Shiwen Wang
Born 1995 in Shanghai, China. Lives and works in London
Shiwen Wang's work concerns language, particularly the limits of its representation and the vagueness of verbal expression. These linguistic liminal spaces are explored in her ambiguous narratives by fleshing out the tension, between hiding and revealing.
Wang is interested in engaging the viewer in a pursuit for hidden meanings and aspires to inspire them into a semantic game of hide-and-seek, to be played merely for its own sake. The artist gathers together an assortment of visual fragments - from language, ritual elements, nature, and digital culture - to create pictorial collages that speak to both the many excesses of contemporary life and our tireless attempts to process them.
From East to West, from the digital world to the material world the artist clashes with, merges in, sometimes reinforcing, sometimes diminishing, sometimes augmenting, sometimes fragmenting, and sometimes being destroyed by her surroundings.
Shiwen Wang obtained an MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art in 2021, a Bachelor of Fine Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2019 and a Bachelor in Art and Technology from the Shanghai Institute of Visual Art in 2017.
Recent solo and group exhibitions include: Things That Were About to be Lost, RuptureXIBIT, London (2021); Art for Artists, ArtSect Gallery, London (2021); The Intermission, Issuing Gallery, Shenzhen, China (2020); After Intermission: Where Are We Heading?, New Century Global Center, Sichuan, China (2020); ASYAAF: Hidden Artists Festival, Hongik Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea (2020); On the White Wall: 20 Litres Interior and Exterior Stable Wall Paint, Millennium Gallery, London (2020).
