Luo Min, Dreams beyonds the Fences (detail - 2), 2022.

Space & Gallery Association presents the inaugural solo exhibition of Luo Min: Dreams Beyond the Fences, at their Shanghai gallery, on view from 18 December 2022 through 19 February 2023. Named after the final verse from the ancient poem Azure Jade Table– Lantern Festival, written by Southern Song scholar Xin Qiji, the exhibition embodies the artist’s promise of hope and future through a passage of memories as beautiful as dreams. And encourages us as a collective to believe, we will move past such dreadful times in anticipation of better days to come. The exhibition will comprise some of her most representational works from the series Female Soldiers, Flowers Collection, as well as new works from 2022, 27 Breathes, Spring Outing 2 and Dream beyond the Fences.

Luo Min, Flower Collection No.26, 2021.

The series title Flowers Collection is based on Luo Min's feelings about the context of her paintings, where flowers and birds act as her recurring motifs. For the artist, flowers have always been a source of emotions. Whether it is the splendour of a flower in bloom or the melancholy of a flower in decline, it translates into a different emotional experience for each onlooker. Well-versed in both the realism style of Western painting and the delicateness of traditional Chinese painting techniques (gongbi and mogu), this gives Luo Min great versatility in her artistic expression. 

Luo Min, Early Summer, 2020. 

Embracing her era and multiple identities— a soldier, an artist and a teacher–– her work combines subject matters drawn from her childhood memories, personal writings and scriptures from poetic sources she admires, all in relevance to her surrounding environments onto the depth of a canvas. They allude to a sense of sincerity and emotionalism that is captured more because of how she sees than of her gifted skills. On a thematic level, her emotionally charged paintings gain energy from the frictional contrast they stand in relation to the contemporary art scene and the crumbling world we live in. Luo’s works brim with humanity and comfort our anxiety with the familiar.

Luo Min, 27 Breathes, 2022.

As the fences open, these Pinocchio dreams of hers, of ours, may just come true. So, why don’t we dream more fearlessly?

About the Artist

Luo Min (b.1968, Sichuan, China) Graduated from the China Southwest Normal University, and received MA from the People’s Liberation Army Academy of Art. Luo Min is a first-class national artist, a committee member of the China Oil Painting Society, and a professional painter at the Beijing Fine Art Academy. She has held exhibitions across Asia and Europe. She currently works in Beijing.

Luo Min’s work is a synthesis of reality, memory and symbolism. Well-versed in Western realism painting and traditional Chinese gongbi and mogu techniques, this gives Luo Min great versatility in her artistic expression. The artist adopts a traditional yet creative painting language and retains the traces of time through elegant inscriptions. Family albums and childhood memories provide the subjects for her works. On the basis of this, she uses flowers and birds as her ideal motifs to create an artistic language that is compatible with the East and the West. They allude to a sense of sincerity and emotionalism that is captured more because of how she sees than of her gifted skills. On a thematic level, her emotionally charged paintings gain energy from the frictional contrast they stand in relation to the contemporary art scene and the crumbling world we live in.

About the Exhibition

Dates: 18 December, 2022 – 19 February, 2023

Venue: Space & Gallery Association

Courtesy of the Artist and Space & Gallery Association.