ABSTRACT
Visitors entering The Dark Matters exhibition at Sydney’s White Rabbit Gallery (2017) passed under a menacing, twisting, oily cloud lowering down ominously overhead. The malignant fusion of storm cloud and carbon smog of Lin Yan’s Sky 2 critiqued urban pollution, loss of tradition, destruction of nature and relentless industrial development in Beijing (White Rabbit, 2016). Other works explored the anxieties of urban crises, melancholic themes of social and spiritual displacement, alienation or the sheer futility of relentless work and social conformity. They moved viewers emotionally, viscerally, intellectually, to appreciate the arts of China in new, discomforting ways.
