About “Mon Visage”
1 From a plant to a sheet of paper, there exist many intermediate states. These states are not only the varying habitats, contexts, life timelines, and growth forms of the plant itself but also the processes, actions, and interactions—both connections and disconnections—with other objects and humans in the journey from one to the other. Intermediate states not only point toward purpose and will but also bear within themselves a potential energy and tension tending toward dispersion. They imply trance, pause, derailment, disorder, and abandonment: that is to say, (for example) after the pulp is lifted, it may be spread evenly and dried to become a sheet of paper with a warm hue; or it may be sorted, balled up, piled, molded, stretched, twisted, and reshaped, becoming the imprint of another set of actions... "From You to Me," “Mon Visage," "Provisional Structure," and other related works presented in Han Qian's solo exhibition are precisely based on such open structures that inhabit transitional relationships—for instance, between the plant Daphne feddei and Tengchong rice paper.
2 Empathy, transference, projection—all are present, but more crucially, art occurs in the moment when the artist transcendentally grasps her own experience. Whether something is grasped or not, the body stands on tiptoe in this full-force action, arms outstretched, stretching or clenching all sensory powers. And this leap, upward or downward, is the very secret that enables some, like Han Qian, to transform encountered objects into spiritual mediums or intermediaries—when we prepare to engage in even the slightest communication with what we call plants, animals, wind, or other named entities, the first and necessary step is to acknowledge that they are actually nameless, unutterable, yet fully present. Thus, the interlocutor becomes the medium through which discourse itself arrives: sometimes, this is how we begin to converse, with something called Broussonetia papyrifera but referred to as Daphne feddei. And it, in our dialogue, tangles, reveals, and releases fibers.
3 What cannot be forgotten but is often overlooked is our origin, our past, and our present whereabouts. This seems to be Han Qian’s deep concern as well. She walked twenty-eight kilometers, a day’s distance, two lifetimes in one, from her grandmother to herself—drawing near yet growing distant, passive then active, departing or returning, tending toward an end or cycling anew. "Humans degrade the inexpressible by trying to express it" (Simone Weil)—thus, walking in silence is an act of remembrance.
4 Time, memory, and the body—their twists and turns, unions and separations within one another—have always captivated Han Qian’s spirit and nourished her with bitter yet fragrant sustenance. The journey that began long ago with Veronica persica now winds upward, turning twists into straight paths, driving Han Qian to continue intending and unfolding movements toward her works amid the endless friction and delay between elements and the whole.
5 So, what is “Mon Visage”? Levinas says the face (Le Visage) is not an external marker for viewing or identification; it is "a site and moment of ethical encounter and occurrence," and almost the only serious one, because at the face, we are exposed to one another. But what about here? Is it the same?
6 Moreover, in an era of beauty filters where faces exist only to be recognized by facial recognition, what is “Mon Visage”? Ubiquitous surveillance and facial recognition constantly enhance and impose human sociality at the visible level, restraining, guiding, disciplining, and coercing everyone’s behavior, even their subconscious. Simultaneously, each person becomes a terminal device in this system, part of a technological process where we incessantly scan, recognize, and upload data about one another. —Is it here that Levinas’s ontological "face"—as an ethical encounter and generative moment with the Other—is doomed to be fully exposed and completely erased? Is no one allowed anymore to retain the path and ability to reach others directly, without passing through data hubs or central processors?
7 Yet, to plan an exhibition is to believe so deeply: my, your, our bodies and minds will still meet in yet another movement toward the work. And we firmly believe that encounter is important, so important that in its absence, we yearn, wait, and even strive to create it.
Text by Wang Paopao
Han Qian ( b. 1993, Wuhan, China) obtained a Bachelor's degree in Art Printmaking from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma in 2016, and a dual Master's degree in Fine Arts from the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 2021. She currently lives and works between Wuhan and Kunming. Han Qian’s practice spans video, installation, performance, and printmaking. Her long-term focus has been on themes of time, memory, and the objects and historical traces associated with them. By exploring and shaping hidden clues and fragile materials, she seeks to connect her family history with broader notions of space and collective memory. Her work reflects the shifting individual experiences shaped by transformations in geography, politics, and the interaction of natural and historical forces. In recent years, her projects have centered on personal family narratives and industrial migration, investigating the movements and settlements of multiple generations. Through this lens, she reimagines and reinterprets constantly evolving landscapes, identity politics, and geopolitical dynamics.