Silk Road Traveler, Lethe’s Wanderer —Manuel Mathieu’s World-Building Painting Comes to China

Longlati Foundation is honored to present “Silk Road Traveler, Lethe’s Wanderer”, the solo exhibition of Manuel Mathieu (b.1986, Port-Au-Prince, Haiti) curated by Chinese artist Pu Yingwei, which marks the launch of Longlati Curatorial Exchange Program, a pioneering gesture of the foundation to demonstrate “exhibition as form” when artists are playing the role of curator.

WRITERS’ ACQUISITION COMMITTEE (SHANGHAI)

Initiated in September 2021, Longlati Writers’ Acquisition Committee, Shanghai, is formed by four Shanghai-based writers, Jenny Chen, Zian Chen, Suchao Li, Evonne Jiawei Yuan, who are actively involved in the local art scene. It aims to promote the intellectual exchange between writers and emerging artists. They will organize monthly visits to gallery and museum exhibitions in Shanghai, conduct research into the works and develop acquisition proposals. Each of them will nominate artists and evaluate each other’s opinions, then make votes to make new additions to the Collection of Longlati Foundation every month.

Longlati Foundation | Building Dwelling Thinking: April Diary for Shanghai

Shanghai experienced a sudden upheaval in the past April, with the unexpected citywide lockdown seemingly becoming the new normal. The entire city found itself reluctantly trapped in uncertainty.

Four members of the Collecting Committee at the Longlati Foundation, Chen Jiaying, Chen Xi’an, Li Suchao, and Yuan Jiawei, initiated this sharing session to discuss their respective work interfaces and lifestyles during the closed-loop management process. They aimed to rethink their relationship with the space they occupy and explore the extension of self within it.
This sharing session also invited representatives from galleries collaborating with the Longlati Foundation in Shanghai, including Cai Junjun, Francois Ho, Wang Ruolin, Zhou Bingxin, and Zhang Zheyuan, to join in the dialogue.

News | Longlati Foundation’s Writers’ Acquistion Committe(Shanghai) 2021.9 Collection

In September 2021, during the process of visiting new exhibitions at galleries and institutions, four members of the Longlati Writers’ Acquisition Committee (Shanghai) noticed two female artists born in the 1990s: Zhang Yibei (born in Daqing, Heilongjiang, in 1992) and Liao Wen (born in Chengdu, Sichuan, in 1994). Focusing on sculpture creation and the development of its language, they each employ conceptual or material-driven visual methodologies in their practices. However, they also incorporate elements of corporeality that exist between performance and action within the expanded field of sculpture, thereby forming an open strategy of media interchange. Based on the selection and resolution by the Longlati Writers’ Collection Committee (Shanghai), the Longlati Foundation gladly announces the acquisition of Zhang Yibei’s work “At the pinnacle of despair” (2021) and Liao Wen’s work “The Garden of Adonis” (2021).

News | Sydney Shen “Puritan Salvage Demolition Co. pencil” —— Writers’ Acquisition Committee(Shanghai) 2021 Collection

Sydney Shen (born in 1989 in New Jersey, currently based in New York) is a Chinese-American female artist who has garnered attention from the members of the Longlati Foundation’s Writers’ Acquisition Committee (Shanghai), including Chen Jiaying, Chen Xi’an, Li Suchao, and Yuan Jiawei, in their respective research practices. In her debut exhibition in Shanghai titled “Misery Whip,” presented at Gallery Vacancy in early 2021, Shen combines sculpture, installations, and immersive environments that blend human corporeal history, medical history, archaeological found objects, contemporary symbols, and science fiction narratives. These works create a mirrored reality of the real world, reflecting the tension and intricate texture of constructive practices. In her subsequent solo project titled “Cupio Dissolvi” at Liste Art Fair Basel, the artist further explores one of her signature visual languages. By magnifying and scaling ordinary everyday objects to the point of alienation and weaponization, Shen reflects on internal conflicts, divisions, and renewal within oneself.