Title: Liu Shiming: Sculpting Empathy
Author: Richard Vine
Pub Date: March 10, 2026
Binding: Softcover with flaps
Extent: 208 pages (estimated)
Illustrations: 73 color images, courtesy Liu Shiming Art Foundation
Trim Size: 8” x 10”
ISBN: 978-1-9788-4741-5New York, New York – November 3, 2025 – On March 10, 2026, Rutgers University Press, with support from the Liu Shiming Art Foundation, will publish Liu Shiming: Sculpting Empathy by Richard Vine, the first English-language book on Chinese sculptor Liu Shiming (1926-2010). The monograph traces Liu’s life and sculptural practice throughout the political and cultural shifts of 20th-century China from the era of the Chinese Communist Revolution to the post-Reform period. Sculpting Empathy, a richly illustrated monograph with over 150 images, explores Liu’s commitment to depicting the life, labor, and rituals of everyday people.Born in Tianjin, Liu attended the prestigious Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing where he was part of the first generation of sculptors trained by the People’s Republic of China to study both traditional Chinese art and French modernist principles. He continued to create and exhibit his sculpture in China until his death in 2010, after which Liu’s sculpture began to be shown outside of China, appearing in public spaces and special exhibitions, including at the Oculus in New York City and the Asian Cultural Center in Washington, DC.
In recent years, Liu’s work has been shown in university galleries and museums throughout the US and Canada, with his first European exhibitions planned for 2026 at the Venice Biennale. Signaling growing global appreciation of his work and his emphasis on humanism as a unifying force, Liu’s works are in the permanent collections of institutions like the American University in Cairo, the Czech National Museum in Prague, Georgia State University in Atlanta, and the Macaulay Honors College in New York City.
Part biography and part cultural narrative, Sculpting Empathy offers insight into Liu’s training, public commissions, personal philosophy, and artistic struggles, as well as the effects of 20th-century China on the lives of everyday people and his artistic peers. Author Richard Vine underscores the importance and relevance of Liu Shiming’s art today: “Perhaps, first, because the everyday is where the vast majority of us live, trying to make sense of our lives and grateful for the occasional insight, release, or enrichment that visual art can bring us. Second, because the story of Liu Shiming reveals a great deal, either by example or by contrast, about the forces that have shaped postwar art and politics worldwide.”
Additional information on the publication date and book launch will be announced in the coming months. To request a review copy, please contact Max Kruger-Dull at max@bluemedium.com.
About Richard Vine
Richard Vine is the former managing editor of Art in America. He holds a PhD in literature from the University of Chicago and previously served as editor-in-chief of the Chicago Review and of Dialogue: An Art Journal. He has taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the American Conservatory of Music, the University of Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, the New School for Social Research, and New York University. Some three hundred of his articles, reviews, and interviews have appeared in various journals, including Art in America, Salmagundi, Georgia Review, Tema Celeste, Modern Poetry Studies, and the New Criterion. He has made presentations at more than 125 universities, museums, and other cultural venues in cities throughout the US and abroad, including Venice, Shanghai, Buenos Aires, and Saint Petersburg. His critical books include the career survey Odd Nerdrum: Paintings, Sketches, and Drawings (2001) and New China, New Art (2008), which traces the emergence of avant-garde art in post-Mao China. In 2016 he published the crime novel SoHo Sins, set in the New York art world of the 1990s. In addition, he has co-curated exhibitions at the National Art Museum of China, Beijing (2013); the National Academy of Art in New Delhi, India (2015); and the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York (2016). He is a member of the International Association of Art Critics and Mensa.
About Rutgers University Press
Founded in 1936, Rutgers University Press is a leading trade and scholarly publisher in the social sciences and the humanities. Headquartered at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, with offices in London, the press publishes bold ideas and essential reading in the areas of sociology, anthropology, health policy, history of medicine, human rights, urban studies, criminology, Jewish studies, American studies, film and media studies, the environment, and books about New Jersey and the mid-Atlantic region.
About The Liu Shiming Art Foundation
Established in 2021, the Liu Shiming Art Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that seeks to preserve and promote the artistic legacy of acclaimed Chinese artist Liu Shiming; advance global discourse on the arts, history and culture; and support the development of future generations of artists. lsmartfund.org.
FOR MEDIA ENQUIRIES
Max Kruger-Dull
Tel: +1-212-675-1800
Blue Medium, Inc.
max@bluemedium.com |
