Han Yun Liang—the end and the beginning
2020.6.6 (Sat.)〜6.14 (Sun.) at wad＋gallery, Osaka
Why am I stuck in the thought of life and death? I ask myself. I think that might flash back to one of my early memories. When I was about ten years old, our family went to a lake park a lot. One day, me and my sister went down stairs of the lake near and played with water on the shore. All of a sudden, I fell into the lake. Weirdly I saw a beautiful female fish smiling to me, in the lake, its blue green color was fascinating, which I didn’t remember that I feel scared or panic. Just in few seconds my dad saved me from the lake. This memory from time to time appears and I cannot help but asking myself: am I still alive? Or Am I always in a dream? This experience becomes a mysterious hunting memory to me.
This exhibition expresses different aspects of life. From the “egg of life” series, I put the foraged bones or animal remains into a hollow clay sphere and fired it. The making process represents the wholeness of a life form from the end to the beginning. This connects to the other series “ouroboros”, these artworks are round clay tubes. Yet unlike the symbol of ouroboros, meaning eternity, they have their physical limitations just like all of the living beings. “ouroboros” questions the relationship between the understanding of physical body and the meaning of existence. The third series is “circle of life”; they are the forms of circling structures with bone standing in the core. The bone represents the death, however, the structure connects with each other passing through the bone. It is an image of circulation of life that once was passed away can still “stay alive” in another form.
For me, clay is a symbol of all lives happening upon and within, and fire has the power to destroy but also transform, which I find intimate connection with these materials. This exhibition is a body of artworks that processes the questioning and explaining of my understanding in life and death.