Ran Huan was born in 1982 in Xichang, Sichuan province. He attended fine-art courses at the Birmingham Institute of Art and Design in the UK (2002-2004), then completed an MFA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths, London (2005-2007).
Ran is known primarily for his film and video work, but his practice also encompasses painting, sculpture, installation, drawing and film. Since 2013 he has been showing with Simon Lee Gallery in London and Long March gallery in Beijing. In 2009 he was awarded a European Media Artists Residency Exchange (EMARE), supported by the European Culture Programme and the Arts Council, UK.
His film The Administration of Glory was shortlisted for the Short Film Palme d’Or at the 67th Cannes Film Festival in 2014. The film brings together five parallel narratives that explore themes of deception, theft and violation. The film is notable for the tension between surface and story. Seductive imagery and narrative serve as a kind of façade, veiling the artist’s interrogation of artistic practice and the possibility of historical credibility.
Other films of Ran’s – among them Disruptive Desires, Tranquility and the Loss of Lucidity (2012), Blithe Tragedy (2010) and Fake Action Truth (2009) – have attracted international acclaim. In much of his work the focus remains on the instability of the human experience, the tensions between narratives of truth and fiction, the nature of perception and the deconstruction of the concept of history.
A solo exhibition of work, Ran Huang: An Experience Shaped by an Experience I Never Experienced, took place at the Simon Lee Gallery, London, in 2014. The same year Ran Huang took part in a group exhibition, Before the Beginning and After the End II, at the Long March Space, Beijing.