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All China Shanghai Shanghart Supermarket
Shanghart Supermarket is permanently closed.

This entry remains in the Atlas as a record of its history, but it is no longer accessible to visitors.

Gastro Obscura

Shanghart Supermarket

This supermarket in Shanghai appears to be a typical Chinese convenience store, but all of the bottles are empty and all the containers are filled with nothing but air.

Shanghai, China

Added By
Lew Blank
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Looking down one of the supermarket’s aisles   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Looking down one of the supermarket’s aisles   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
One of the main aisles   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Looking down the aisle   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Shanghart Supermarket front entrance   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Shanghart Supermarket sign   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty glasses   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty jugs   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty bottles   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
A whole stack of empty bottles   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty bottles and a baby   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty containers of hygiene products   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Empty packs of cigarettes   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
Cash register   Lorenz Helbling / Shanghart
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About

Xu Zhen is a young, contemporary Chinese artist who looks to combine conceptual art with social critique. Critical of global consumerism, he created an empty supermarket that sells absolutely nothing.

Shanghart Supermarket, which currently is showing in Shanghai, looks like any typical convenience store from the outside. Chinese shoppers often walk inside in search of actual supermarket goods, without the slightest clue that they won’t find any content inside of the packaging.

For the first few seconds, everything looks normal. Products like toothbrushes, sodas, and shampoos are fully stocked along the aisles of the store. But, after a few seconds, the customers become befuddled as they realize that there is no liquid in any of the bottles, and all the containers are light as a feather, filled with nothing but air. This was made possible with the painstaking process of buying thousands of real products, delicately opening them, emptying them of all content, and then sealing the packaging back up.

In an interview with AJ+, Vigy Jin, a worker at Shanghart Supermarket says “this work is actually opposing crazy consumerism; everyone sees the colorful appearance, but they don’t pay attention to the actual things inside it.”

Related Tags

Markets Food Museums Food Art Museums

Know Before You Go

This was a temporary exhibition and is no longer there

Community Contributors

Added By

lewblank

Edited By

arsenm

  • arsenm

Published

May 17, 2016

Edit this listing

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Sources
  • http://theartnewspaper.com/news/artist-opens-subversive-supermarket-in-shanghai/
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_P700DBK0RA
  • http://www.blouinartinfo.com/news/story/1027325/video-xu-zhen-and-his-ironic-supermarket-in-shanghart
  • http://www.shanghartgallery.com/galleryarchive/exhibition.htm?exbId=7774
Shanghart Supermarket
No.1015 Yuyuan Road, 1015 Yuyuan Road
Shanghai
China
31.212333, 121.448854
Get Directions

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