When I prick holes on xuan paper
I subconsciously take the needle as a weapon
I’m experiencing a kind of prick
It’s kinda like a female releasing her feelings
Towards her body
I was born in 1976 in Shanxi
The Chinese village in the 1970s
It was kinda like an uncivilized land
When I was a child
I was eager to escape from that place
I studied western oil painting in the college
After I graduated, I came to Beijing
Suddenly I found my major was out of step with the reality
I couldn’t adapt to that
So I got myself enrolled by the Experimental Art Department of Central Academy of Fine Arts
My child was already three years old
Especially for people who were born in the 1970s like me
The society expected us to be a good wife and a good mother
I felt so depressed
And I was desperate for self-cognition
In 2009
I started to experiment with mud, wood and iron
I pricked holes in all my small works
Which were in the shape of trumpet and barrel
I also made holes in mud directly
The woman has a hole in her belly
I was like crazy
Until I pricked a hole on a piece of xuan paper
Suddenly I saw a ray of light coming in
And an epiphany came to me
I realized that what I had been looking for was just a simple hole, a simple breath
Then I thought of my childhood
When my mother released her own feelings
By embroidering with needles
Could I release myself in a similar way
Then I began the experiments of pricking holes on xuan paper
I went to the producing areas of xuan paper in Anhui and Sichuan
The workers handmade lots of thick xuan paper for me
Generally I have 5 types of stitch
Which are up, down, left, right and vertical
When you change the direction in which you insert the needle
You actually change the light source
And thus create different brightness and shape
I was basically doing landscape between 2010 and 2015
Traditionally, ink and wash was a male-dominated world
I first removed ink and wash from the paper
And then removed the thread and embroidery
It was actually a ‘dual denial’
It denied both the traditionally male-dominated literati painting
And the conventional presentation of female embroidery
Numerous holes have been made on the paper
Which looks as transparent as a cicada wing against the light
‘Life is as thin as paper’. Life is fragile
Gradually since 2016
I have been paying more attention to life itself
Including female body
Such as the breasts or the bodies
I consulted lots of books
In order to know how ancient people perceived life
I also created around life elements
Like various egg cells and plant fibers
When I begin creating, I would get a clock
Each prick echoes with the tick tock
And my heartbeat as well
It takes around a month to finish a work of 1 meter long
The biggest single work has over 8 million holes in it
By far I have a least pricked billions of holes
In the first two years
In fact I wondered if what I was doing was futile
Or if I had mental problems
The first time I had showed my work to others
They didn’t consider that as art
Which was a huge blow to me
But I also told them that was me
And I would keep going in that way
In 2016, my father passed away suddenly
I really wanted him back
My father often told me that he had frequently dreamed of wolves
The wolf was woven by me with thin wires
All my statues basically pursue transparency
I have lots of female-themed small statues
I make holes in woman bodies
The hole is a metaphor of womb, the origin of life
You can also see it as a wound
The females are emptied by reality
I feel too struggled in Beijing
I moved a dozen of times within a dozen of years
My studio was pulled down and removed for many times
Until one day I thought I couldn’t stand it anymore
So I bought the loft as my studio
I prick on paper indoors
There’s a sun room outside in the yard
I make statues there
Finally I feel settled
Now I’m over 40 years old
Self-doubt and tiredness disappear
As I prick
It’s like practicing
Gradually I find my say in the world as an individual
And I’m sure about my life