Having been buzzed in to an imposing Georgian townhouse in the heart of Mayfair, London, and ascended an ornate staircase to a magnificent door, I find myself entering a light-filled room, with full-length french windows to the balcony opposite me; an enormous mirror, reaching up to the firmament, on my immediate right; an opulent chandelier; creaking floorboards and an archway to the adjoining room, which has an open fireplace and mantelpiece. The spearmint-coloured walls provide a soft backdrop for a near-wall-sized triptych, hung so closely that the joins are seamless and the swirls and strokes, painted from a rainbow palette, cascade from one canvas to the next, creating the illusion of a fresco. More than that, even, because the mirrors and glass reflect this riot of colour, and my presence in among it, so that I feel I am standing in the eye of the cyclone. I am winded, hit hard by the energy and vim of the kaleidoscopic eddies. Looking at the reflections, I only ever see one part of the paintings at a time; they are fractured as they are refracted.

At first glance, these gestural scribbles could be the work of Cy Twombly, but, in fact, they hail from the hand of Xiyao Wang (b1992, Chongqing, China), who describes the scrawls as “extensions of my body, of my limbs”. Indeed, my heady sense of spinning could be the result of a zealous dance partner twirling me in and out and round and round in endless pirouettes. Inspired not just by her western present, but by her eastern heritage, aspects of Taoism and associated martial arts practices also come to mind. The graphic lines interact, colliding in busy passages where the paint is stippled and several layers deep, and dispersing to the peripheries, larger, looser, fading to shades of pink and grey, mere traces of the transitory presence which fleetingly passed by. Yang versus ying. Qigong versus neigong. Movement, flux, impermanence – a condensation of life.

Η συνέχεια εδώ.