Silence is one kind of sound, but also numerous kinds of "sounds". More often than not, we cannot enjoy the complex mental state brought to us by silence, and we no longer hear the sound of silence. The beauty of silence leads us to be curious and to watch. Both Chen Han and Xie Qi's works radiate with the charm silence. In the exhibition "Silent Theater", they created new works bathed in a quiet and floating atmosphere to evoke subtle emotions.
Xie Qi’s works recreates countless performance “stages” emptied from time and space by using colors in extremely low saturation. Some “still lives” of blurred human bodies that are difficult to read at first are sublimed into major protagonists. Their spirituality flows out from the picture as the "stage" carefully created by the artist across time and space captures the secrets of the human soul. Chen Han's works, as always, use a still life technique to deal with human characters. These anonymous actors tell stories reminiscent of films noirs. The strong emotions in the pictures are often poignant, and they create a metaphysical space between reality and literary universes. Although the two artists use completely different methods in their artistic process, and contrast sharply in the narrative of their works, both of them show a sense for dramatic suspense and loneliness. Whether it is a "still-life person" or a "characterized still-life", they mobilize our most private and disturbing emotions, inadvertently exploring our complex but unconscious mental state.
Chen Han was born in 1973 in Shenyang, China. He graduated in 2005 from the Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts. He lives and works in Shenyang and Beijing. His soft, blurred painterly style helps invoke a sense of empathy, and in his complete eschewal of technology he makes manifest the material presence of the artist. Vivid with traditional brushstrokes that are visible and emphatic, his pallet is muted and cold, made visceral with flesh-coloured tones. He has been featured in both national and international group exhibitions including at the Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts Museum in Shenyang, Hongding Gallery, the M50 Creative Garden Shanghai, and had presentations at International art fairs such Art Brussels and Art Taipei.
Xie Qi was born in 1974 in Chongqing, China. She works and lives in Beijing. Xie Qi's recent series of oil paintings depicts the human figure, with a special focus on the areas below and above the clavicle. Her subjects are solitary forms illuminated by dramatic lighting, as if on a stage separated from their mundane identity to become the sole vessels of emotional expression. Her works have been exhibited in important domestic and foreign institutions such as BANK Gallery, Pekin Fine Arts in Beijing, Dawan Art Institution in Paris, Galerie Urs Meile, Kunst Museum and Today Art Museum. Her works have also been collected by The Uli Sigg Contemporary Art Collection Foundation, Hong Kong M+ Museum, DSL Collection, Porsche Collection Foundation and many others.
