Xu Tan began his career as a member of the well-known Guangzhou-based artist collective, “Big Tail Elephant.” His installation and video works explore issues crucial to the post-Cold War, postcolonial, and increasingly globalized world like urbanization, the geopolitical relationships between the developed and developing worlds in terms of political, economic, and cultural production and their impacts on personal lives and their expressions. Xu’s works are often site-specific, dealing intimately with everyday experiences to critically demonstrate the tension between globally circulating images, modes of communication, and the impact they have locally. Powerfully and intelligently, Xu’s work calls for contemporary art to engage with social reality in our time.