opportunities to engage directly with controlled ecological systems. In Emergency Nature Supply Kit (1970), Cheng provided viewers with a handheld carrying case filled with a patch of grass and a device for playing bird sounds to be used in an apocalyptic scenario, as demonstrated in an included film strip. Supply and Demand (1972) created an enclosed humidified system for growing venus flytraps.

From the 1980s onward, Cheng expanded his practice with larger installations and public art projects that interrogated humanity’s impact on the environment. Cheng’s Natural Museum of Modern Art series (1978–80) created immersive, site-specific installation in a condemned building on the Santa Monica Pier. The installation included an interactive coin-operated kiosk that used organic tools such as seashells and pelican beaks to create patterns in sand.{{Cite web |last=Bury |first=Louis |date=2024-11-27 |title=Artist-Tinkerer Carl Cheng Teaches a Lesson in Surrendering to Systems |url=https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/aia-reviews/carl-cheng-contemporary-austin-ecological-systems-1234725008/ |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=ARTnews |language=en-US}} His first public art commission, Seattle Underwater (1980) presented a water-filled window frame at a high viewpoint in Seattle, where visitors saw the city submerged underwater with bubbles rising, leaving its meaning open to interpretation. Another public art commission, Santa Monica Art Tool (Walk on L.A.) (1983–88), was a large concrete roller designed to be dragged behind a tractor across the sand, imprinting a three-dimensional model of the city onto the beach that could be erased by footprints or the wind.

In Anthropocene Landscape (2006), Cheng arranged grids of green and gold computer microchips to resemble industrial agricultural landscapes. His interactive installation Tar Pool Project (2020), developed during a residency at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), contained pool of bubbling tar that mimicked natural asphalt seeps.{{Cite web |date=2019-06-25 |title=Introducing Carl Cheng’s "Tar Pool Project" |url=https://unframed.lacma.org/2019/06/25/introducing-carl-cheng%E2%80%99s-tar-pool-project |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=Unframed |language=en}} More recently, in Human Landscapes (2024), Cheng created an abstract, large-scale topographical map in sand within a gallery space.

Major exhibitions of Cheng's work include Human Nature at Philip Martin Gallery (2022) and Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses at the Contemporary Austin (2024) and Philadelphia Institute of Contemporary Art (2025).{{Cite web |title=Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses |url=https://thecontemporaryaustin.org/exhibitions/carl-cheng-nature-never-loses/ |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=The Contemporary Austin |language=en}}{{Cite web |title=Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses |url=https://www.pewcenterarts.org/grant/carl-cheng-nature-never-loses |access-date=2025-01-10 |website=The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage |language=en}} Cheng received an Art + Technology Grant from LACMA in 2017.

{{Reflist}}

• [http://johndoecompany.com/ Official John Doe Co. website]

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Category:1942 births

Category:Living people

Category:American new media artists

Category:American artists of Chinese descent

Category:University of California, Los Angeles alumni