Quiet Feelings

Artists: Dai Dashan, Gao Zhouyan, Huang Yue, IKKY.L, and Lin Zhengqi Eddie

Have you ever looked at a painting, suddenly burst into laughter, and then, just as suddenly, fallen silent?

It is a strange and delicate feeling. You laugh because it is a little absurd, a little endearing, a little unexpected. You fall silent because you suddenly realize that, somehow, it seems to be speaking about you.

This exhibition exists for that very feeling.

We have invited five artists of different ages and backgrounds, each working with entirely distinct subjects and visual languages. Yet they share one thing in common: none of them likes to say things too directly. They would rather paint an animal with melancholic eyes, an absurd figure without a head, or a hazy scene suspended between dream and memory, and then leave it to you to sense what lies within.

What the exhibition wishes to say is, in fact, quite simple: to live seriously does not mean one has to wear a solemn face. You can respond to absurdity with absurdity, to cruelty with tenderness, and look at the world anew through the eyes of a cat.

Lightness does not mean indifference. Humor does not mean a lack of depth.

We invite you to come and see the exhibition, and then tell us which work made you laugh — and which one made you fall silent.