Wen Zhongyan: Wandering the City, Waking from a Dream

Wen Zhongyan's first solo exhibition in North America will feature a series of seven works on paper and two paintings that depict the city of Beijing through what was lost, what remains, and what has changed. WEN combines multiple layers of imagery in an intuitive screen printing process that evokes a feeling of nostalgia but also embracing the city that was and is – on a personal level to the artist, and on a collective cultural scale as well. Ancient landmark structures throughout Beijing bear witness to its long history over the course of several dynasties. Alongside these fragments, the constantly evolving contemporary cityscape reflects the decades of demolition and development that have occurred since the mid-1960s, when the city wall and significant parts inside the city wall were demolished. Thus, Beijing stands as a unique case study for rapid change and the sense of loss that follows in its wake, as the city underwent many iterations of deconstruction and reconstruction both before and during WEN’s time there. The distinctive architecture of the city, as illuminated beneath the strong artificial lights of the night, forms the background for WEN’s screen-printed circuit board diagrams and illustrated map. WEN Zhongyan: 游观 Wandering in the City, Waking from a Dream will introduce the artist’s poignant work to the Silicon Valley community, a place with deep ties to the complicated narrative of technological advancement and change explored in the exhibition. History, as recorded in the built environment and experienced in the fabric of urban life, is equally central to WEN’s body of work. Audiences are invited to connect with WEN’s unconventional scrapbook of Beijing and to consider the dense networks that underlie their perceptions of place.