Fan Jing Exhibition @ HdM Gallery, Beijing - "Fall to the Mortal World" Curated by Crystal Yao

Fan Jing

Fall to the Mortal World

HdM Gallery, Beijing

13 September - 25 October 2025

HdM GALLERY presents a solo exhibition by artist FAN JING. The exhibition features over ten of the artist’s paintings completed in the past two years.

 

This exhibition continues and further develops the themes of Fan Jing’s 2023 solo show: Fan Jing - As You Like It . As the title “Fall to the Mortal World”suggests, Fan Jing constructs scenes that appear to draw from mythological narratives, yet she romanticizes the most mundane, worldly “raw materials” and grafts them onto myth-inspired races. Through tensions filled with violence, conflict, and provocation, she pulls the “divine” down from its pedestal and creates a fallen paradise of the absurd.

 

Compared to her works of previous stage, Fan Jing has amplified the intentional sense of humor present in earlier stages. The conflicts and violence are now more direct; the figures take up a larger portion of the canvas, and the dynamics between them have become more complex and expansive. While female figures remain central to her work, their identities are more ambiguous than before—no longer clearly identifiable as the Young Pioneers, ballerinas, or housewives frequently seen in her earlier paintings. These monumental, sculptural "giants" heighten the visual tension with sharply pointed breasts, large and muscular limbs, and insect-like wings that seem to sprout from their bodies. The exaggerated sexual features are not eroticized but instead suggest aggression. Hybrid creatures—such as centaur-like women or butterfly ladies—appear on the scene, affirming the metamorphosis resulting from intense desires while intensifying the theatricality of the compositions.

 

Fan Jing’s strong technical foundation underpins her classical approach. She skillfully uses stage-like lighting to produce dramatic contrasts between light and shadow. In her current works, the use of highly saturated colors has been further reduced. Instead, detailed rendering and subtle transitions of light and shadow enhance the sense of volume in the painted subjects. These techniques contribute to the dramatic tension and sense of pressure within the compositions. A precarious sense of equilibrium also adds unease. In the work “Test Flight”, for example, the composition is visually balanced on both the vertical and horizontal axes, yet the entire weight of the central figure is precariously supported by only two pointed breasts—prompting the viewer to question the very nature of that stability. Similar balancing acts appear in other works as well. What is more daring is the way Fan Jing places exaggerated human poses into intense scenarios while deliberately positioning private body parts at the visual center of the composition—as seen in works like “Mother and Son” and “No-Fly Zone”. This marks an escalation from her earlier implicit provocations regarding the disciplining of the female body. Here, challenges to sexuality and identity are laid bare. Her attention to dislocation and disorder reflects a female gaze that observes and testifies to the absurdity of reality.

 

In “Fall to the Mortal World”, Fan Jing employs a subversive humor in portraying violent scenes, provoking open-ended interpretation through entanglement and confrontation.

 

Artist Fan Jing

 

Born in Beijing in 1983, Fan Jing graduated from Capital Normal University’s School of Fine Arts, majoring in oil painting. She currently lives and works in Beijing. Her work predominantly centers on the human figure and consistently explores the confrontation, conflict, and balance between opposing forces—both in content and form. Her paintings have been exhibited in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Paris, and Singapore, and are collected by important private collectors and foundations.

 

Curator Crystal Yao

 

Dr. Crystal Yao studied at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (MA Art History) and Department of Chinese of Sun Yat-sen University (PhD Modern Literature). She now lives in Beijing and works as an independent scholar and curator. She focuses on History of Material Culture and Media Studies, tends to work with artists from different intellectual backgrounds, and looks forward to fostering a new sensual experience that connects and creatively transforms classical and early modern Chinese cultural resources in a global context.

HDM GALLERY - BEIJING

798 East Road, 798 Art District, No.2 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Zhao Yinou @ HdM Gallery, Beijing - "Ghost Raising" Exhibition

Zhao Yinou: Ghost Raising

HdM Gallery, Beijing

Through 28 June 2025

ZHAO YINOU

2024-25.3, 150 × 220 cm, 2024-2025

© Zhao Yinou, courtesy HdM Gallery

ZHAO YINOU

2025.4, 150 × 220 cm, 2025 

© Zhao Yinou, courtesy HdM Gallery

ZHAO YINOU

2025.10, 50 × 35 cm, 2025

© Zhao Yinou, courtesy HdM Gallery

ZHAO YINOU

2020-25.14, 150 × 220 cm, 2020-2025

© Zhao Yinou, courtesy HdM Gallery

HdM Gallery presents “Ghost Raising”, the latest solo exhibition of Zhao Yinou. This is Zhao Yinou’s third solo exhibition at HdM Gallery after “On the Wings of A Swan” in 2022. The exhibition features over 30 works on canvas and wood, alongside the artist’s first experimental integration of sound installations within painting. Zhao’s recent practice delves into meditations on eternity, transforming diffuse collective memories of our era-viewed through the microscopic lens of individual experience-into layered spatiotemporal structures. 

Light

Light is the universe’s primal language—formless yet shaping all visible forms. In Zhao Yinou’s oeuvre, light manifests itself as a spiritual presence: the sacred light, the arbitrary light, the stalemate light, and the repressed light appear repeatedly in different densities and in different stages of her creation, forming multiple echoes between the artist her spatiotemporal self. In her new artworks, light appears in every infinite texture and space radiated by herself, becoming a link connecting countless parallel spaces: on ice, sea, trees, mountains, and grasslands, resembles a fleeting blink of cosmic radiance.

 

Dust

The traces after "burning" are not only the suspension of material particles in the layers of paint, but also the poetic interval between the artist's memory and the present. Zhao Yinou's creation does not rely on linear narrative. She restrains and selects emotions and memories in a cross-dimensional perspective. Time is distorted into any frame that can be extracted in the physical dimension, and transformed into repeated brushstrokes and spray-painted textures on the canvas. Layered surfaces do not merely obscure but capture emotional variables through accumulated dust, extrapolating potential parallel worlds. The delayed emotional catharsis and stratified “dust” forge an intangible distance between artwork and viewer, immersing audiences in a heterogeneous field of overlapping time and space—a realm both visual and psychic.

 

Breath

The sound installation incorporated into this exhibition leads the audience into the artist's sealed field with a flowing energy that can be perceived in multiple dimensions. The low hum on the back of each artwork once again forms a kind of unspeakable "interval" with the audience. The "breath" of hearing drives the "breath" of vision. Between one breath and another, time is like a lie, the future collapses into the past, and the past flows towards the end.

 

Reignition

The brevity inherent in the  existence of human beings in the universe is heavy and depressing; in this unburned box, Zhao Yinou uses almost always monochrome paint to visualize abstract emotions into an existence that jumps out of time and space, in the rational laws of physics, she uses a silent declaration to outline a love letter, which is eternally entangled in the vast smoke.

 

ZHAO YINOU was born in 1972 and currently lives and works in Paris. She was  the producer of documentaries “À l'ouest des rails” and “He Fengming”. Recent group and solo exhibitions include: “Being of Evils”, Hive Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China (2020); “Psychicalreality”, Space Station, Beijing, China (2019); “Prisonnier”, Vanities, Paris, French (2019); “HAPPY PEOPLE......”, Inside-out Art Museum, Beijing, China (2019); “HER KIND•CHUANG”, Zhuzhong Art Museum, Beijing, China (2018); “The Pleasures of Adventures”, N3 gallery, Beijing, China (2016); “OPEN TO YOU”, Pusan, Korea (2014) and etc. 

HdM GALLERY

798 East Road, 798 Art District, No.2 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Zhao Yinou: Ghost Raising

HdM Gallery, Beijing, 17 May - 28 June 2025

Ceramist Alain Vernis @ HdM Gallery, Beijing - "Black" Exhibition

Alain Vernis | Black 

HdM Gallery, Beijing

9 April - 10 May 2025

HdM Gallery and Luohan Tang present Black, a solo exhibition by artist ALAIN VERNIS. The exhibition features over a dozen ceramic bowls, focusing on the artist’s exploration and enlightement of ceramics over the years.

Alain Vernis: The charm of simplicity

Alain Vernis's works are mainly pottery bowls. Since he set up his studio in the Haut-Morvan in 1985, he has started to make pottery with local clay. Alain Vernis didn’t learn from a master, he relied on his own exploration from kiln construction to firing. The primitive pit that he used then caused all of the pieces, shaped over ten years, to explode. He had no choice but to give up pit firing and build a new kiln. After years of adjustments, he came to discover the effects of diverse combinations of clay, water, duration of firing, type of wood. Black was once used by Taoism to discribe the invisible and intangible universe, “Darkness within darkness, the gateway to all understanding. ”  Darkness presents color and also the profoundness of Taoism. Alain Vernis uses black extensively in his works, shaping through “renouncement” and firing with “naturalness” . The combination of shape and glaze color explains the charm of simplicity.

 

Alain Vernis: Deep connection with Raku-yaki technique

The famous Raku-yaki technique of the Momoyama period in Japan in the 16th century is characterized by simplicity and naturalness. The seemingly "imperfect" works break the traditional aesthetic system of symmetry and glaze perfection, which is similar to Alain Vernis's works. Starting with a handful of clay, Alain focuses his perception on his hands and slowly kneads the bowl into shape, combining the beauty of form with the beauty of spirit. The surface of the bowl is either smooth or rough, with the glaze color bolding, and even natural flow appears. However, it was not until the 15th generation of Raku-yaki master invited him to Japan that he realized that he had such a deep connection with those masters of several centuries ago.

 

Alain Vernis was born in Sens, France in 1946 and currently lives and works in Morvan. His works have been exhibited in art institutions such as the Biracte Archaeological Museum in Burgundy, Guardian Art Center in China and Musée d‘art Moderne, Musée national de la Céramique, Musée de Bibracte, Musée Asrien Dubouché, Musée Bernard Palissy, Musée de Sarreguemines, Musée Joseph Séchelette in France.

HdM GALLERY

798 East Road, 798 Art District, No.2 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Fan Jing @ HdM Gallery, Beijing - "As You Like It" Exhibition

Fan Jing - As You Like It

HdM Gallery, Beijing

23 September - 28 October 2023

The name of the exhibition is taken from Shakespeare's classic comedy "As You Like It", but the artist did not write a fairy tale with a perfect ending like the play. On the contrary, in the whole exhibition, she created countless stories that happened after the "happy ending" viewed through one "closed" space after another, each of them appropriating classic stories in traditional stage plays and classical paintings. Besides the story itself, we can't ignore the artist's solid painting foundation and tribute to classical painting. The relationship among the picture’s structure, the picture expression and the title of the work forms a stable combination, which makes the artist form his own "trinity" when facing a new kind of figurative painting.

 

The strong contrast between light and shade in the picture has not only become a way to interpret Fan Jing's recent works but also helped the works to deepen their symbolic meaning, creating a very tense dramatic atmosphere and a strong emotional tension. The picture structure is crossed by "marked diagonal lines" that seem to be dynamic, but which in fact lend the pictures a balance and a quivering stability. The highly participative and dramatic composition arrangement not only constitutes a closed and stable space but also enhances the evocative power of the characters. Subtle tone changes also highlight very subtle texture differences between objects; an "image" with a sense of volume appears in the rigorous framework in the center of the stage as a combination filled with antagonism, giving a dramatic interpretation of a busy life full of spiritualism. In “Happy Ending”, a fuzzy space and soft light fill the whole picture, and the boundary between light and shadow becomes blurred until both blend. The wrestling fairies in “The Battle of the Fairies” are in the center of the whole drama, and they are also the focus of the picture. The chiaroscuro method makes the audience as close as possible to the space where the event takes place, and the reduction of apparent horizon strengthens this sense of participation again, making people immerse themselves in the image. However, in “Young Hero”, the characters are suddenly focused by light rising from a dark background, suggesting that a fierce drama has just ended and this naturally forms a set of intertextualities with “The Battle of the Fairies”. In “Death of the Swan” and “The Battle of the Fairies”, a very real sense of strength emerges from the tight and elastic muscles of the characters, and this tension is not only reflected in their bodies but also in their emotions. In “Death of the Swan”, a harsh light is shined from the top down, and the diagonal line from top to bottom cuts through the initially calm picture, which reminds people of the secret visual experience brought by “The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa”. The plump and round body with the strong light source directly caters to most men's imagination and stereotype of the female image, and the ballerina performs within narrow confines and in an atmosphere of passive submission, which is full of aggression and provocation. The expression of "aggression" of the body also appears in works such as “Appropriate Education”, “Young Hero”, “Group Exercise”, “Psalm”, “Housewife”, etc. Women's bodies are no longer soft, and the inverted clothing structure also loses the proper function of clothing. The hard chest and the human body distorted by strenuous exercise make different social roles (female students, ballerinas, maids, and housewives) in the picture have a profound and implicit relationship between art and human identity. This misplaced identity image also implies a tangled relationship between visual control and power structure. In this exhibition, Fan Jing's works combine dramatic plots with her exploration of fiction and fantasy, which is full of infinite possibilities for interpretation.

 

FAN JING, born in Beijing in 1983, graduated from the Oil Painting Department of the Academy of Fine Arts of Capital Normal University. She studied under Duan Jianwei and now lives and works in Beijing. Fan Jing's works often focus on depicting characters, and her works always focus on the confrontation, conflict, and balance between "force" and "tension" in terms of picture content and picture form. Her works have been exhibited in Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Paris, Singapore, and other places, and have been collected by important private collectors and foundations.

HDM GALLERY - BEIJING

798 East Road, 798 Art District, No.2 Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Updated Post 05.10.2025

Alexander Tinei Exhibition @ HdM Gallery, Beijing

Alexander Tinei 

HdM Gallery, Beijing 

8 April - 13 May 2023 

Alexander Tinei (born in 1967 in Caushani, Moldova) lives and works in Budapest, Hungary. He studied at Chisinau Repin State Collage of fine arts, Moldova between 1988- 1991. Alexander Tinei's art is that of an interested painter concerned with his subjects. A true figurehead of his movement "New Figurative Painting", he has established himself in Europe as a painter with a rich technique. Until 2013 his work is characterized by a dark atmosphere, where oil on canvas is combined with collages to deconstruct his characters and landscapes.

 

Today when color emerges, the disconcerting energy of Alexander Tinei's works remains untouched. His popular sources of inspiration: newspapers, magazines, photographs are mixed with his own melancholic memories, his friendships, and what he sees. An adorer of Lucas Cranach's Mannerist painting, Alexander Tinei works to perpetuate the interest of his elders in the atmosphere that a body can suggest, the aura of a person on its environment.

 

The most recent works are particularly interested in the boundary between the internet and privacy, the way in which images are treated by their frames very differently. In each of the works, the bodies fade, become morcelled, to the point where the individual lives only as a spectre or disembodied image of himself. Only faces remain visible, bluish veins that run through his work.

 

Through this process of social study, of deconstruction of the body, Alexander Tinei dives back into his own childhood under the Soviet era where the individual in the mass disappears and where fiction and its discourse intrude into reality. Solo exhibitions were staged at Erika Deak Galeria Budapest and Dukan Gallery Paris. Besides, his works were included in group shows at Budapest Gallery, Hungarian National Gallery and DSC Gallery Prague.

HdM GALLERY

798 Art District, No.4 Jiuxianqiao Lu, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Ye Linghan @ Donjon de Vez, France - From Disappearance to Disappearance

Ye Linghan

From Disappearance to Disappearance

Donjon de Vez, Vez, France

17 - 24 October 2022

The video work "Disappearance", "A Part in Narrative Film - 3", serves as an introduction to the exhibition, which allows us to see Ye Linghan's creation in different periods. "LUCY" means a new beginning. "LUCY" is the artist's most representative project, including a series of paintings that use Internet images as life objects. The works brought by this exhibition show a very different appearance, which is a kind of iteration and evolution. The artist sees them as important transformational works, a renewed visual language, a foreshadowing of the artist's future creations.

 

In his explicatory text, Serge Lemoine draws an enlightening parallel between the “Combine Paintings” of Robert Rauschenberg, which freely mixed collage, assemblage, use of composite materials, with Ye Linghan’s own creative process, during which he uses a computer to construct the different elements of his works, rearranges them until he is satisfied with the result, and then transposes them back manually to the canvas. Lemoine also likens Ye Linghan’s Lucy paintings to the Dada movement and to the works of George Grosz, who used a multitude of pen and ink lines together with cut-out images to depict the port of Hamburg.

 

Born in 1985 in Lishui, Zhejiang Province, Ye Linghan now lives and works in Shanghai. He has been widely exhibited at galleries and institutions including at How Art Museum, Shanghai, X Museum Triennial, Beijing, PowerLong Museum, Shanghai, chiK11 Art Museum, Shanghai, Yuan Art Museum, Beijing and Australian Cinematheque, Melbourne.

DONJON DE VEZ

3 bis rue de la Croix Rebours, 60117 Vez

www.donjondevez.com

HdM GALLERY

798 Art District, No.4 Jiuxianqiao Lu, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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Isshaq Ismail @ HdM Gallery, Beijing - Allure

Isshaq Ismail: Allure

HdM Gallery, Beijing

20 September - 11 October 2022

Born in 1989 in Accra, Ghana, where he still lives and works, Isshaq Ismail is one of the most original figurative artists to have emerged from the African continent. Describing his portraits as “infantile semi-abstraction”, Ismail’s artistic practice tries to reduce the human figure to its most basic characteristics. He uses thick patches of bold colors dominating the surface of the canvas to give the impression of larger-than-life beings that are endowed with an almost three-dimensional aspect. Painted in red, purple, black or maroon, they question the audience’s expectation of figurative depiction and instead create the impression of a parallel world peopled with grotesque creatures both similar to human beings but different in appearance. 

Isshaq Ismail’s influences are many and varied. The legacy of modern art and its deconstruction of the human figure obviously comes to mind, as are the menacing features of African ritual masks. Finally, the Western tradition of silhouette portraits and caricature also looms large when one attempts to interpret Ismail’s figures. Isshaq Ismail has declared in the past that he is “interested in breaking the mould of painting by subverting and interrogating the preconceived notion of the idea of beauty within the canon of painting, and challenging the perception of aesthetics”.

 

A graduate from the Ghanatta College of Art and Design (Accra, Ghana), Isshaq Ismail has already been widely exhibited. Besides a solo show at Nicholas Roman Fine Art, New York, he has participated in group shows at Christies New York, Ross-Sutton Gallery, Choose Gallery (Stuttgart, Germany), Ghana’s National Museum and Absa Gallery (Johannesburg, South Africa).

HdM GALLERY

798 Art District, No.4 Jiuxianqiao Lu, Chaoyang District, 100015 Beijing

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