Sun Yu is not an artist who is contented about his work. To fully perceive the historicity and uniqueness of the time-space in which he is living, he would spend much of his time walking and exploring on earth to have adequate contacts between himself and the environment. He attempts to seek out the medication for the impatience and unsafety in current society through exploring nature and spirituality. The subject of this exhibition is “Luminary”, which is a Buddhist concept to describe the monk contemplates the perception of light during Samādhi meditation. This exhibition uses artworks as a canal for experience and exploration, and provides the audience some tranquil experience in the restless society.
The artworks in this exhibition are more abundant and more experimental in artistic forms. In Kalpa the artist passed through more than half of Northwestern China, he got himself trapped in the city he built by his own with special materials in Gobi desert or on the plateau, waiting for the moment when he finally broke out the city. Having been through “Formation”, ”Existence” “Destruction” and “Emptiness”, and then “Sumeru”, finally the journey was “imbued” with “Luminary”. This is perhaps what Sun Yu wants to express through exhibition and artworks, the state of walking as well as standing, of activity as well as tranquility. He applies his body as the medium in the paradox derived from the particle experiment, and he takes time to ferment its outcome. Then the results become the cause of next experiment, propelling him to explore and comprehend the truth of the Cosmos. With light as the clue, the exhibition presents the subtle effect of light over human senses through the perception, depiction and pursuit of light; or through the “Aura” intrigued by brain waves. As “Luminary” and “Kalpa” face each other across the road, is there a gap or a wormhole between illusion and Samādhi, between eternal light and endless circle of “Formation”, ”Existence”, “Destruction” and “Emptiness”?
Sun Yu persistently practice the wisdom to “read ten thousand books, to travel ten thousand miles” of ancient thinkers. In the modern society that is developing with continuous refinement, acceleration and intelligence, he considers the experience of the predecessors as the streetlight, the artistic experiments as driving force; and he illuminates, experiences and comprehends the nature of innermost being in the manner that is “time-energy consuming”. As Giorgio Agamben notes, “those who are truly contemporary, who truly belong to their time, are those who neither perfectly coincide with it nor adjust themselves to its demands. They are thus in this sense irrelevant (inattuale). But precisely because of this condition, precisely through this disconnection and this anachronism, they are more capable than others of perceiving and grasping their own time.”
About the exhibition
Dates: Dec 23, 2017 – Feb 11, 2018
Opening: Dec 23, 2017, 16:00
Venue: Tong Gallery+Projects
Courtesy of the artist and Tong Gallery + Projects.
