I lived in a small town in Shanxi province when I was little
In 2002, I was admitted to the Central Academy of Fine Arts
The understanding of different stages of a woman’s life
Has always been a part of my creation
I got married in 2011 and in 2012 my first child was born
I gave up everything just to take good care of her
And I realized that all the effort I had made
Working my way to a good university
Winning a lot of rewards, going to all those exhibitions
All just vanished into thin air
Back to square one
I am only a gender figure – female
Producing milk, nursing my child, like a robot
I had to give myself pep talk very often back then
“You must trust yourself”
“You won’t stop following your dream”
“Because of immediate problems”
I had to create works to relieve my anxiety
Shanxi women would cut their hair before they got pregnant
I used the hairs as sketches
Stitching them into white cotton fabric
My feeling that day, whether it’s calm or manic depressive
Was expressed through the straight or curled lines
Half an hour every day for about two years
It sinks in gradually
Ring is a representation of woman’s abdomen, a symbol of fertility
Only after I gave birth to my child
Did I realize how much pain my mother had been through
To bring me to the world
I started inviting my mother to create with me
Selected two photos
Stitching hairs to my mother’s young, beautiful face
And a portrait picture of three-year-old me
Cover our old faces with the present hairs of ours
She stitching my black hairs, me stitching her grey hairs
For both of us it’s a kind of memory and communication
She and my father were actively involved in the work
They were very happy to be helpful
When I had the second child
My pressure became unprecedentedly high
One day my daughter told me
“I don’t like you anymore mom”
I felt like it sucked all warmness and passion out of my heart
Her words was like a weapon shooting right into my heart
I carved it out of jujube wood
Charred it, desperate
When I had no voice
I tried to express myself through words
The word “baby”
Is actually more complicated than its sweet appearance
Such as requesting, requiring, moral abduction
“Mother” is a great word
But meanwhile it implies the unconditional love of a woman
I want to highlight the conflict
When the bulb lights up
Sacred halo fills the space
And when it’s switched off
It goes back to being a cold industrial product
After giving birth, if a woman wants to return to her professional place in the job market
The society asks for more from her
“You did a great job, almost as good as a childless woman”
But I don’t think it’s natural
Leave Me Alone、Bitches
These are sentences my female friends have said
Unconscious curses, rejections
They are an honest reflection of contemporary women’s feelings
I made it into bead curtains
“NO” is quite interesting
When you pass through it, the giant No starts to swing
It seems that we are determined to reject
But at the end we always give in
The pressure and confusion that women are experiencing
Should be expressed in a straightforward and bold way
Recently I’ve been creating works with female workers
I want to record these ordinary women of the same age as me
And sing praises of them
Every individual is just a tiny wave in the torrent of this era
To do embroidery with women’s hair I’ve collected
The people seem to be rolling in the waves, trying to lean forward
Creating works with woman as the theme
There are some doubts
But I believe that recording emotions
Is an important part of present social life
If no one expresses them
Then the voices will disappear
So I want to be such a recorder