'Moonquake' explores the mental conditions of contemporary people

"Moonquake," artist Zhang Zipiao's solo exhibition, is currently underway at Long Museum West Bund through October 16.

Although the exhibition is titled "Moonquake," the works do not directly depict the moon. Instead, they suggest the complex mental conditions of contemporary people, the richness of women's emotions and the connection between painting and human consciousness.

Born in Beijing, Zhang, 29, studied at the Maryland Institute of Art from 2011 to 2012 and later graduated from the Art Institute of Chicago in 2015.

Her painting practice revolves around the human body, organs and natural objects.

In fact, her paintings echo with their titles, as beneath the seemingly calm surface of the moon, a relatively mild, imperceptible but persistent type of quake often occurs – a moonquake.

For example, her "Battlefield" series extends and deepens the artist's earlier discussion of the body as a register to project mental, emotional and spiritual conditions. As the title suggests, the body is a field of external or internal confrontation with the other or oneself.

The bodies in the artworks become increasingly abstract, and even the skeleton that once served as a pictorial structure is no longer visible but rather replaced by "masses" of flesh shaped by flowing curves. As a result, the static images reveal the artist's state of body and mind at the time of creation.

Zhang also tries to expand the scale of her works at the exhibition via diptychs and triptychs, which not only enlarge the picture's dimension but also strengthen the visual effect of vibrant emotions.

Exhibition info:

Dates: Through October 16 (closed on Mondays), Tuesdays-Thursdays, 10am-6pm; Fridays-Sundays, 10am-8:30pm

Venue: Long Museum West Bund

Address: 3398 Longteng Ave