Incessant Capacity

It is important to tell different stories and to tell them in their own way.

Considering the impact of exhibitions and artistic work in our view is measured by how it contributes not only to new ways of thinking about history and the present, but also making space to understand, and know the other. We at the Gallery Under the Mango Tree are often striving to bring the international discourse. We are very glad to present our upcoming exhibition INCESSANT CAPACITY of three Chinese artists which exposes the underlying themes of memory, home, and time presented with wide-ranging techniques in the individual practices and the subjects of each artist, including painting, installation, digital drawings, ceramics, and performance.

On closer examination, one gets to experience the Inherent feminine pride, strength, and beauty in Ping Qiu´s works. Surveying her artistic in/ter/ventions- as Kerstin Mey suggests in her essay in 2012- over the past period of her practicing art, it becomes obvious that an interest in the poetic transformation of domestic and organic forms permeates her creative practice. This characteristic surfaced in the early explorations of the ancient cooking vessels and their translation into powerful contemporary ceramic forms that oscillate between human physicality, animal body and suggestive artifacts. The use of yellow or pink hand gloves, stuffed and sewn together, floating lightly on the water amidst lilies and reeds, on closer inspection conjure up uncanny humanoid allusions. Their use was partly motivated by the artist’s own experience of domestic chores and women´s role in the hotel and the cleaning service industries. In her work, this form of precarious labor and exploitation as a global phenomenon is given expressive consideration.

Lately, Ping Qiu explores their digital avatars, in a series that would be present in this exhibition alongside her installation of the piano and the spread of its Strings. Her drawings with ink and brush on rice paper based on the ancient Chinese tradition are floral forms expressed through clear, tense outlines which evolve from a concentrated almost meditative engagement with this artistic media and spread across the picture ground. These works, along with her other works express an unfading capacity to engage mind and emotions alike, to provoke thoughts as much as aesthetic pleasure across cultural and geographic boundaries.*

Born in 1961 in Wuhan, China, Ping Qiu completed her Art Studies at the China Art Academy, Hangzhou before joining Hochschule der Künste, Berlin in 1988 

With an inexhaustible list of awarded residencies after her graduation in 1994, she participated regularly in Biennales, and solo/group shows. Ping Qiu at present lives and works from her Studio in Uckermarkt.

Zhou Lei says „No matter what form and medium I choose for creating, it is the embodiment of my pursuit of free will.“** Through the learnings of Chinese traditional Calligraphy, Zhou Lei could see many possibilities that could be recreated in contemporary art. His sculptures are unconventional – theme, form, and material are all for him about inspiration during the creative process. Through his past and present experiences, Zhou Lei is focused on the moment, allowing the special performance of the sculpture making to center on a single shape, deliberate over it, and finally unifying the content. It is not about perfection, his work is about the process.

For the exhibition, Zhou Lei is showing his sculpture amongst his Digital drawings. His years in the pandemic offered him the possibility to sketch freely; a few strokes to draw the willow strips and the hat on the chair. The freedom that he has experienced in this process might be an indication of already abandoning a ritualized art style and living with free artistic emotion.

Born in Nanchang, Jiangxi province in 1962, Zhou lei graduated from the Sculpture Department of Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts (now China Academy of Fine Arts) in 1985

Now he teaches in the Ceramic art Department of the College of Manual Art, China Academy of Fine Arts. At present, he lives and works in Budapest, Hungary.

Lavia Lin’s works draw on painting elements, her canvases appear like an idealized utopia, or the multi-level landscape of an illusion of disappearance while creating her own world. Lavia Lin takes strong conceptual references from music, to create these abstract landscapes. She selects and uses colors with different intensity, often influenced by the music that she is hearing- resulting in a multilayered expression. The works often express a sense of tranquility, or a search, guiding the viewer into self-introspection and increasing their perception of, and engagement with, surrounding space.

Traces of memories and experiences, a past in combination with the reality of the present, the artist connects together all these, displaying them in a way that they seem to be a part of each other while retaining the possibility to rearrange.

Born in 1995, Lavia Lin studied philosophy and arts at Bard College, Berlin, and is presently living and working in Berlin.

*Kerstin Mey, Organic Re-Calibrations: on recent work by Ping Qiu, 2012

** Lin Shuchuan, Hanyang art, 2020

Opening Hours:
Mo-Fr 11:30-14:00 / 15:30-18:30
Sa/So 13:00 – 16:30