"I started this series by thinking about whether a mussel would feel pain when it was cut by a blade." – Hua Xiyu
Following the first solo exhibition "Chasing the Wind and Shadows" of Hua Xiyu's work in 2019, Wei Gallery is honored to present the solo exhibition "Midsummer Trance" in collaboration with artist Hua Xiyu on 7th June 2023, featuring a series of oil paintings from 2019 to 2023. Specializing in capturing fleeting light and shadows, Hua's paintings exude a quiet and solid visual impression, making her a contemporary artist with a distinctive style based on her pure colors and unique compositions.
In this series, her works emphasize the importance of perception, such as the ears that appear in the conch listening to the stories that the ocean brings from afar. The artist hopes that the viewer can feel the emotion of the painting not only visually, but also through a profound experience that awakens the other senses, like a moment of encountering a sound, a smell, a taste, or a touch on the body that transports one to a special moment in the past.
Hua's works are full of rhythm and flow. Her paintings include elements such as landscapes and animals, capturing fleeting thoughts or images. The appearance of landscapes is often used to position the scene and complement the flow of emotions, and the curves reinforce the dynamism of the picture, bringing out the movement of life. In the "Swing" created in 2019, which depicted a panda lying on its mother's swinging belly, the scene was then transformed into the water in an attempt to continue the sense of movement onto a swim ring. This sensation of swaying was further deepened in her "Ice Floe" created in 2020, where the warm body melted into the hard ice, seemingly deepening the sense of undulating movement. Continuing into "Snow Butterfly" created in 2022, a butterfly is depicted hovering in the falling snow, capturing the rhythm of snowflakes floating down.
The final piece in this series, "Heart Flame," features fire and ice, two extreme forms of stimulation to the skin, serving as the artist's response to the question of "whether a mussel feels pain when being cut". The viewer is invited to immerse themselves in the world of "Midsummer Trance" and experience the fusion of nature and life, reflecting on moments of perception and illusion.
