Xu Bing was born in Chongqing, China in 1955 and grew up in Beijing. In 1975 he was relocated to the countryside for two years during the Cultural Revolution. In 1977 he enrolled in the Central Academy of Fine Art in Beijing where he studied printmaking. He received an MFA from the Central Academy in 1987. In 1990 he moved to the United States and he still lives there today, making his home in Brooklyn, New York.

His work as been shown in the 45th Venice Biennial; MOMA, New York; Museum Ludwig, Koln; The Reina Sofia Museum (Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia), Madrid; V&A, London; Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki; Sydney Biennial; Kwangju Biennial, Korea; Johannesburg Biennial, South Africa; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; San Francisco Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA); National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; ICC - International Communications Center, Tokyo; P.S. 1, New York. He has had solo exhibitions at the New Museum of Contemporary art, New York; Joan Miro Foundation (Fundacio Pilari Joan Miro a Mallorca), Spain; ICA (Institute of Contemporary Art), London; National Gallery of Prague; National Gallery of Beijing; the North Carolina Museum of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C..

In 2004, Xu Bing was awarded the first Wales International Visual Art Prize, Artes Mundi, one of the largest international prizes in the world. He also became a Coca-Cola Fellow of the American Academy in Berlin