
Why Li Qiang matters
Li Qiang is a Beijing-based artist known for a distinctive practice of cutting and tearing pages from magazines, comics, and official print media, then reassembling the fragments into portraits and landscapes. His work is held by the White Rabbit Collection in Sydney, one of the largest private collections of contemporary Chinese art in the world, and it has appeared in a collateral exhibition of the Venice Biennale. For collectors, he is a useful case study in an artist with real institutional visibility but, as of this writing, no documented secondary-market track record.
- Nationality
- Chinese
- Media
- Collage, Mixed-media
- Movement
- Contemporary Chinese art
- Education
- Jiangsu Institute of Education (now Jiangsu Second Normal University), graduated 1993
- Signature motifs
- Cut-paper photocollage, Reassembled print-media portraits and landscapes
By the numbers
- White Rabbit Collection, SydneyMuseum collectionMajor private collection of contemporary Chinese art
- Venice Biennale collateral event, 2013International exhibitionVoice of the Unseen, Chinese Independent Art 1979 to Today
- Solo show, 2016Recent exhibitionKlein Sun Gallery (now Eli Klein Gallery), New York
- Not publicly documentedAuction recordNo verified auction result identified as of 2026-07-18
Biography
Li Qiang was born in 1966 in a small town outside Nanjing, in Jiangsu province, China. He graduated in 1993 from the Jiangsu Institute of Education, now known as Jiangsu Second Normal University, and later relocated to Beijing, where he continues to live and work. According to the White Rabbit Collection, he chose his own given name, Qiang, whose character can mean gun or rifle, as a deliberate artistic statement.
His practice involves cutting, tearing, and reassembling pages from magazines and mainstream or official print media into dense collaged portraits and landscapes.
His exhibition history includes the group show Morbid, Our Arts Today at the Nanjing Art Museum in 2005, Le Deluge, apres Mao, China's Surging Creative Tide at the Cress Gallery of Art at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga in 2010, and Voice of the Unseen, Chinese Independent Art 1979 to Today, a collateral event of the Venice Biennale, in 2013. He held a solo exhibition, Li Qiang, Solo Show, at Klein Sun Gallery, now Eli Klein Gallery, in New York from August 4 to September 3, 2016.
It should be noted that the name Li Qiang is shared by several other Chinese artists, including an oil painter and professor at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in Chengdu, born in 1962, and other figures working in photography and pen illustration. This profile follows the biography and exhibition record specific to the paper-collage artist documented by the White Rabbit Collection, and readers researching other artists of the same name should confirm which individual a given source describes.
Critical reception
Independent critical commentary specific to Li Qiang could not be located in named, major-outlet reviews as of this writing. His inclusion in the White Rabbit Collection, a leading institutional survey of contemporary Chinese art, and his selection for a Venice Biennale collateral exhibition in 2013 both indicate curatorial interest in his collage method as a commentary on print media and image-making, but no verbatim critical assessment from a named reviewer is available to cite here.
Market
No confirmed all-time auction record for this artist could be located as of 2026-07-18, despite a thorough search of auction-market and art-price sources. No gallery is currently and publicly documented as representing him or an estate. His public visibility rests on museum and private-collection presence, principally the White Rabbit Collection in Sydney and his inclusion in the 2013 Venice Biennale collateral program, rather than on a documented history of public sales.
Selected exhibitions
| Years | Exhibition | Venues |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Li Qiang, Solo Show | Klein Sun Gallery (now Eli Klein Gallery), New York, August 4 to September 3, 2016 |
| 2013 | Voice of the Unseen, Chinese Independent Art 1979 to Today | Collateral event of the Venice Biennale, Venice |
| 2010 | Le Deluge, apres Mao, China's Surging Creative Tide | Cress Gallery of Art, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga |
| 2005 | Morbid, Our Arts Today | Nanjing Art Museum, Nanjing |
Museum collections
- White Rabbit Collection, Sydney
Authentication and provenance
No catalogue raisonne.
No catalogue raisonne exists for this artist. The name Li Qiang is shared by several Chinese artists working in different cities and mediums, including an oil painter and professor at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in Chengdu, born in 1962. This profile follows the paper-collage artist born in 1966 in Jiangsu province whose work is held in the White Rabbit Collection, Sydney. No certificate-of-authenticity program or confirmed public auction record was located as of 2026-07-18. Identity and provenance should be checked carefully, directly against the holding institution, before any transaction.
Primary reference: https://whiterabbitcollection.org/artist/li-qiang/
What collectors should know
Because more than one Chinese artist uses the name Li Qiang, the first step for any collector is to confirm which artist a given work, listing, or auction record actually refers to; details such as birth year, medium, and region of activity should be cross-checked against a specific biography rather than the name alone. There is no catalogue raisonne, no confirmed current gallery representation, and no documented public auction result for this artist, which means provenance for any work attributed to him should be verified directly against institutional sources such as the White Rabbit Collection rather than assumed from market comparables.
Further reading and resources
Data current as of 2026-07-18.

