EVENT DESCRIPTION
Tang Contemporary Art is pleased to announce the Group Exhibition “Ritual, Trauma, and Allegory” bringing together ten international artists whose work revolve around the three core themes. Curated by Lu Xiangyi, the exhibition features the spectacular works of Anouk Lamm Anouk, Jonas Burgert, Jigger Cruz, Guillermo Lorca, Leng Guangmin, Raffy Napay, Edgar Plans, Rodel Tapaya, Woo Kukwon, and Xu Hongxiang.
In the face of globalization and technological upheaval, contemporary art continues to undergo a revolution of violent grammar – both physically and metaphorically. This revolution can be seen in the material rupture of the canvas, the dismantling of cultural symbols, and the reconstruction of identity narratives. It is not merely an aesthetic stance but a cognitive guerrilla warfare waged by artists along the fault lines of civilization.
Bringing together ten artists from diverse cultural backgrounds, the exhibition declares that painting undergoes self-destruction to achieve rebirth. By focusing on their radical explorations of materiality, cultural identity, and existential dilemmas, we witness not only a self-reflexive experiment within the medium of painting but also a poetic suturing of civilization’s wounds.
On Jigger Cruz’s canvases, as colors and lines wrestle with one another driven by both passion and intensity, new images emerge – while simultaneously destroying, enveloping the layers beneath, evoking the sanctity of a ritual. Like a postcolonial shaman, he merges the gilded splendor of Baroque religious icons with the graffiti spray paint of the slums, melting together a shared structure of faith and identity. The seemingly chaotic splashes, scratches, and burns are, in fact, topological specimens of colonial violence – acts of destruction transformed into a contemporary ritual of disenchantment.
In contrast, Chinese artist Leng Guangmin transforms this violent grammar into a more concealed visual experiment. He constructs with rational precision, only to expose truth through destruction. Through repeated covering and scraping, painting is reduced to an mechanical process of “image formation”. Yet, the gentle deviation of depth in his knife marks, thickness of his paint betray the rhythm of his breath during creation. In his works, objects exist both concretely and allegorically; his techniques are both restrained and provocative. This contradiction forms the tension that defines his art.
Dutch artistAnouk Lamm Anouk, on the other hand treats the body itself as a ritual of destruction. Fragmented or fused bodies appear in her paintings, blurring the boundaries of subjectivity and suggesting the fluidity of identity all at once. The unprimed reverse side of the canvas becomes a metaphor for the “unfinished”, enveloping radical social issues in the restraint of minimalism – a poetic testament to the survival of marginalized communities in a society where rules remain unwritten.
Due to an allergy to paint, Raffy Napay employs thread and fabric as his primary mediums, transforming the needle into his brush and thread into his pigment. This distinctive material choice allows his works to seamlessly blend the compositional and expressive qualities of painting with the tactile richness and textural depth of textiles. The act of sewing becomes a meditative ritual, where the repetitive motion of stitching and mending evokes a profound sense of emotional healing. Through this process, Napay intricately weaves together personal memories, cultural identity, and universal existential themes, creating a layered tapestry that resonates with both intimacy and universality.
This ritual of destruction extends beyond the physical, exposing the spiritual decay of globalization. Humanity is facing a widespread state of mental displacement, and these works present a synchronous expression of cross-cultural trauma. The riot of colors, the metamorphosis of figures, and the dislocation of time and space construct a psychological labyrinth – both unsettling and captivating.
