Solid Wind
A Solo Exhibition by Jingyi Wang
17 June - 8 July
Gallery Poulsen is proud to present Solid Wind, a new solo exhibition by Chinese artist Jingyi Wang (b. 1989). The exhibition consists of twelve new oil paintings and opens on Saturday, June 17th with an opening reception from 12.00 to 15.00 in Gallery Poulsen, Staldgade 32, Copenhagen V. The exhibition is open through Saturday, July 8th.
Jingyi Wang debuted in Gallery Poulsen in March 2022 in the three-person exhibition Contemporary Perspectives, where she exhibited alongside her compatriots Jiannan Wu and Zhou Chen. Since then, Wang has been a significant part of the Gallery’s profile through numerous group shows and art fair presentations in both Denmark and the US. Now, Wang is ready to present her first solo exhibition in Gallery Poulsen, a presentation that, through twelve oil paintings, expands on her already established visual framework where cacti are playfully and colorfully humanized in an examination of our personal affiliations and our fickle relationships with the natural world.
“The wind is flowing, just like us drifting abroad. The solid wind describes the stable friendship between my friends and me, helping and supporting each other, growing together.”
- Jingyi Wang, 2023
Whereas the focus of Jingyi Wang’s previous works acted as a lonely portrayal of humankind’s changed relationship with nature, due to a shift in ideals and ways of living in the wake of the pandemic, the new solo exhibition uses her recognizable cactus portraits to convey intimate interpersonal relationships where loneliness is deliberately absent. Instead, the cactus is used as a vehicle to examine our everyday lives and to convey strength, independence, warmth, and care. Qualities that characterize Wang’s relationships with her friends and family. Hereby, the exhibition adopts a new focus that is based on an embodiment of Wang’s internal, and often subconscious, contemplations.
Through the adoption of this new focus, the paintings act as a physical manifestation of Wang’s relationships with, and perception of, her friends and family members and by doing so, portrays emotional aspects of a relationship that couldn’t have been conveyed truthfully had she chosen to paint photorealistic portraits of her acquaintances. The result of this approach is a surreal portrayal of personal relationships where the physical reality is abandoned in favor of a tangible interpretation of Wang’s own, and her acquaintances, subconscious and emotional lives. This manifestation of the subconscious is not based in reality any less than photorealistic portraits, the focus is just shifted to put emphasis on parts of reality that aren’t directly perceivable in our tangible lives, instead of how the physical world presents itself. This surreal mediation of the subconscious blurs the line between fiction and reality and forces us to reassess our perceived notions of realistic depiction of reality in painting up until this point.
Jingyi Wang received her BFA from China Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2013 and her MFA from New York Academy of Art in 2016. Since then, her works and artistic achievements have been published in numerous publications including China Daily, The China Press, Sing Tao Daily Newspaper, World Journal, Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, Aesthetica Magazine, Create!Magazine, ArtMaze Mag, Planet China, Friend of the Artist, and 100 Artists of the Future. Over the past years, her works have been included in prominent collections in Europe, Asia, and the US.
On the same day, at the same time, we will also open the very first solo exhibition in Gallery Poulsen by the Seattle-based painter Rebecca Orcutt (b. 1992) who, like Wang, is a graduate of New York Academy of Art. Alongside the two solo exhibitions, there will also be a special presentation of three new works by Finnish artist Emilia Nurmivaara (b. 1992) on the occasion of her first-ever sale to a museum. We are looking forward to seeing you for what is undoubtedly going to be an exceptional display and celebration of contemporary figurative painting!
Solid Wind
A Solo Exhibition by Jingyi Wang
17.06.23 – 08.07.23
Opening reception: Saturday, June 17th, 12.00 – 15.00
The exhibition presents twelve new oil paintings
Please contact the gallery at [email protected] or tel.+ 45 33 33 93 96 for more info
Installation Images
